Ask the Author: William Alan Webb
Answered Questions (10)
William Alan Webb
Greg - I cut Hitler short but am really interested in what else you'd like to see. I didn't feel like it was done, but wasn't sure about either expanding it or doing a sequel. And please feel free to call me Bill. My wife calls me much worse.
William Alan Webb
Hi Greg, and thanks for the question! I'm very grateful that you like my stuff. Hitler a la Mode was a strange one-off that I wrote because...well, I don't actually know why I wrote it, except that it was fun for me. Anyway, yes, 'Moles' is out! It's in a book titled "No Greater Love, Martyrs of Earth and Elsewhere." It's only available in PB, don't ask me why, I have no control over that. I also have a story titled "The Granite Man" in another anthology based on HP Lovecraft's Cthulu world, if you like that kind of thing. There's a sequel to "The Demon in the Jewel" in an anthology called "Valor Holds the Line", and I'm now writing in the Four Horsemen Universe too.
William Alan Webb
Hi Steve! I"m pounding as fast as I can! The book is nearly 43k words, so I am working on it as hard as I can. I'm shooting to finish in March, then maybe a late April release. That's assuming my hands hold up, I have pretty bad arthritis in both of them.
William Alan Webb
How did I just see this? Hi Linda, do you still need my suggestions?
William Alan Webb
Everything inspires me, from something said on TV to the latest news, or a photograph or the hawk nests surrounding my house. When my brain gives me that flash of "hey, write that down!", I must get it down somewhere before it's forgotten.
William Alan Webb
Train yourself in your craft. Writing is a business even more than it's an avocation, and if you don't have a thick skin it can eat you up. YOU ARE GOING TO BE REJECTED. A lot. You will probably get some negative reviews. Your job is to be dispassionate and decide if there is any merit to the reviews or rejections, and to not take it personally.
Easier said than done, I agree, which is where training comes in. You must believe in yourself and your work more than you believe in your critics.
Easier said than done, I agree, which is where training comes in. You must believe in yourself and your work more than you believe in your critics.
William Alan Webb
Not exploding. Literally. If I could not write, I think my head would explode with all of the ideas and scenes crowding such a small space.
And no, that's not a flippant answer. For me, writing is a compulsion. I can't not do it. If I'm working on something and get interrupted, I get really cranky because I'm afraid I'll forget what I should have been writing.
On a more concrete level, there is a moment every night when I sit down to work. I pull up my Status Quo (that's the name of the world's greatest rock and roll band) Youtube playlist (402 videos) and crank my speakers as loud as I can without waking up the household. For me, that's magical.
And no, that's not a flippant answer. For me, writing is a compulsion. I can't not do it. If I'm working on something and get interrupted, I get really cranky because I'm afraid I'll forget what I should have been writing.
On a more concrete level, there is a moment every night when I sit down to work. I pull up my Status Quo (that's the name of the world's greatest rock and roll band) Youtube playlist (402 videos) and crank my speakers as loud as I can without waking up the household. For me, that's magical.
William Alan Webb
I don't think that I suffer from what most writers call writer's block. For me, it's more 'writer's fatigue.' At some point my brain says 'enough'. If I continue trying to work it becomes slow and unproductive, so usually I do chores around the house and yard, or run errands while listening to Status Quo at full volume.
There ARE times when I've written a book as far as I can for the time being and have to let my sub-conscious work things out. I guess if I was only working on one book at a time that would become writer's block.
There ARE times when I've written a book as far as I can for the time being and have to let my sub-conscious work things out. I guess if I was only working on one book at a time that would become writer's block.
William Alan Webb
LOL...I have to laugh because of the way I work. I do not typically write a book straight through, but instead write scenes as they come to me, and fill in the blanks later. Thus, I wind up working on a bunch of different things all at once.
But when I sit down to work in my allotted time at night, right now I'm self-editing Book 2 of The Last Brigade, titled "Standing In The Storm". As all authors know, it's our job to edit our work to the best our ability, to hopefully make the content and copy-editor's work easier.
Others works in the pipeline are Book 3 of The Last Brigade, titled "Standing At The End", plus a prequel dealing with Green Ghost and his twin sister, who they are and how they became what they are. The prequel's working title is "Not Enough Bullets."
I'm also actively working on my non-fiction World War Two book, "Bloody Roads West: Army Group South and the Defense of Austria, 1945".
And if that's not enough, I plan to re-write my first novel, working title "The Queen of Death and Darkness," and a related novella "A Night At The Quay." Both of these are sword and sorcery.
Whew!
But when I sit down to work in my allotted time at night, right now I'm self-editing Book 2 of The Last Brigade, titled "Standing In The Storm". As all authors know, it's our job to edit our work to the best our ability, to hopefully make the content and copy-editor's work easier.
Others works in the pipeline are Book 3 of The Last Brigade, titled "Standing At The End", plus a prequel dealing with Green Ghost and his twin sister, who they are and how they became what they are. The prequel's working title is "Not Enough Bullets."
I'm also actively working on my non-fiction World War Two book, "Bloody Roads West: Army Group South and the Defense of Austria, 1945".
And if that's not enough, I plan to re-write my first novel, working title "The Queen of Death and Darkness," and a related novella "A Night At The Quay." Both of these are sword and sorcery.
Whew!
William Alan Webb
I'd had these two disconnected scenes playing over and over in my mind for years. I've always had a thing for the underdog, for people facing impossible odds but somehow fighting through to victory. Those two scenes were like that, mini-movies of two disconnected scenes. In September of 2014, I felt compelled to write them down, kind of like these guys were screaming at me to let them out of my head!
That's when I found out the scenes were part of a larger narrative. The characters began telling me their story, and in 45 years of writing that has NEVER happened before.
That's when I found out the scenes were part of a larger narrative. The characters began telling me their story, and in 45 years of writing that has NEVER happened before.
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