Four Questions and a Commercial

Well, crap!!  I really have to apologize.  You see, I was asked to participate in a blog tour by the wonderful S.E. Dee (see her kick ass blog here) and I forgot.  It’s completely inexcusable.  It was horrible of me.  My apologies to everybody. 

Now that my work and family life has calmed down… here I am.  I’m supposed to answer four questions.  So here I go…

What am I currently working on?

Unfortunately, emergencies at work and home have prevented me from working on anything (fiction-wise) for a good month.  However, I was…and hope to resume…working on a story called KRAVEL. 

It’s about an evil (although he’d argue this point) goblin who has been terrorizing everybody in the goblin kingdom for centuries.  Then his protector, the powerful Undead King, disappears.  Suddenly, Kravel has to save his own skin before anybody realizes the King is gone.  Like they say, payback is going to be a bitch!

I’m still in the development phase and have only written about 30,000 words.  Hopefully it’ll work its way into becoming a novel-length manuscript.  We’ll see what happens.

How does my work differ from others in its genre?

Boy… I hate this question!  Every time you approach an agent or publisher, they always ask it and I never have a good answer.

Part of my difficulty is that I’m not sure any of the work in our genre is completely unique.  We all have various influences and so forth.

I also don’t want to sound like a pompous ass by saying “My work is SOOOOO original!”

How about if I will say this:  There are very few fantasies where the main character is the bad guy. Perhaps that little twist will help me sell it to a publisher.  

Why do I write what I write?

One word…Tolkien.  He’s why I love the genre.  I suppose I’ve been writing fantasy in a vain attempt to re-gain the feeling I had when I first entered Middle Earth. 

I’ve written other stuff (I once wrote a romance novel called Thunderstorms and Undying Love. But nobody liked it because all the characters died.); however, fantasy is what comes easiest to me.  I like the idea of roaming around and exploring a completely unmapped world.  You never know what you’ll find!

How does my writing process work?

I basically fling words on a page and see what sticks.

Seriously.

I have no idea what I’m doing when I write. Some people have outlines or character bios.  I just sit and type.  I don’t know the plot. I don’t know the characters or what they want from life. I just type.

Sometimes interesting characters pop their heads in and take over the story.  That’s when the magic happens. 

I see my role as just a recorder.  I watch what happens and write it down.  Nothing more than that.  Does that sound odd? 

My characters are their own people.  I let them do what they want and, eventually, a story develops.  In fact, my first book, RIDDLE IN STONE, was nothing more than a writing exercise.  I had no desire to write a novel. I just wanted to practice my dialogue.  But something happened and a story developed. Like I said, MAGIC!!

Well, that’s it for now.  Again, I’m very sorry for being so late posting this.

I also want to remind everybody that BLOOD IN SNOW (my third and final Riddle in Stone book) will be coming out on July 15^th.  It's currently available for pre-order. I hope you all enjoy it.  I have to say, it's my favorite so far.

I’ll write more later.  Right now I have to run and get my car’s oil changed.  I'm late!!!  (Someday, I hope life stops getting in the way of my writing! :)

Cheers!

Rob