Fantasy and Science Fiction

There's always been absent-minded professors, twisted geniuses, wild virtuosos, call them what you will. Einstein showing up for big prestigious lectures wearing odd socks. Every musical genius who ever trashed their lives with stupidity, from Paganini and Mozart to Whitney Houston. Those with an abundance of intelligence and creativity, but dysfunctional personalities. On their own they are usually unreliable and inconsistent, they don't take care of their responsibilities very well, they work like maniacs when inspired by a project but lapse into inactivity when discouragement sets in.

They are never successful unless they do one of two things; they must either join a structured group or team like the military or something like that, or they must gain the assistance of someone more stable and grounded to help keep them on track and on schedule, be it a spouse, an assistant, a secretary, or a partner.

To some extent, I am one of them. I'm doing okay, my books are selling, but I'm definitely not fulfilling my potential.

I worked for five years to have a wife, but it didn't work out.

So now I'm going to hire someone to help me. Someone who is reliable, consistent, versatile, capable of doing basic computer work and using MS Office, upbeat, and a positive motivator who can keep me on schedule. Someone to remind me to stop working when I've been at it for sixteen hours, and to motivate me to get going on time when I don't. Initially we'll work on publishing and marketing.

If this works out we'll build an international publishing, music, and manufacturing enterprise that will make us rich and allow us to help a lot of people while solving some major problems.

If it doesn't work out it's a temporary position that'll last until my money runs out. Compensation is negotiable.

I'd prefer to hire someone who is presently living in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, where I'm living now. But I'd be willing to work with someone remotely via internet and telephone if I found an outstanding candidate. I plan on moving to the Philippines in the fall, for at least six months, and it would be handy if I hired someone who wanted to join me in that. Ideally, I'd like to have a completely mobile business that I can attend to over the internet while travelling the world at whim.

If you're interested in the position you can contact me at wayne_clarke84@yahoo.ca or leave a message on my Facebook page.

If you know someone else who may be interested in the position, please let them know about it.

Thanks.

The other day a publishing company made me an offer. I didn't like it so I sent them a counter-offer. Now I've been waiting around on tenderhooks for days. Hopefully they'll get back to me soon.

After I finished writing and publishing The Fire And The Storm, I planned on starting a big marketing effort. But I decided that I would first re-edit all four books, and re-write People Of The Tiger to broaden it's appeal. I've become a better editor since I last worked on People and Hunters, and I used a lot from the reviews, tips and suggestions I got from readers. I thank all of them, especially Soronel who is visually impaired and listens to my books with a text-to-speech converter. He catches things no one else noticed.

In a process that began two days ago and will finish in a couple of weeks, the 2012 revisions are being posted to all the sites where my books are sold, starting with Smashwords.com, then my site, then Amazon, then everywhere else.

I've also changed my pricing policy. People Of The Tiger will no longer be available for free, and will be priced at 99 cents. Blessings Of A Curse will be available for free, for a limited time. The 2nd book in both series will be priced at $5.99.

Metric Editions of Blessings Of A Curse 2012 and The Fire And The Storm are available now on Smashwords.

My new releases aren't available here on my own website yet, because I'll be rebuilding this site today first.  It should be finished by tonight.

The new releases won't be available at the major retailers (Amazon, B&N, Apple, Chapters, etc.) for another one to four weeks. The delay is due to a manual inspection process they have for new releases, that I didn't know about before now.

It took a while to track down the new email addresses of some of those who bought the Limited Pre-Release Edition of The Fire And The Storm Part One, but I finally did, and I've sent the complete book to all of them.  If you bought Part One and you haven't received the complete book recently, just let me know and I'll make sure you get it ASAP.

After a more than a year and a half, I'm finally finished the draft of my new book; The Fire And The Storm! And as you can see, I have original cover art for the first time, produced to my design by Dana Robinson! Now I just have to do editing and final production, and it'll be released in the next two or three weeks, barring any unexpected eventualities.

Then of course there's a ton of publishing and marketing work to do, and I'll be getting started on Book Three of The Rational Future Series!

When I wrote People of The Tiger and Blessings of a Curse, I wrote them purely for my own enjoyment.  I write only when I felt like it, setting it aside when I didn't, sometimes for months at a time.  I was constantly re-writing as often as I was adding new material, just playing with the storylines until I thought it was cool.  Both books took years.
When I wrote Hunters In The Sky I was determined to be professional about it; just sit down and write the damn book, pre-plan the storyline, be disciplined enough to produce professional work from the beginning that requires very little editing, keep going until it's finished.  I completed a 285,000 word novel in four months while working a strenuous full-time job.  I took two months to publish and publicize with equal dedication, then I planned to do it all again with the next book.
Now I'm amazed at that.  I've been working on The Fire And The Storm for over a year, mostly making steady progress, but I just can't sustain the dedication to write in every spare minute and neglect everything else in my life while I do so.  I thought I could, and I feel bad that I publicly said I would.  I think that once I achieve enough success  to write full-time I'll be able to arrange my life well enough to produce a big novel about every eight months at best.  This year I lost my wife to divorce and my best friend to suicide, and a lot of my family have had equally serious problems.  Under my present conditions I'm four-fifths finished The Fire And The Storm, but my production has been improving lately.

To everyone who's given me encouragement and help, thank you so very much.  It's made a big difference.

For most of the last two months I've been completely down on energy.  It's taken all my willpower just to do my day job and my housework, and I couldn't seem to make myself get anything done on my own projects after work or on weekends.  I chalked it up to my recent failed marriage and having taken on too many projects at once, and tried not to get too down on myself about it.

But I recently found out that I've had a growing infection for a while, and now that's it's well on its way to being cured, I'm getting my energy back.

I'm finishing The Fire And The Storm first, because I owe it to those who bought Part One, and I'm making steady progress, though I still hesitate to speculate on a completion date.

The Limited Pre-Release Edition of Part One of The Fire And The Storm - Book Two of The Nexus Of Kellaran Series is no longer available.  Thanks to everyone who bought it.  I'll have the complete edition out as soon as possible, and everyone who bought the limited edition of part 1 will get the complete edition in the same format as an attachment to an email, which I'll be sending to the same email addresses you submitted when you bought part one.

Thanks as well for all the supportive messages I've gotten about my recent tribulations, they've meant a lot.