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Category: Sci-fi
There is an interview with Jake Nanden from the Iron Series here today:
http://libraryoferana.wordpress.com/2014/02/01/character-interview-number-seven-jake-nanden-sci-fi/
If you want to read more about Jake Nanden, read the page for Too Bright the Sun or its sequel, Unknown Place, Unknown Universe.
And don’t forget to subscribe to the Newsletter for Chapter One of Too Bright the Sun for FREE!
This week: sneak preview and what keeps you writing?
Sneak Preview
This week it’s from the new project provisonally entitled December Radio a sci-fi World War II story.
The following scene takes place in an aeronautical centrifuge in Cologne. Remember those? I seem to remember they featured in a few 60s films and as a very young boy, one of these left a lasting impression on me. In fact the scene has such a powerful effect on me personally – it almost disturbs me in the same way OCD does sometimes – that I would love to pin down the film I originally watched and see it again. The Gerry Anderson film Doppelganger, sometimes called Journey to the Far Side of the Sun, may well have been the one. It is reputed to have a centrifuge scene in it and the only other film I know if is the Roger Moor Bond film Moonraker, but this would have been too late for it to have affected me so powerfully and yet be a vague memory. If anybody knows of any other film where a man has trouble surviving a centrifuge, please get in touch. Continue reading “What keeps you writing?”
This week: What is the most effective way to promote a Sci-Fi book launch? Also Lazlo Friend Newsletter, Hinduism and HAL 9000
What is the most effective way to promote a Sci-Fi book launch?
Two beta readers have now completed Iron III: Worlds like dust and it is getting nearer to publication. Science Fiction books are always hard to promote: sci-fi simply doesn’t get the attention of other genres, which is a shame, because it allows you to develop characters and explore elements of human nature in ways that no other genre allows. So I am faced with the problem: how do I promote this book? Continue reading “Most effective promotion for Sci-Fi books?”
This week: a story’s soul, Frankenstein and the Monster from Hell, Strunk & White: The Elements of Style.
A Story’s Soul
This week I have returned to another incomplete work, December Radio. The story is a sci-fi WWII whodunnit of sorts. So far I haven’t written much, although I have spent many hours thinking about it. The problem is that the story’s soul as I last envisaged it may be too obvious. The problem has been compounded by the recommendation by a friend, based on my description, to read Gravity’s Rainbow. I am on page 50, and so far I have very little idea what is going on; a British Agent is investigating V2 rockets amidst a chaotic kaleidoscope of disjointed feelings, weird characters and disparate locations. What is clear is that the main story is uncomfortably close to mine. A battle has begun for the soul of my story. Attack Hitler’s Bunker was a simple story; men fighting against immense odds for Good. Its soul was born without hiccups on page one. The Ordo Lupus series have their origins in my own private obsessions with the darker side of Religion and more specifically, Faith, God, the Devil and luck. However, both Escher’s Staircase and December Radio have been born of the nebulous (to quote William Shatner) inspiration of a relationship; they have neither a beginning or end. I think the former title has now settled into a comfortable childhood, but the latter may lack something to distinguish it from its distinguished competition. Once I have the soul, the story will tell me what to write. This probably probably sounds kinda whimsy and not a little bit pretentious, but I believe it! If a book doesn’t have a soul it can’t live. Continue reading “Carnival of Souls and Hammer Movie Review”
ORDO LUPUS AND THE TEMPLE GATE IS FREE FROM TODAY – 30 AUGUST UNTIL 3 SEPTEMBER ON AMAZON SO TELL EVERYONE, THEIR DOGS, THEIR DOGS AND THEIR DOG’S BEST FRIENDS!
This week’s subject is modelling but I simply couldn’t find a well-known movie with the word ‘Model’ in the title. Hence the break in tradition for the blog’s title.
Sneak Preview
This week it is from a section called Monk in Lotus. This is the penultimate chapter of the book so I am not far from completing the first draft.
Lotus
Copyright © 2013 by Lazlo Ferran
All Rights Reserved
At the eleventh hour of the day, my duties in the dairy being completed for the morning, I was, as usual, in contemplation. Kneeling in the third pew back of the main Abbey Chapel, I watched the glossed back of the black ant. Reflecting the pillar of holy light shafting through the stained-glass window, the tiny ant’s carapace dipped up and down as it negotiated the uneven surface of the bible rail. This was my favourite time of day. Continue reading “Blog: How to Model a Life”
This Week’s Excerpt
This week it comes from the upcoming publication which is currently going under the name Lotus. I am going off that title though; anyway its an erotic suspense novel with deep philosophical angles (I hope!). This part is from an unnamed section but lets call it The Detective. If you read the novel you will know where it fits in.
Lotus
Copyright © 2013 by Lazlo Ferran
All Rights Reserved.
The red 1971 Pontiac LeMans Convertible streaked along the highway at full speed. The muscular driver behind the wheel was wearing Ray Ban’s and his medium-length brown hair was ruffled violently by the air-stream over the windscreen. He seemed intent only on the road ahead. He held the accelerator flat to the floor with his foot. On the passenger seat was an elegant blonde. Her hair too was flowing out behind her head in the turbulent air. Her head was reclined and at rest on the top of the seat. She appeared to be asleep. The car raced on. Continue reading “Blog: The Fast and the Furious”
Nano-Short Story – or Flick-Story
11.25: This week I am trying something different: don’t say I don’t try and provide you with variety. I wanted to write a short story so short it would fit in one tweet (140 characters) and I intend to do that today. It’s 11.25 and so I am starting now, posting live the stages as I publish in real time.
11.38: Okay, we’re off! I first had the idea of writing a story shorter than flash-fiction or ultra-short stories when I was promoting Too Bright the Sun. I found that when translating into Chinese or Japanese, there were many characters spare after I had composed the tweet: oriental languages that use logograms depicting ideas (far more complex than in the west) are way more economic than Western ones. I wondered if it might be possible to squeeze a very short story into a tweet of 140 characters. I have had an idea floating around in my head for a short story during the last week and it seemed very suitable for the experiment. It’s basically the story of a Catholic Nun who believes the menstrual cycle is murder. So she becomes what some might call promiscuous but to her she is simply doing the work of God. Last night I wrote a very short draft and just now I found this interesting site talking about writing Flash Fiction. However ultra-short or Flash Fiction are stories of a few paragraphs. There are some very nice short ones like the following: Continue reading “This week’s Blog: Gone in 60 seconds”
Hot off the Press!
Hot of the press replaces previous ‘Excerpts’. It will be excerpts that I have just written; little tasters of what I am up to, but not too much. I think I can just about manage this final one from Iron III: Worlds Like Dust.
Worlds Like Dust
Copyright © 2011 by Lazlo Ferran
All right Reserved
“Good thinking, Caron. However that still doesn’t help much. I don’t think any of us would get far … wearing a suit outside the port is gonna look pretty strange … And I don’t even speak Ischian!” After half hour deliberating they still had no decent plan. “Anyways, I am gonna get some kip. Bryant, you are on watch. Wake me in one hour. I’ll sleep on it!”
When they drifted cautiously into Dock 422 in Mars Space Port, they still had no plan beyond the inchoate one suggested by Caron. Continue reading “This week’s Blog – Mars Attacks!”
As you will see in the post below, I was very happy to find out today that Too Bright the Sun entered the Top 100 FREE Kindle books list on all three: Amazon US, UK and Canada on Monday. Promoting my work takes me away from writing so it’s really nice to get some reward for all the effort I have put in over the last few weeks. I only wish I knew exactly what number it reached. You can rest assured I am watching the progress of Vampire: Beneficence (Short Stories III) very closely. Below I will discuss the results of the Amazon KDP Free Promotion for my books so far.
Vampire: Beneficence (Short Stories III)
So far there have been 131 downloads, 17 of them in Germany. It seems to be taking longer to get people’s attention with this one although it’s doing much better in the US than here. Perhaps the UK market really isn’t so keen on Vampire stories. Then again it’s been my experience that lycanthropy stories do well here in winter and not summer whereas for Science Fiction it’s the other way round. Continue reading “Too Bright the Sun – Progress in Promotions”
I was very happy to find out today that Too Bright the Sun entered the Top 100 FREE Kindle books list on all three: Amazon US, UK and Canada on Monday. Unfortunately I wasn’t there to see it because I simply wasn’t expecting it to do that well! The book has been in a Free promotion over the last week and so I was expecting high download volumes but what I didn’t realise is that there are not that many eBooks offered for free at any one time. Hence I was looking the wrong way. Thanks to @JessieBTyson (an author in the Facebook Group Authors Tweeting Authors for noticing. Only wish I had taken a screen grab but I will be watching closely during the next Free Book Promotion.
I have no idea what number I reached although I checked Amazon UK, US and Canada today and there were no Science Fiction books in any of them so that in itself is a victory for Science Fiction.
Looking at the books in the #1 position for Free Kindle books on Amazon UK and Amazon US they generally rank first in their category and somewhere between 20 and 300 for all the Kindles on sale. The ones at the #100 position vary anywhere from 300 to 3000 in the sales ranks. Too Bright the Sun peaked at #17 (UK) and #38 (US) in the sales rank for its category and therefore it could have been anywhere really in the Top 100 Free kindle books.
There may be a very short blog this weekend – I will be sipping a margarita and reflecting on the success of Too Bright the Sun. It’s not just my success though but a team effort. Thanks to everybody who tweeted for me or posted, shared and commented on Facebook. It all helped a lot.
High resolution images of the MCS (Mobile Command Station) and SU 401 are available in the deluxe edition of The War for Iron: Element of Civilization: Boxed Set.
Occult, Sci-fi & Military 