Losing your hearing is a very lonely experience

You hear a voice, and you look up, and you realize everyone is laughing. Someone nearby elbows you, but you missed the joke. Are they laughing at you? Yes, losing your hearing is a very lonely experience. Have you ever travelled to a foreign country, or gone somewhere in your own where you don’t fully speak the language? Ordering food, paying for groceries, getting a cab, asking for directions… all these things become chores where the outcome is uncertain. Did I order the food I actually wanted? I’m I getting charged the right amount of money? I am going where…

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Kindle Vella is Live

And I have a book available there: There are 11 episodes available now (there will be 38 total for this run), and the first three are available for free. Since I know many of the people who read this blog are authors or artists themselves, let me run through a few things about Vella, now that is live: First, there is a dissonance between what established authors are already trying to do with the platform, and what the platform was designed/intended to do. Vella is supposed to be a serial fiction platform, not a straight book-reading platform. There are 11…

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HOBBITON BIRTHDAY 2021

To celebrate my birthday, as well as that of our duly elected president, Donald J. Trump (who really ought to make me his heir and give me his ring), I’m giving away lots of my stuff. Here’s the complete list! You can also get my album from 2017 for free: https://zulonline.bandcamp.com/album/memories-adrift

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Converging Energy and the Blessings of the Hermit

I’ve been seeing a bunch of posts like this lately: This is widespread across my YouTube subscriptions, and I’ve talked to a few author friends who feel the same way, either about content or just work in general. I’m part of this. Prior to getting sick, I purposely took a step back from YouTube to focus on drafting a new book. I figured it was a natural time because it was summer and, more relevant to this post, I just wasn’t feeling enthusiastic about turning on the camera. That lack of enthusiasm has persisted, and while getting an illness is…

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The Dangers of Social Media in 2020 – what you NEED to know as a creator or a user

Following up on some recent videos and livestreams regarding social media, here is what you NEED to know as either a creator or as just a user (or both) regarding social media platforms in 2020: Terms of Service are a red herring. Each platform represents a technical monopoly with little or no competition The core functionality is severely damaged I’ll expand on these below, but here’s what this basically translates into: There is no behavior pattern that can keep you from getting banned The “alternative” platforms are not alternatives at all The service is set up to NOT give you…

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Keys to Prolific Creativity now available!

My book on creativity and productivity is now available in ebook ($2.99) and physical formats. Grab it now and unlock your inner master! ebook – https://www.amazon.com/dp/B084P8P1M2 physical – https://amazon.com/dp/B086B79WFW Still not sold? Listen to the introduction and first chapter in audiobook format: Just so you know, the audiobook by necessity will be a later release. Amazon takes much longer to process audiobooks than the physical editions. I’m still waiting for the completed audiobook for Eyes in the Walls to go live. In the meantime, you can check out the ebook here:

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Blogs are Back!

To kick off 2020, we have a cascade of agreement on all sides: And I’m not the only one agreeing with Scalzi and Wendig: So why? Why are blogs a thing? Or alternatively, why do they NEED to be a thing? Scalzi spells it out – even if you are on the left, and I STRONGLY URGE any of my readers who feel “safe” on social media due to being politically aligned to the left to consider this, the goalposts can shift at any time and you can get your social media presence destroyed. They can destroy it directly by…

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Eyes in the Walls – Psychological Horror coming Friday the 13th of December

I’ve got a new book coming out, and you can pre-order it for 99 cents. After this period, the price will go up to 2.99. The ebook is free for Kindle Unlimited customers, and will be free for paperback customers when the physical becomes available. What should you expect? Eyes in the Walls is a book about a boy named Billy who sees a monster. No adults in his life believe him. They think he’s crazy, and they put him on antipsychotics. However, the other kids seem to believe him, even confirming the reality of the monster, who lives in the…

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New Scifi Horror – free for being on my email list

Yes! You can get my latest 2 hour read – this time scifi horror – for free for being on my email list. It’s something very different from what I’ve done before – a mixture of Lovecraftian themes, classic horror, dark scifi (with plenty of gore) – and in a fairly modern style. So join my list and check it out!

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From Concept to Published book in 30 days – National Novel Writing Month #NaNoWriMo

I made a decision while making a video the other day on the bootcamp mindset that I was going to do National Novel Writing Month. Of course, being me, I felt I had to up the stakes and the challenge from “writing 50,000 words” to “put out a novel in 30 days.” This process will involve all four phases of book creation (planning, drafting, revising, and publishing) in an extremely condensed and (though limited) intense fashion. NaNoWriMo (as some call it) focuses entirely on phase 2 – drafting, encouraging people to get to that mythical 50k mark in the space…

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