Indie Book Club discussion

Listen, I love that we're all here to share our love of reading, and the fruits of our labors when it comes to writing.

But the more I read, the more I find I don't want to be blurbed. No, "this novel is fantastic and gripping" or "set in a world of violence and decadence" that reads in my head like the Voiceover Guy from movie trailers.

I just want to know why you love your book. We all love our books, they're our children and our darlings, but seriously: what moves YOU about them? Not what do you want to sell me on, but what puts a smile on your face?

I can read the back jacket for myself, and I'm sure that will be a nice little tease, but this is the self-promotion thread. Promote it for me. Share your love of the material, not just the query letter stuff.

Look: For me, I wrote Mason's Order because I wanted a more realistic look at an urban fantasy novel, where everyone in the world knows at least some of these supernatural things exist. It's not the powers that are the mystery. The story's got crime and adventure and superpowers and werewolves, but mostly I wanted to write the story of a regular guy put in a tough situation. His power doesn't let him have even the simplest human contact without repecussions, so his isolation and desire to both keep that distance and cross it appealed to me.

I don't write for plot, necessarily. There obviously IS one, and it's engaging (I hope!) but I write characters first and plot second. All the intrigue in the world doesn't do anything for me if I don't care about the folks I'm reading about.

So what I love about the book are the small moments:

- the humanity of the characters, even the non-human ones.

- the things Mason misinterprets (because he's the somewhat fallible narrator) and that hopefully the reader catches on first or second reading.

- the moments of bleak humor in tough situations, and the way the conversations flow. I enjoy hanging out with the characters, and kinda wish a couple of em would come over for dinner.

- the bits of love from a guy who doesn't really know how to.

- the way it feels like a window into a slightly-altered universe and not like a package with a bow on it. It's un-bow-like. Loose ends abound, but hopefully for good cause.

I love that everybody seems to have a different favorite character and they ask me about their eventual fates. Because I love all the characters, even when they're wrong or selfish.

I loved making my dad cry, to be honest. That was maybe the most gratifying part of the whole stupid novel was handing him a draft to read (since he shredded my previous two novels which, not-coincidentally are not published because they suuuuck). When he cried, I knew I had the novel I wanted.

And now I wanna share it with you. :)

So please, tell me: what do YOU love about your novels, and their creation, and what they have to say to your readers? Do you love the world, or the people, or the message?

Why did you write it, and what do you hope your readers get out of it?

Trust me, I really wanna know. Please post your novel and your reasons for loving it below, and I'll make sure to pick it up and see if I enjoy it for those reasons too.

I love my characters, mostly, and also the message. Other people seem to love them, too. Like you, I write about people and the plot evolves from and around them. Readers have said similar things.

I can't imagine my dad crying while reading any book, but especially not one that I wrote. Unless maybe I wrote about my real life...it's safer to stick with fantasy.

First of all, awesome post. I'm a little jealous I didn't think of it first. What I love most about my first novel is the plot and the characters. I took a long time planning it out, and the first book was just the tip of the iceberg. My book ends, much like yours, with a whole mess of loose ends, intentionally of course. It would be fair to say that my first book is primarily a world builder for the series. There is a rather large cast of primary characters and I did my best to portion each of them a section all their own in the book, without devoting too much time to any one person (or monster). I couldn't fit in too much in the way of character development in book one, but that's what book two will be for. My best friend described the book as "The Avengers that go bump in the night." I couldn't think of a more complimentary description than that. If I wasn't so sure Marvel would sue me, I'd put it in my blurb.


I'm also quite happy with the way I dealt with the subject matter. Part of the reason I wrote the book is in response to the way supernatural creatures have been watered down in recent years. My vampires do not sparkle, my succubi do not have plucky human sidekicks, my werewolves are not neutered whiny bitches. The monsters in my book are just that, monsters, not male leads pulled from harlequin romance novels with superfluous fangs. One villain in particular has several dialogues in the book that are, in essence, me venting my frustrations regarding vampires in modern media. Not to say that all of my characters are indiscriminate killers, but most of the villains certainly are. Long story short, it's a bit of a bloodbath.

As strange as it sounds, the negative reviews I've received thus far have been my favorites. I take some degree of pride in knowing that PNR junkies hate my book. Conversely, horror fans seem to really enjoy it, and that's who I wrote it for.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1...

What I like about my book?

I would say my favorites are the characters, especially the protagonist. He comes from out of space, and for him, English is quite intriguing with its expressions meaning other things than it actually says. I had a blast imagining situations where he could be confused. I even caught myself smiling at some of the replies he said, because sometimes I think he has a mind of his own. Too often, the story, MY STORY, changed because of him. It's as if he was talking to me and pulling me in the direction HE wanted it to go, so I can't even take the credit for the book. It's HIS book. (Well heck, he bugged me long enough for me to give him a chance to express himself.)

Other things I love:

-the dialogues between the characters, especially when they argue.

-the internal conflicts they constantly have to fight.

-my protagonist managed to give us an ending even if it's the first installment of a series.

-the story is told through his eyes (first person POV) and maybe that's why he has taken such a great part in its creation. Who knows him better than himself?

-the world I chose, or rather maybe I should say he chose, is our world except it has vampires in it and the government is well aware of their existence.

Now I also have things I like that someone who hasn't read the sequel cannot understand yet. As I said, the book is a stand-alone but the little clues I left in the book here and there should let the reader guess that there is something more to it than what it looks and it all becomes clear in the sequel, which is written but undergoing some editing, and should be out in the beginning of 2014.

@Gordon Your description here reminds me a lot of Anton Strout's A Simon Canderous Novel and I loved that series!

I agree with nixing the glossy blurbage, I don't even read those because the hyperbole it tiring. I got into the Elise t'Hoot series space adventure because I'm alarmed at our general complacency toward climate change. When I did my thesis on climate change communication, I already had three books written and used them as references. These characters have to grow up in the world 100 years hence and I used some worst-case predictions to really push them. Having them exiled to a far desert planet while smuggling aliens makes the stories more of an adventure; I promise they aren't not preachy. When the sea encroaches enough and storms get more vicious, we may start displacement camps that dwarf Katrina's tragedy. If we have excess refugees of our own, why would we accept refugees from anywhere else? Don't we need a strong leader in a national crisis, not gridlock and protesters? How dangerous is Freedom of Speech? I love having those guys act in ways based on the Earth they inherited, they surprise me because I have grown up in an era of plenty. I love the aliens, too. Last weekend the flow of events made the ultraconservatives kill a friendly, generous alien who responded to a false cry for help. That shook me, but when Barto found out his reaction choked me up. I don't know how I'll ever begin a new series because I am so connected to this paradigm - it looks like I'll keep following what they do a while longer.Tenembras: An Elise T'Hoot Novel

Climate change is a good theme. I'm outlining my next novel in the Sonoma Knight series to be called Gut-Check Green. It's a crime thriller about getting revenge for corporate disreguard for the planet.

There are so many ways to express this theme. My goal is to have characters that do nasty things to encourage corporate citizens to take more responsibility. Of couse, it's fiction.

What a great topic :) It seems like we as authors don't get a lot of chances to talk about what we personally love about our novels.

Mostly, I love my characters. They get into my head and won't let me alone until I write their stories. Strong, complicated heroes who also have their tender, loveable sides; heroines who are just as strong as the men but also distinctly feminine. They also all have very distinct personalities, quirks, likes and dislikes, and often end up surprising me! I love the romances in my stories, where the romance between the lead characters is an integral part of the fantasy plot. I also enjoy exploring my overall themes of individual responsibility and empowerment, distrust of institutions and people who seek after power, the importance of doing what's right no matter how hard it is, and the transforming power of love.

I love Rashali's tough but vulnerable personality; Eruz's strength and integrity while still having this kind of hapless quality; the world, based loosely on ancient Sumeria; and the soap-opera thing going on with the gods.

I love the tragic, epic scope; Sevry's integrity and determination even against hopeless odds; the world and form of magic (I have other stories written and planned in this same world); Lucie's journey to gaining the strength to do what she knows is right; and the really cool method of time travel :)

(Coming out next week, assuming I can stay off the internet long enough :P) I love the depth of Roric's personality and how he's overcome the terrible challenges he's faced, and his interesting personality quirks; the interplay between him and Perarre and their developing relationship, especially how they face adversity together; the epic scope of the story; the mystery of lost and forbidden books.

And of course, always, the happy endings :)

I like the idea of us all sitting in our own corner in an inn, near the fire, telling each other about our books and why we love them. I loved my book most when I was inside it, writing it, when those who inhabited the world I created said and did things I myself did not plan. In one chapter, for example, called The Meeting of the Makers, Prince Azel, my chief character, while standing in the aisle of a Throne Hall in a castle, is suddenly disturbed in his thoughts when he sees someone he knew, but I did not, walking towards him. So a new character that I did not plan or foresee came to life on the page. It is magical when that happens and can only be experienced when you are inside the book, writing it. To the reader of my story, Zaddik, who speaks to Prince Azel in the Throne Hall, is only a minor character, but how he came to be there, on the page, is an event that is mysterious and magical to me. I love the fact that the seed of my story was planted in my brain when I was a fifteen year old schoolboy. It was then that I first read Chapter Six of the Book of Revelation, which speaks of the war in heaven, fought between Michael and his angels and the dragon and his angels. Being a schoolboy, I wanted to find a book which told me the entire history of that war. Of course, such a book does not exist, and The Bible only says that the war happened, but not why. So eventually, I wrote my own version of the events of the war and its aftermath. I love best in my book, Angel War, the monologues spoken and written by Prince Azel. When I was inside the writing of them, there were times when I felt that the words were being dictated to me by him, and I was not simply inventing what I wrote, alone. And I love that in my book I could achieve the greatest victory, and that is the victory over death. "Death is the enemy," wrote Virginia Woolf in her book, The Waves. In the telling of the tale of Khem, the Child of the White Mountain, and his journey down to the Citadel to try to be the slayer of the Dragon with his Silver Sword, I was able, at least on the page, to do combat with death and to live beyond its defeat.

Reed wrote: " My best friend described the book as "The Avengers that go bump in the night." I couldn't think of a more complimentary description than that. If I wasn't so sure Marvel would sue me, I'd put it in my blurb.

I'm also quite happy with the way I dealt with the subject matter. Part of the reason I wrote the book is in response to the way supernatural creatures have been watered down in recent years..."

*laughs* Yeah, the editor on my first book described his trouble with my expansive world and lack of focus on one particular area this way: "It's like Minority Report with unicorns! How can you sell that?" I dunno, Mr. Editor (who was a great guy and had some very nice insights about some of my loose ends) but I'm definitely gonna try.

And I hear you about sparkly vampires and the like. A monster isn't much of a monster without the threat of violence. I flagged your book to read, because it sounds like something I'd probably enjoy. I wrote my book in response to reading one too many books with the premise, "There's a whole other world out there but only YOU, ingenue, know about now. In the whole world, it's just you. Don't you feel special?"

I wanted to write a world where yes, people move things with their minds and no, nobody gets too flustered over it. Entire generations have grown up with that around, and are now used to at least seeing it.

So with that mystery out of the way, how do you tell an engaging story about everyday superpowers? When I was a kid I read the Secret Wars from Marvel Comics, and there's a guy in there (Molecule Man) who is basically the most powerful person in the world. The Beyonder is ripping the world apart molecule by molecule and this part-time pizza driver with a girlfriend he loves dearly is basically thwarting God by putting it back together.

And something about that stuck with me, I guess. He didn't really want his power, he just wanted to deliver pizza and date a wonderful girl. If a hundred thousand people could set stuff on fire, would it cease being special? If it was on a huge scale like that, would it be like firearms, where there are permits and registration and repercussions for using em in public, but otherwise nobody really worries about it?

I wondered, so I wrote. Because what better way is there to solve problems and entertain at the same time? :)

~G

G.G. wrote: "@Gordon Your description here reminds me a lot of Anton Strout's A Simon Canderous Novel and I loved that series!"

I haven't read it! And I've only read one of the Dresden books. That was on purpose - they're the two series most closely associated with my books by people who have read em, so once I found that out (during the beginnings of the first one half a decade ago) I wanted to be sure I wasn't unconsciously stealing from them as I developed my series.

I have a 10-book arc plotted out now (not that I'll necessarily write em all, but it's important to know the whole arc, IMO) with space to add more if I wanted, so NOW I can go read Anton Strout and Jim Butcher since I'm sure I'll love em and be ABLE to love them without aping them.

But yes, apparently I read the same stuff as a kid that those guys did and these particular stories that took root in me resemble theirs. :)