The long awaited third book in my Dark Tyrant Series is finally live! It took me way longer than I anticipated to finish this book. I had to battle through busy life getting in the way, burnout, writers block, and just about everything under the sun. However, it's done. It's ready. It's here! Get your copy today.

Thulisile Mahlangu is the captain of an elite team of paramilitary soldiers trained to deal with large-scale supernatural crises. But when an Alpha Protocol is radioed in from an agent who was reportedly dead, Thuli and her team are put to the test. Their mission: verify the radio call, exterminate the problem, and bring the agent back to the Bureau of Investigation, Observation, and Defense of Extraordinary, Extraterrestrial, Demonic and Paranormal Activity. As time runs out, Thuli begins to question everything and wrestle with her own inner demons. If she doesn’t succeed, the Bureau will release an Omega team, and the Omegas have no problem scorching the earth to fix problems. Alpha Protocol is a fast-paced tale that is one part action thriller, one part supernatural horror, and a dash of dark comedy. ​

I finally finished drafting Alpha Protocol, and I have to say, thank the gods! It's with the editor and a couple beta readers at the moment, but we're on track for a February release. However, once I finished and could release my brain from scramble and write mode, I started daydreaming. What if I had the ability to pick the cast for the hypothetical movie version of Alpha Protocol? Any else ever do that with their books? Anyway, here's who I chose for the main characters:

Captain Thulisile. Lupita Nyong'o. Thuli is the leader of the Alpha Team and has supernatural powers, but she's fighting a shadowy spirit that wants her to give in to her dark urges.

I've seen Lupita Nyong'o in various films and she's awesome in everything she does. I think she could portray Thuli very well and bring a lot to the movie.

Following Thuli, we have everyone's favorite, Special Agent Doyle Johnson. He's appeared in the other two Dark Tyrant books. I needed someone who was older and could play both action and comedy well. I wracked my brain thinking about this for awhile, but then my wife said, Woody Harrelson. It was perfect!

Think of Special Agent Johnson as a Deadpool-esque character that is equal parts badass and insane. 

Next, we have the rest of the Alpha Team. Here we have Sergeant Fergus. A large man with ginger hair. He's quick to anger but takes care of his friends. I picked Kristofer Hivju, or as many of you know him, Tormund from Game of Thrones. 

For the team's sniper, we have Kenshin. He's quiet, funny, and is very into origami. I chose Hiroyuki Sanda. He always shines in everything he's ever been in.

For the team's medic, let me introduce Hanna. As a former Navy corpsman, she brings a lot to the table. I needed a strong actress to play her, so I chose Jessica Chastain. She's amazingly talented. 

Finishing up the team, we have Cheryl, a Crow woman who is also a demolitions expert. She's not one to trifle with so I needed an actress that could bring that kind of seriousness. I chose Native actress, Devery Jacobs.

Next, we have Frank and Holly Phister. They are siblings and lead the Phister & Phister Paranormal Research Squad, or PPRS. I needed another strong actress and someone who could play a funny sidekick. So I chose Brie Larson and Josh Gad.

There are more characters in the book, but these are the ones that get most of the spotlight. For those of you who have read my books, who would you cast for the role of Special Agent Johnson? 

So what's been going on with me lately? Where to begin? First off, I'm getting ready to retire from 20 years of military service. That alone has been eating up a lot of my time and energy. Who knew retiring was a full-time job? So many damn appointments, getting documentation and records in order, all that jazz. I've got so many plans for post-retirement, I'm pretty sure I won't have any extra time at this point. What are those plans you might ask? Well, for starters, I'm super excited to start my life as a stay-at-home dad and help raise my two kids. 

Second, I'll be writing full-time. That's right, full-time. I don't plan on going out to get a job anywhere (although raising kids is a full-time job, but I have the help of family). I will be carving out a portion of my day to dedicate to nothing but putting words on digital paper. At the moment I'm actively working on the third book of the Dark Tyrant Series, my grimdark/post-apocalyptic fantasy serial, the second Terrence book, and a couple of other secret projects. In the queue is a fantasy western serial, a horror short story for an upcoming anthology, a haunted house novella that takes place in three different timelines, a YA/horror series involving a high-school ghost hunting team that always seems to get involved with dark and scary entities (think Ghost Facers from Supernatural meets Scooby Do meets Lovecraftian horrors) and a choose-your-own-adventure style of horror books that involve gruesome deaths.

I finally made some headway with book three of the Dark Tyrant Series. My biggest hold-up was I didn't really know how it was going to end, so a lot my writing speed slowed to almost nothing because I was floundering. Well, I figured out where it's headed, so now we're making headway again. 

Moving on to another aspect of my life that I enjoy--hunting. This year I'll be retired when hunting season starts, which means I can be out in the wilderness longer, which means hopefully a better chance of harvesting something. Over the years, I've come to find being up in the mountains is my zen place. I love it. The sights, the smells, the connection to nature. It's amazing and magical for me. I'm taking my oldest daughter with me elk scouting this year and I can't wait. I'm tempering my expectations of what I'll be able to accomplish as far as distance and area covered since she's still pretty young, but the memories and experience that both she and I will gain will more than make up for it. 

Anyway, what are you up to these days?

I've decided to try something new. Instead of creating an anthology of my past short stories, I want to release them via Amazon Kindle as singles for a low price. I'll be subtitling all of them as Tales from the Storm because many of them tie into my world that I created for my Dark Tyrant series. Here's the first one, "Horishi Tom" which first appeared in Fictionvale magazine. 

The story is set in the Utah Territories in the late 1800's and follows Jeremiah Redford, a man whose family was brutally murdered. Vengeance didn't fill the void of his dead family, so he journeys through the wilds searching for a way to bring his family back from the dead. His quest brings him to the abandoned mining town of Angus, Utah where he finds more than he bargained for.

"Horishi Tom" is a classic tale of loss and being careful what you wish for...you might just find it.

Buy it here on Amazon for only .99 cents.

Stay tuned for more Tales from the Storm coming soon. 

From the author that brought you Consequence comes the next book in the Dark Tyrant Series.
 
Imprisoned since the creation of the world, an ancient cosmic being waits deep in the mountains near Canyon Shadows, Utah. He searches for the proper host in order to break free from his chains. That host draws near.
 
Sheriff Dan Blackwood is hiding a mysterious secret and even darker past. However, his deception could be the only thing that stands between the mountain and the world’s destruction.
 
Garrett Porter is an antiques dealer suffering from the recent loss of his wife and daughter. He travels to Canyon Shadows on the trail of a unique artifact but finds more than expected it the sleepy town.
 
Troy Grimes searches for answers regarding his father’s recent yet mysterious suicide. As his investigation brings him closer to Canyon Shadows, he begins to question what’s real and what’s not.
 
Templars, Anasazi, as well as Christian and Native American legends come together in this fast-paced novel of good, evil, and everything in-between.

​
It's alive! The next book of my Dark Tyrant Series hit the streets on the 13th of December. I've added purchase links below. 

Click here to purchase:
Amazon: http://amzn.to/2gC0wkd 
Barnes & Noble: ​http://bit.ly/2hxDY6h

​There are many different types of magic to be found in the world of the Dark Tyrant Series. While I don’t want to spoil the secret for all of them, I would like to explain a little bit about the magic featured prominently in my first book, Consequence. The protagonist, Tobias, finds himself caught in a supernatural storm that’s raging across the world. The storm awakens a latent magical potential that has always been with him, but he didn’t know he had. It’s a power that passes through familial bonds (i.e. father to son, or mother to daughter). Toby’s father has the power, and was already able to utilize it before the storm rolled through his area.
 
The magic they can utilize is a type of life magic because it’s based on life energy. A skilled user of this type of magic can pull the life force out of nearby living organisms to fuel their powers. While in the book Toby and his father only use this power for offensive magic (they create burning golden energy and walls of force), the magic can be used for so much more to include: healing, moving objects with a power similar to telekinesis, warping time and space to teleport, and even ripping open gateways to other dimensions. Yet, there is always a price for such actions, for nothing is free.
 
To use this type of magic, you have to have an ample supply of life energy. As seen in the book, Toby first pulls life from the plants around him when he’s in the forest. While he’s channeling energy, the flora around him wilts and dies. This connection to the life around him gives him a radar of sorts, and allows him to “feel” the things surrounding him. Users of this type of magic can also pull life from other beings other than plants. The danger of this, is that the power becomes addictive and changes the magician. They can become drunk off the energy and will always want more and more, and many undisciplined users of this life magic have succumbed to the desire and have had to be eliminated (yes there are organizations dedicated to keeping magic users in check). 

​Another risk of using this type of magic, is that if there are no sources of life around, the user can pull on his/her own life energy. It should be fairly obvious that this is an extreme and potentially deadly practice. If the user pulls too much of their own energy, they risk burning out. While scholars haven’t been able to figure exactly why, they theorize that the body overheats and reacts with the energy until it will literally explode. Let’s just say that the Tunguska event in Siberia wasn’t a meteor.
 
There have been other noted side-effects from overdrawing on one’s own energy reserve to include loss of memory, blackouts, migraines, hallucinations, hearing voices, and even bad indigestion. To get around this, users of life magic have developed ways of storing reserves. Some will store energy in trinkets for later use, while others will hold energy directly in their own bodies. Storing energy in their own bodies will only work for a temporary time, as it will dissipate within a day.
 
The use of magic of any sorts is dangerous in the world of the Dark Tyrant series, for harnessing such powers generally draws the attention of unwanted beings. In the case of Toby, he drew the attention of a powerful demon in the Utah wilderness. While magic can be a boon, there are always consequences.

Here's the cover for my newest novel, Canyon Shadows: A Novel in the Dark Tyrant Series. It's the second book in the series. 

So you've written a book, revised the living shit out of it, done the whole Beta Reader deal, and you're about to send it off to the publisher. But wait! What about the back cover blurb? Shouldn't be too hard right? It's only a couple hundred words explaining the meat and potatoes of your story.

I've done a back cover blurb before for, Consequence but must have blocked the stress of it from my mind. Because, OH MY EFFIN' LORD!!! Back cover blurb must be perfect. Back cover blurb must get what it wants. There is no Zuul, there is only back cover blurb!

You might be asking, hey, why is it so stressful? Well let me answer that question for you. You have to shorten your novel into a small chunk and convey the main idea of the story. Oh, and it will probably be the first thing any reader really reads of the book, so it has to be good enough to hook them. No pressure.

I went through about five iterations before finding one that didn't make me want to slam my head into my keyboard. I'm sure I could have kept going too, cutting, revising, rewording...but at some point you just have to say, nope! I'm done. 

Anyway, here's the version that made it to the publisher. Enjoy the back cover blurb for Canyon Shadows: A Novel in the Dark Tyrant Series.

From the author that brought you, Consequence comes the next book in the dark urban fantasy/horror line of The Dark Tyrant Series. Set just before the events, in Consequence, find out what caused the supernatural storm.
 
Imprisoned since the creation of the world, an ancient cosmic being waits deep in the mountain near Canyon Shadows, Utah. He waits deep in the mountain for the proper host in order to break free from his chains. That host draws near.

Sheriff Dan Blackwood is hiding a dark secret and an even darker past. However, his secret could be the only thing that stands between the mountain and the world’s destruction
.
Garrett Porter is an antiques dealer suffering from the recent loss of his wife and daughter. He travels to Canyon Shadows on the trail of a unique artifact but finds more than expected in the sleepy town.

Troy Grimes searches for answers regarding his father’s recent, yet mysterious suicide. His investigation brings him closer and closer to Canyon Shadows and his sanity begins to crack as he nears the mountain; however, he’s starting to like it.

Templars, Anasazi, as well as Christian and Native American legends, come together in this fast-paced novel of good, evil, and everything in-between. 
​

You’ve written book…awesome! Not many people can slog their way through the maze of words and creativity to finish such a project. You’ve even gotten it published! Great work and congratulations on that aspect, it was the next big step. Perhaps you’ve had friends or schooling/training on how to write and all that jazz, which is wonderful. I wrote a post about education you can check out here. However, one thing that I found lacking from all the schmoozing and schooling, was marketing and how to handle signings. I’m still trying to crack the nut on marketing and I’ll write up a post on it later once I figure it out. However, I think I have some insight on book signings or convention presence.

I recently had a book signing at a Barnes & Noble which was a first for me. I’ve attended other signings and book events and I think I had an epiphany at this one. Going into it, I knew it was going to be tough. In a short amount of time, I had to try and move X amount of books. In this case, it was 15 books in four hours. Why did I feel the need to move ALL the books? Well because since I’m working with a small press, and the books were marked as returnable, Barnes & Noble had the option to return any unsold books back to the publisher which would, in turn, end up costing the publisher money. So before I even left the house I had it in my mind that I was going to move as many books as possible, which brings me to my first guideline to success: confidence.

You need to be confident in your product. If you don’t believe in what you’ve written, it will show in how you interact with customers. Your book is good. You wrote it well. People will like it. You need to have your elevator pitch down pat so when people ask what the book is about you have a clear and concise answer for them. It’s important that you answer is short and to the point too, narrow your story down to a couple of sentences and use it. This also will show that you are confident in what you’ve done. When people asked me what my book was about, I said the following: It’s about a guy who’s hunting in the Utah wilderness with his friends when the demonic apocalypse happens and he’s trying to get back home to his family. Sure there’s a lot more happening, but that’s the main theme of the story.

The second guideline or rule I made for myself was to only sit when I was actually signing a book. I stood the entire time and was active. I think it made me more visible to people and kept me from getting distracted with my phone which goes right into my next guideline: don’t play on your phone when people are around. You need to be approachable and engaged and tinkering with your phone accomplishes none of those goals. Along the lines of being approachable, I decided to not cross my arms in front of my chest if I could help it. It's an aggressive and off-putting stance so I did everything else I could. Sometimes I would catch myself and have to actively unfold my arms.

The next guideline I made was to actively engage everyone who came near my table. I said hello, how are you doing, or tried to make small talk on anything I could think of. One person was wearing a Star Wars shirt so I asked them what their favorite Star Wars movie was and we talked about that for a minute. Another dude had an awesome beard so I complimented him on it. People like to talk about what they are into and like to be complimented, so it was a way to engage them in conversation and get them talking in the hopes that they would then want to ask me about my book. However, you have to be sincere. People will be able to see through an act, so be genuine and only engage in topics that you’re interested in.

I’m not an extroverted person by any means and I had to push outside my comfort zone to make this happen; however, I sold every book Barnes & Noble had ordered. The staff was very impressed with how aggressive and successful I was, stating that a lot of first-time authors only sell a couple copies because they’ll sit there at their table and wait for people to come to them. If you want to be successful, you need to almost slap people in the face with your book. A lot of times they don’t want to come to you because they are also shy or introverted, so it takes that extra nudge to start the conversation. However, the majority of my sales that day were because I got them talking and had a chance to pitch my novel. It was exhausting and by the end of the day I just wanted to curl up in a ball in a dark room, but it worked and I made a good enough impression that they wanted me to come back and do a launch party for my second book (coming in December). Now the real test will be to see if this works again because I have another book signing at a different Barnes & Noble next Saturday. #writerproblems

I thought I’d shake things up a bit and do an interview from one of the characters in my book, Consequence: A Novel in the Dark Tyrant Series. After some thought, I figured the best choice would be Special Agent Johnson. He seems to be a fan favorite, and I figured his answers would be the best.
 
The Special Edition of the book can be purchased either through Amazon or Barnes & Noble through the following links:
 
Amazon: http://amzn.to/1WjzsZr
Barnes & Noble: http://bit.ly/1Vixjwc
 
CRL: I’d like to welcome Mr. Johnson, and I’d also like to say thanks for taking the time to do this interview, I know you must be a busy man.
 
Special Agent, please and thank you. I didn’t go through all that training through the Bureau of Investigation, Observation and Defense of Extraordinary, Extraterrestrial, Demonic and Paranormal Activity, not to mention all the follow-on specializations at Miskatonic University just to be called mister.
 
CRL: Excuse me, Special Agent Johnson, can you tell us a little about yourself?
 
Of course, although it’s probably going to bore your readers. I grew up with a normal childhood, run of the mill kind of life really. My father was an angel and I never knew my mother. I’ve heard nice things about her though. The Bureau raised me, forging me into this raw-steel stud muffin before you. So yeah, nothing too special I guess.
 
CRL: Sounds exciting and strange, not really normal at all. So you grew up under the Bureau’s care? What was that like?
 
I suppose it was like a boarding school of sorts, but instead of scary nun’s wielding weapons grade rulers, there were scary para-military instructors wielding weapons grade…well…weapons. The scariest (and prettiest if you ask me) was Professor Antoinette Huxby. She was in charge of teaching about Demonic Sorcery 101. At some point I suppose she had become possessed by an ancient Assyrian demon who liked to be called, Bubba. She was hot as hell, but had a temper that could warp titanium, know what I mean?
 
CRL: Actually, no I don’t. Did you have many friends growing up with the Bureau?
 
Not in the traditional sense. I tried to make friends with the other children in the program, but it was discouraged. Although, I did get everyone to go trick ‘r’ treating for Halloween one year. I dressed up as XXXXX(Reference was omitted at Special Agent Johnson’s request, citing it would be dangerous to mention his name too many times, and didn’t want to get his attention).
 
CRL: I’m not too familiar with XXXXX.
 
Think of a flaming booger with many sets of teeth. Amazing how many folks at the Bureau had dentures. I’m still banned from the cafeteria for that stunt. Totally worth it though, although I do miss Taco Tuesday.
 
CRL: Who wouldn’t? Anyway, what’s with the wardrobe choices? I mean, Crocs and a trench coat made of duct tape? Kind of stands out doesn’t it?
 
Are you serious? Don’t judge until you walk a mile. These are the most comfortable shoes I’ve ever worn. I keep trying to get the company that makes them to build a set that look and function like combat boots. They stopped responding to me after the 10th or 15th time though. Or maybe it was the special thank you package I sent to them. There isn’t an end-date on the no-contact order, so I’m not sure when I can start writing again. As for the coat, if you had one you’d understand. Duct tape can fix anything, sometimes even space and time if you know what you’re doing.
 
CRL: I’ll have to take your word for it. Any plans on retiring? It looks like you’ve been around the block or two.
 
You aren’t very subtle are you, could have just said I look old. Part of this sexy look is due to the mileage. If you had seen the things I have, you’d look just as bad, let me tell you. Plus, I heard people die when they retire, I’ve seen the movies. Two weeks to retirement is basically a death sentence. No sir, no way. I’m playing it safe.
 
CRL: Let’s make this interesting, if you could tell your writer anything about yourself that would turn the direction of the plot, what would it be?
 
Breaking the fourth wall eh, bold move. I’d have to tell him not to let me access the “secret” pocket of my coat. It could change everything!
 
CRL: What does that mean? What’s in there?
 
It’s CLASSIFIED.
 
CRL: I see, well thank you for taking the time to answer these questions. Any closing remarks?
 
Yeah, thanks a lot, this has been a hoot. I also want to give a public service announcement. Most accidents in the workplace are related to tripping hazards. If you find a potential hazard, use a Bureau Form 453 to document/report it through your chain of command. Also, don’t use necromancy, not even one time. It’s a gateway sorcery. The Bureau has some excellent informational pamphlets on the subject.