Aaron Frale's Blog

Before I start, a Fantasy Book Sale and Free Dystopian Novels.

Why do that same boring old barbecue every year? Paper plates, potato salad, and hot dogs may work for some people, but not for a hardcore fantasy lover like yourself. Why not try some unique ways for some holiday fun only half of which will get you arrested? 

1. Village Sacking Party – Why settle for an AirBNB in a picturesque small town when you can dress like orcs, vikings, the evil sheriff and raid the village! Add some life to that sleepy little town when you rush in at first light with swords and torches!

2. Elven Healing Magic Tent – Move over faith healers, Galadriel or her best lookalike is here with her Elven mysticism and cryptic words to heal the sick. “The woods as the crow beckons with light and behold the grotto, your legs are healed” you can say when putting your hand on a man in a wheelchair you planted in the audience.

3. Elevenses – Because everyone should have elevenses.

4. Horn Party – The neighborhood will love this one whether it’s Gondor, Helm’s Deep, Valere or any of those army summoning devices, it’s bound to be a good time. Especially if you can combine it with the Village Sacking Party. 

5. Bloodsport Lawn Games – Horseshoe? Cornhole? Bocce ball? Put spice into that barbeque with some real jousting and wailing on each other with flails. Your guest will love being splattered with blood while they eat their hot dogs.

6. Ancient Demonic Summoning Spell – This one’s almost a no brainer. Ancient deities slumbering that will one day devour the world will be the life of any party! While waiting for the VIP to arrive it will be a barrel of laughs when one of your guests is possessed by the entity, spouts curses, and ancient ruins appear on their skin.

7. Dwarven Tavern Brawl – It’s almost expected. I wouldn’t be surprised if the pub owner didn’t kick you out for not brawling. “You dwarves are way too well behaved! Get out of here before I throw you out!”

8. Overly Complicated Sporting Event – Make up your own fantasy sports with incomprehensibly complicated rules. So that way when everyone else is confused as to what is going on, you can say things like “Well it’s only a point if he hits the bludger but not unless she gets the golden snitch but they have to avoid the thrust and get the three willies, but not before 3rd turn spin, but by that time it’s all late drive. Know what I mean?”

9. Final Fantasy X-2 rock concert – People flying around on disks, wailing on guitars, and inexplicably being able to hold their breath for freaking hours or something like that during strenuous activity… I mean the party will be unforgettable.

10. Wizarding Duel Beach Party – What better than Gandalf and Saruman dueling? Gandalf and Saruman dueling in a speedo. I’ll just leave you with that visual image.

Books to Consider

There’s a cache of magical weapons that just might save the world from an apocalypse that could leave both Earth and Carnt in ruins.

Read The Golden Assault Rifle and Other Weapons of Mass Destruction today!

Not chosen for magical college and surrounded by a gaggle of blue bunnies? What’s a witchy Hollywood brat to do?

Read Hollywood Ghost Trip today!

When a mangy-looking flamingo is stolen from the zoo, Lowan is called in to investigate.

Read The Great Flamingo Robbery today!

Technology accelerates human evolution … Yet extinction draws near …

Read Wilderness Five today!

In this tale of space opera and cosmic adventure, the Ambassador of a mysterious and ancient family must forge a path through chaos to overcome the terrible enemies that desire humanity’s destruction.

Read The Survivors today!

As torn petals of a rose fall, a hero must rise in a race against destiny.

Read Wedding of the Torn Rose today!

In a covert survival test that pushes nerves and grit to their limits, proving herself worthy of the Space Girl mantle against impossible odds.

Read Green’s Good Day today!

Before we start: An LGTBQ All Genre Giveaway and a Sci Fi/Fantasy Giveaway.

At long last, the 4th Misfits of Carnt novel is here and the tension is really ratcheting up in this one. As you know, the series is about endings and beginnings. And now we are square in the middle of that story. For this one, I really wanted to pay out some threads that I planted in the first couple novels about the nature of Carnt, its relation to Earth, and how the landscape will forever change.

While inspiration for the series was wanting to see the “Breaking of the World” from the Wheel of Time” series, an event so significant it alters everything, even the landscape, I also was inspired because we were watching The Magicians. I love The Magicians, I’ve already seen it twice through, and it probably won’t be the last time I watch the series. Now, I haven’t read the books yet, it’s on my audiobook wishlist, but there’s a part of me that hesitates, only because I heard that the Magicians books are really nothing like the TV series.

I completely respect Lev Grossman, the writer. Without him, the TV series wouldn’t have been possible, but there is a part of me that has some trepidation about going to the books after falling in love with the TV series. There’s a weird fear that I won’t find what I found in the show, when the reality is that I’ll probably love the books too, and it will be just more Magicians, which is a good thing.

Is it better to leave the cat inside the box for fear of being disappointed or let the cat out because it very well may be alive and better than the TV show ever was? You already know my thoughts that collective art is in a lot of ways better than any one single human can do (ie Silo series), but there are also times when collective art fails. There are TV shows based on books that fail in the first season, where you wonder if they ever read the book they were making the show about.

That’s why I haven’t read the Magicians yet. It feels like an unknown quantity. I do want to say that at least in the TV show, Fillory is one of the best parts. It’s a unique rich fantasy world, but also a parody of Narnia among other fantasy worlds, though I would say it’s heaviest in Narnia. And well, if you are reading this email you probably know that I’m a big comedy blended into fiction fan. 

That’s what Carnt is for me. It’s primarily a parody of Middle Earth from the Tolkien world, as Fillory is to Narnia. While the Magicians takes it a step further and ties a meta narrative about the writer of Fillory also being a participant of the world, I didn’t want a meta narrator as I was already weaving so much into so few pages. But I did parody events like Sauron waiting in his tower for something to happen, elves and dwarves, the party coming together, and even a little Harry Potter with the third book.

But now that events are getting more serious in the story line, the jokes are getting further in between and the characters are going through some deep shit, which is kinda what happened in the Magicians. The story started off like Harry Potter but in grad school, and the humor elements were high (yes double meaning, get it?), but as the story progressed even the characters like Elliot and Margo, who by far were the most entertaining in the first season, got all serious with emotional plotlines.

That’s what’s happening here too in Book 4 of the Misfits of Carnt. What seemed maybe not as serious is suddenly threatening. This one will tighten those screws as the story careens to the ending. If you liked the others, you’ll love this one too. There may not be as many jokes, but its definitely heading to the end, but not yet, there are still more books to come in this series, but with Office Maxi, and another super-secret project I’m writing, I can probably only get to one Carnt book a year. But I will finish them. I don’t like leaving a series unfinished. It just takes me a while because I want to do it right.

Books to Consider

A cache of magical weapons just might save the world from an apocalypse that could leave both Earth and Carnt in ruins.

Read The Golden Assault Rifle today!

Above the cliffs where the sea meets the sky, Fauna weaves life into existence.

Read Breath today!

The Fimmara convoy carries a treasure. It’s well guarded and impossible to steal. But Jac Kanto is determined.

Read The Fimmara Raid today!

Commander Sorăna Mirra has spent years leading a hand-picked team of marine special operators.

Read The Blade Within today!

Liv at the End of the World is a funny, absurd and hopeful story, sure to make you laugh and cry.

Read Liv at the End of the World today!

Kayn dreams of a world beyond the shelter walls, a world full of sin—yet he yearns for its freedom.

Read Wine & Smoke today!

In this tale of space opera and cosmic adventure, the Ambassador of a mysterious and ancient family must forge a path through chaos to overcome the terrible enemies that desire humanity’s destruction.

Read The Survivors today!

Before I start, free Sci Fi and Fantasy books. On with today’s fun:

In my last email, I had a throw away joke about adjusting If I Had $1000000 for inflation. I thought I’d maybe give it a try. With a 23-year-old song (27 if you count when they wrote it), there has been lots of people who have done the math on whether or not one million dollars would actually buy all the stuff mentioned in the song. I feel all of them miss a fun opportunity in the calculation.

Most of them settle for a replica of John Merrick’s remains, citing that there isn’t really a way to buy the bones. However, because they are being held at the Royal London Hospital, I propose that there is a way to “buy” John Merrick’s remains, and that my friends, is a well-planned heist, worthy of a Ocean’s 11 movie.  

However, since I don’t know how much a heist would cost, I did a little research and found that most heists in Grand Theft Auto 5 costs between $25,000-$100,000. Completely within the $1000000 budget of the heist. However, video games are not like real life, so for the house, the chesterfield, craft dinner, I’m going to go as cheap as possible.

They didn’t specify where the house was located. Most assume Toronto because that’s where the band is from, which blows most of the budget on the first purchase. I’m gonna go with a ruin in Italy which I can get for $20k Euros, $30kish American. No one said the house had to be renovated or even livable. The tree fort in the yard can be built with the ruins so $0. Okay fine maybe old stones aren’t the best for trees. So maybe $500 on materials with as much repurposing as possible. So, $35500.

Let’s be generous for a faux green dress, faux fur coat, Kraft dinner, mini-fridge, Dijon Ketchup, those could all be easily purchased for less than $1000 if I’m going to thrift/budget stores. Probably even less, but let’s make it $36.5k Since I don’t have to buy the Chesterfield because the “or” in the song, I’ll use a rock in the ruin for the ottoman or make one with leftover treehouse materials.

So, I’m left with k-car, llama or emu, monkey, limousine, and art (Picasso or Garfunkel) all of which can be used in a heist, so it’ll come from the nearly million dollars we have left for the heist. First off, any good heist deserves a getaway vehicle, and since we are buying a k-car, might as well use it to get away. Now I always thought it was a k-car, but turns out there is a class of car in Japan called a Kei car that is pronounced like the letter k. They are reliable and the smallest class of street legal vehicle. So, I’m guessing Kei car is the car in question. Which I can get used for $10k bringing my total to $46.5k.

Now, Kei cars aren’t fast, topping out at 80 mph or less (130 kmh), so there won’t be any driving on the walls of sewers Italian Job style with our tiny car, but it doesn’t need to go fast. In England, the speed limit tops at 112 kmh (about 70 mph). Obeying traffic laws and speed limits will help the getaway not get pulled over by chance, so a Kei is good as any, and reliability is good to have here. I don’t imagine what the conversation would be like to explain to the tow truck driver why you have John Merrick’s remains in your back seat.

Now that we have our car. We need a crew. Unfortunately, this is a little hard to research. I figured an art thief would be the best person to get all them crazy elephant bones because breaking into a hospital would probably be the same as a museum. When I attempt to find “the price of an art thief” and other variations of the search, I get an AI reminding me that art theft is illegal and has serious consequences. Which if I had the intelligence of a twig and searched on the internet for how to plan a heist and then actually committing the heist, I would be leaving law enforcement officials an invitation to my door (even in incognito mode). So, I would like to take the time to explain this post in no way condones the stealing of John Merrick’s remains or any theft and is purely a satirical fiction exercise of how to spend a million dollars in the Barenaked Ladies song. So, I don’t need AI telling me it’s illegal. I know that, but I just need more information. However, no matter how I phrased the search, the AI wasn’t going to give up, between sales pages of “The Art Thief” and other generally useless information, I gave up on my search to find the price of hiring an art thief.

Which is sad for writers, as I’m sure many writers of crime novels probably have a search history that would make a person think they are up to no good, when the reality is that writers just want accuracy in their work. I remember hearing a story about how search results were used to track down a guy through food orders who also happened to be researching how to dispose of a body. When they got to his door, it turned out he was a writer on a very popular crime TV show. I can’t imagine what AI is doing to those writers now. But I digress, if you want a fiction (both movie and book) about the dangers of preventing crime before they happen, check out the Minority Report by Philip K Dick.

Since there really wasn’t any information I could find about hiring an art thief, and also not having the time or resources to do some hardcore investigative journalism and interview art thieves in prison (I’m a fiction writer, we mostly make shit up). I decided to base my hiring price of the thief based on the value of the heists in the past. Some of the higher profile art thefts in history were estimated between 500 million and 2 billion dollars. Which even if I spend the entire 1 million on the best thief in the world that would earn them 0.2% of value of a heist they could do on their own.

And you don’t ever one to skimp on hired thug wages. I mean they know about the whole thing and could throw you under the bus for a plea deal, or they can blackmail you. The point is that if you hire someone to do your dirty work, the pay must reflect A. not just stealing the item for themselves or B. make them feel so cheated that they rat you out or get revenge on you.

0.2% is not going to attract the best talent in the world, so maybe some pretty good talent. Which I think I have found. In January of 2006, Sripuranthan Chola Idols were stolen from a temple and were sold to the National Gallery of Australia for $5.1 million. Luckily the Australians knew it was stolen and handed them back to India. But if I were to offer the thief 9.8% of 5.1 million dollars that’s a cool 500k. I think that’s enough for the person to keep their yap shut.

So, we got the Sripuranthan thief, the getaway car, and we still need a llama or an emu and monkey, limousine, and art (Picasso or Garfunkel) and have only spent $546.5k so far. Now, I know what you are thinking, the person you hired is an art thief, so steal the Picasso. That would mean another heist since John Merrick’s remains are at the Royal London Hospital which I doubt would have any Picassos, maybe a replica but I don’t want to bank on it. So, I may as well hire Art Garfunkel as my distraction.

Okay so Art is in his 80’s at the time of writing this, but that doesn’t stop him. His last album was 2024, so imagine $100-$200k or since it’s at a hospital, I bet I can convince him it’s for charity (we’ve already established the lack of morals in the scheme so why not just make it worse). So, let’s go with $200k to play a couple songs, maybe the Sound of Silence for ironic crossfades while the heist goes on.

We can set up Mr. Garfunkel on the helipad on top. Get all the eyes looking up, while my art thief is sneaking out of a parking garage in a Kei car. Now here’s the brilliant part of the plan. You thought the Garfunkel concert was the distraction, but it’s really the llama, emu, and monkey. We can unleash them into the crowd while Mr. Garfunkel is playing. Exotic animals can be rented from the film industry for about $10,000 for primates. I’m sure the emu and llama are less expensive, but we got some cash left, so let’s throw $50k at the animal handler to have an “accident” and let the animals go free for a while.

You know a llama, monkey, and emu terrorizing (or most likely being terrorized) at a folk concert is immediately pull out your cellphones newsworthy. For while all the world is distracted, John Merrick’s remains could be snuck out the back. Now. It’s just getting them into Italy, which is accessible by car. So maybe Kei car swaps at a parking garage to keep the authorities off the trail, and maybe even some driving around in sewers on the walls (we couldn’t resist) and a few bribes, paying people to look the other way and there goes the rest of the million dollars.

And if Interpol needs to find us, we’ll be in a ruin in Italy enjoying Kraft dinner while gazing upon John Merrick’s actual remains. But don’t worry, I saved enough for limousine trip to the store where we probably are going to buy a tent and camp stove, because we were crunching on hard noodles before. But that’s post the song and like any great heist, screw long term planning!

Books to Consider

When unassuming Toby stumbles upon an ancient prophecy, he’s thrust into a quest for powerful magical weapons that could save all of humanity from a devastating worldwide apocalypse. A humorous, adventure-filled fantasy!

Read the Golden Assault Rifle and Other Weapons of Mass Destruction today!

In the near future, asteroid prospectors—rock hoppers—risk everything mining the belt.

Read Blowups Happen! today!

Eighteen-year-old Becca is a regular kid. At least on the outside.

Read Becca Princess of Sona today!

Two empires. One planet. Rule the planet. Rule the universe.

Read Specter today!

In this tale of space opera and cosmic adventure, the Ambassador of a mysterious and ancient family must forge a path through chaos to overcome the terrible enemies that desire humanity’s destruction.

Read The Survivors today!

Before we begin, a massive independent book sale. Many books, including mine are cheap or free. If you want to buy mine and a bunch of others in a bundle there is a Mid Range Bundle and a Fantasy Bundle. Finally, a different Sci Fi and Fantasy sale with 5 of my books.

I didn’t realize the effects of age on my body until you try to do something that would have been no problem in my twenties but thoroughly exhausting at middle age. As I mentioned a while back, we wanted to take my son to his first concert, mainly to see Fastball with the Barenaked Ladies being a bonus. This was because after this nightly ritual of exposing our son to a variety of genres, artists, and styles of music, Fastball has risen to the top as his favorite songs, dethroning Taylor Swift, classical music, the Bangles, Janis Joplin, and even The Scorpions as measure by the amount of time he requests it.

A pilgrimage to see a concert was easy in my early years. Spending my teen and early twenties in Albuquerque, we’d have to drive either to Denver or Phoenix to see most shows. For whatever reason perhaps fear of left turns, most concert tours skipped Albuquerque. My friends and I would often find ourselves in Phoenix for a show and driving back the next day. I even remember a time where we decided on a road trip to Vegas at 10 pm at night and rolled into Vegas around 8 am.

The point is when I was young, it was easy to travel. The first time I realized that the breakneck get there for the show, and get back might not be the best thing was sometime in my 30’s when one of my best friends and I went to Denver for the Mars Volta and decided to drive back that same night to save on a hotel. It was about 3 or 4 am when we were too exhausted to drive and pulled into a rest stop somewhere in northern New Mexico that seemed like it aught to have the name massacre after it.

While were never massacred for sleeping in a rest area in the middle of the desert, I did learn that I’m not a spry as I used to be. Now that I’m approaching 50, the whirlwind adventure really took a toll. The aforementioned Fastball/Barenaked Ladies concert was taking place at Redrocks in the Denver area. My aunt lives in Northern Colorado so we figured that we could stay at her house, which she was all too excited to host.

However, what we didn’t account for after buying the tickets was the fact that we would be getting back from a trip for my day job, 36 hours before we needed to leave for the concert. Before this concert was even on the radar we had planned a family vacation to Philadelphia. I was going there for a conference, and we have a policy that personal travel could be booked if it’s cheaper or same as traveling on the conference dates. We’d stay in the hotel when work was paying for it, and switch to an Airbnb, great plan. It all worked out, until we realized that our plan lands at 11 pm on a Saturday, our kitties boarded by the vet can only be picked up between 10 am and 11 am on Sundays, and the concert was a Tuesday. Also, I have limited time I can take off work, just used a bunch in Philadelphia.

The plan when we bought the tickets was we’ll drive out Saturday, stay with my aunt a few days and drive back Wednesday and it got shortened to drive out Monday, drive back Wednesday, after already being tired from traveling for over a week. As any experienced traveler knows, sleeping is never better than in your own bed.

We saw the show and almost got to meet Fastball (who said they’d be at the merch tent, and we realized too late there were 2 merch tents), but it worked out fine anyways because I talked to them afterwards via Instagram to tell them how much their music means to my son. Which is a strange time we live in where celebrities are accessible to common folk like me and probably worthy of a whole other essay topic.

But the real trial of my middle-aged body was yet to come, the drive home. Which was longer because we stayed at a hotel near the concert venue, not to mention Denver traffic. I’m pretty sure Denver likes to pretend its some quaint little mountain town, but it’s the only place in America where I’m sure they could do a race Cars Versus People and the people would have a good chance at winning! I can walk faster than I can drive on most Denver highways.

We began our day on the drive home in the murk of bumper-to-bumper traffic hoping to get through Denver as quickly as possible, which is at the pace of a leisurely stroll. Finally, about 2 miles from the Wyoming border, traffic lets up, and well there is nothing. I mean a whole lot of nothing. The University of New Mexico, where I went to school has more students that live in towns in Wyoming. With 80 mph speed limits (that’s 128 kmh who live in countries with sensible measuring systems), you will miss seeing a town if your attention wanes even for a moment.

Me: I wonder if the Barenaked Ladies will have to adjust If I had a 1000000 Dollars for inflation? Wait was that Cheyenne?

At about 4 pm when we reach Sheridan Wyoming, I have a moment at a rest stop where I wonder how much a hotel costs. My wife apparently had the same thought about being ready to be done with the drive. Both of us wouldn’t even considered it in our 20s. 4 pm is an interesting number because it means so many things pending on your age. Lucky for you, I’ve made a chart.

4 PM Chart (that’s 16:00 for those of you in sensible measuring countries)

0-10: Yay! Mommy!

10-20: A few hours before mom comes home.

20-30: Breakfast time? Lunch time? I don’t know anymore

30-40: I wonder if they have any drink specials

40-50: Can we be done? It’s time for the day to be done.

50-60: No one will notice if I sneak in a few rounds at the course

60-70: Maybe a few cocktails at the golf course

70-80: Dinnertime

80+: Bedtime

But the day wasn’t done for us. We still had to get through Montana, which is even more spread out that Wyoming. People think Nevada is where the government stores all the alien bodies. Aliens could homestead in Montana and no one would notice.

Clee: Glorp, why aren’t the deer and antelope playing?

Glorp: I tried to get them to play, but I incinerated them.

Clee: Oh Glorp, I can’t take you anywhere.

Glorp: You know that planetary destruction bomb that you told be never to press the red button?

Clee: Yes?

Glorp: I pressed the red button.

Clee: I guess we’ll just have to move back to Andromeda.

Laughtrack. Queue opening credit sequence for hapless but well-meaning alien.

It was driving through the great wilds of nothing, when I started falling asleep and my wife said it was getting harder and harder to concentrate on driving (we had been switching off all day). By the time we got to Billings, we were so tired that when she asked me what gas station was at the exit, I said a Holiday. But it was this weird exit as most of them are in Billings where stuff advertised on the sign weren’t on the road crossing the freeway, but further in.

So, I did what any sleep deprived, exhausted travel would do and looked around for the advertised Holiday, and my wife after a bit of driving said, “Um, okay, so where is the Holiday?”

To which I said, “I don’t know. I don’t see it.”

Her: You didn’t look on your phone?

Me: No, I just kinda looked.

Her: But you have a phone!

Me: Oh yeah. I do. Hey look, we passed it. It’s down in that direction.

I point to the right away from where we are driving.

Luckily, before we could get demoralized any further, we saw it. The hallowed welcome halls of affordable hot dogs, and bulk egg products, Costco, not only did they have gas, but we wanted to stop at a grocery store before we got home (still three hours away at this point), and $4.50 to feed a family of three. It was a reprieve from the exhaustion we were both feeling.

At that point we were seriously considering packing it in, getting a hotel and driving back in the morning, not enough time to take off work be damned! It was the closest I ever came to giving up on a road trip. Even sleeping at the rest stop after the Mars Volta concert didn’t feel like giving up because we originally planned to get a hotel. The hype feeling you get after a concert prompted us to leave Denver the same night. So, getting to the rest stop was a triumph.

Sitting in the Billings Costco, felt like a defeat, my aging body finally won. I could no longer do a road trip with about 24 hours total of driving in two days. We were going to get a hotel, but there was something about the Costco, its ability to rejuvenate and refresh. If scholars years from now figure that capitalism was some sort of early human religion, then Costco would be the Mecca, the holy temple, the whatever it is Mormons are hiding in the bunkers under those golden trumpeters.

Years from now, when our culture is gone and these words are dust, Costco would be sacred ground and strangely a good place for a rest for weary travelers because after the Costco stop, which added an hour to our already long journey, we found the will to move on. Also, caffeine, I drank a diet soda, which I know is wimpy of the caffeine scale, but when your stomach roils like a Yellowstone geyser every time you drink a caffeinated product, you have a tendency not to drink it all that often. So, when I do have it, it probably feels like what an overdose victim feels after getting a hit of Narcan.

That is to say hyped up on caffeine, fueled by massive $1.50 hot dogs, and a car full of Costco food, I was ready to get back on the road, which I could barely see because of the sun in my eye. So yeah, getting old sucks. Gone are the days of driving all day and all night to get to where I want to be. But there’s a positive side to it too. For the next time, we road trip, we plan to do some overnight stops in between, and I’ll get to places that I never thought I’d see, especially if I was thinking about Barenaked Ladies lyrics while I was driving through them.

Books to Consider

When unassuming Toby stumbles upon an ancient prophecy, he’s thrust into a quest for powerful magical weapons that could save all of humanity from a devastating worldwide apocalypse. A humorous, adventure-filled fantasy!

Read the Golden Assault Rifle and Other Weapons of Mass Destruction today!

It’s a new kind of war. When you see them… it’s too late. But Byllard Iddo is a new kind of commander… and he’s about to become a legend.

Read The Dark Sea War Chronicles today!

En un futuro donde la tecnología lo es todo, la supervivencia pende de un hilo y la inteligencia artificial es el arma definitiva.

Read La Firma Del Cisne today!

530+ pages. 90,000 Words. Endless Laughter.

Read The Galaxy of Comedy today!

Vandryn of house Glenclare faces insurmountable odds fighting against the corrupt Melborians.

Read Brothers of Chaos today!

Before I start, free books involving birds, (I’m not joking).

Also my friend Chris had me on his show Liminal Spaces. We talk my top 10 favorite books of all time, a little about my writing, and fun game we used to play called scare game. You should check it out.

A couple months ago, I did a survey to ask you about what content you like to see on the list. A lot of you said you want my Personal Stories, Funny Lists, with In-depth Book Info and Futurism posts, and the message was loud and clear, keep political views to myself (though I imagine it wouldn’t take a political scholar to figure out which way I lean). So, I’ll try to write at least one personal story, one funny list, one in depth book info, and one Futurism and science article each book release.

In case you are wondering, I only write new emails every time I release a book. The reason you are getting them once a week is because I have an auto sender that sends out a message weekly of everything I’ve written since starting the list. So, you can tell when it’s book release time because you’ll get two emails from me in one week. Then after the new email comes out I pop it on the auto queue so new people on the list can get the classics like 25 Cult Ideas (which I wrote in 2010 but still continues to amuse years later). You can also generally tell what book I was promoting when I originally wrote the email (with some exceptions, when I switched to Sendfox, I had to redo some of the headers and footers because it didn’t migrate over).

I sometimes like to put books (like Office Maxi) up to the top of the autoqueue because it would take years for new subscribers to get to those via the auto emails), so that may explain why some of you may have gotten the same email twice. It depends on where you are on the queue and when I plop it in. However, if you get the original email, and then the autoqueue email that will be the last time you’ll ever get that particular one, because when someone finally gets to the end. I have a little joke for you (some of you OG subscribers when I switched from Mailerlite to Sendfox are getting close to end). Anyway, if you get to the end, and want to go through it all again, let me know.

The rest of the survey, like all my surveys, asked about your reactions to a silly scenario, which was based on a real-life event that happened to me (no, not the alien part). Basically, it was a survey about what you’d do if you were sitting in your car and saw people running then found out it was aliens.

Basically, I was sitting in my car after having come down the Rio Rancho hill at the intersection of 528 and Ellison Road (which also happens to be where my high school is located). For those unfamiliar with the Rio Rancho hill, it’s steep and short and I’ve gotten my car going pretty fast down that thing just by coasting and very shortly after you get to the bottom there is a traffic light.

Now, if you are like me, I have a guess that you are at least a little because you read my books, you’ve seen your fair share of disaster and apocalypse movies. You’ve probably seen aliens zap major cities in Independence Day or the world freeze in Day After Tomorrow, and maybe even saw the lava apocalypse, whatever the hell that was of 2012. I have a personal unscientific theory that people are being trained by those movies and fiction in general to look at what are people running from, not what are they running toward.

Case in point, when I was minding my own business, listening to Metallica or whatever heavy metal music I was into at the time, I saw a bunch of people get out of their cars and run. Seriously, it was at a red light and people were just getting out of their cars and running. My first instinct (trained by Hollywood disaster films) was to turn around and see what they were running from and if you think I’m unique 89% of you who took my survey said you’d do the exact same thing, turn to see what people are running from. The other more sensible 13% decided to put the pedal to the metal and drive away.

I’m pretty sure all of us have seen the movies and know what to do in that scenario. I’m sure you’re wondering, what would cause a bunch of people to get out of their cars and run at a traffic light in Albuquerque? When I looked behind me, did I see a dragon burning the hilltops? A megatsunami that made it from the coast to the high desert of New Mexico? A portal with orc armies rushing out? Or maybe it was aliens or undead?

It was nothing. There was nothing behind me but more cars piling up to the intersection wondering why traffic was halted. However, when I turned to see what people were running toward, it all suddenly made sense, why people all got out of their car at the same time and started running.  

Because I was playing loud music, I failed to hear the car that must have been going pretty fast down that hill (that curves by the way, so you don’t see the traffic light until you’re close). They must have swerved to avoid plowing into us people stopped at the light and went off the side of the road and flipped a couple times. There was a banged up black camaro upside down not more than a car length or two from where I was sitting. The people getting out of their car and running were doing it to check on the driver who I noticed was thankfully wearing his seatbelt and sitting stunned upside down in his car.

By the time I realized what was happening, there were plenty of people at the scene with cell phones out calling emergency services, so at the point where I discovered the tragedy, I was just another rubbernecker holding up traffic and decided to continue on my way. But I think about that day and wonder if movies taught me to look at what people are running from rather than what they are running towards. What I witnessed that day was a whole lot of people helping another person in need and not an alien apocalypse.

As for the survey, it was aliens, and the responses were pretty split evenly from people jazzed about aliens coming for a visit to those heading for their weapon filled bunkers and those who wish they were here to take that one politician away (you know who I’m talking about). Including a few of you just ready to fall in love with the alien who looks human, but glows occasionally and have a Hallmark Christmas movie affair. 

When I reveal that the aliens are here to harvest Earth’s one unique natural resource K-pop artists, 100% of you said, “finally :)” I’ll let you interpret the results on your own on what that means. And finally, I got some questions from all of you that I will answer in a future Ask Me Anything Email (psst… there is still time to ask me more questions if you want).

Also, drumroll, Misfits of Carnt 4 is out. Get it direct from me or at your favorite online vendor.

Mount Hood bellows an unnatural smoke while Toby stumbles upon a cavern with an ancient prophecy. The pictographs feature his friends, the real heroes. He had always thought he was a supporting role. Until he saw an image of himself holding a powerful artifact.

Meanwhile, the moon mage Jenny cuts a deal with Petra to resolve her death problem. But like all deals with the lunar wizard, there’s a catch with a cost that may not be worth the price of her life.

Turns out there’s a cache of magical weapons that just might save the world from an apocalypse that could leave both Earth and Carnt in ruins.

Read Misfits of Carnt 4 today!

Books to Consider

They told him peace was worth any cost. Even genocide.

Read Ashes of Xyphos today!

Before we start, I got a buck of Sci Fi and Fantasy authors who share their books about going on journeys.

Time Burrito 5 is off the hook. It is by far one of the weirdest books I’ve ever written. When I wrote the Time Burrito novel, Amazon had this program called Kindle Scout. It was a user vote publishing deal. I didn’t win, but remember doing pretty good. I mean I got a hand typed email as to why my book wasn’t selected, instead of a form rejection letter.

Anyway, for Kindle Scout, I had to answer this question:

What is the inspiration for the story?

Here was my answer at the time: “For this story, I decided to lock up the internal critic that told me, ‘No, don’t write that, that’s stupid.’ I wanted to write the most ridiculous story that I possibly could. A time travel burrito story with a cat pretty much covered the stupid quota. The rest of the story just fell into place.”

I knew if I was going to end Time Burrito and write the last book, I had to go back to that original mission statement. What’s the most ridiculous story that I could possibly write? It’s been 8 years and I’m a way better writer than I was back then. I also knew that if I was going to go for absurd, I was going to have to go all in. I needed to write something so crazy that it made Time Burrito 1 look conventional.

So that’s what I did. It’s the first book where not only do the characters break the 4th wall but they kick it down. I appear as a character in my own book. Throw some Misfits of Carnt and Office Maxi characters into the story? Sure! Why not? What about all the wacky people our intrepid time traveling gang has met over the years. They’re there too!

My goal for this book was to have it read like an AI fever dream, but be completely written by a human. I wouldn’t be surprised if people do accuse me of using AI for this book because it’s just that weird. But I assure you. I wrote every word of this parody that is almost a parody of the Time Burrito series itself.

The funny thing is that I didn’t realize that this book needed to be weird until a part of the way in. When I first started writing it, the beginning was a lot like all the other novels. Introduce some sort of time travel plot, wackiness ensues, characters save the day. But I shelved it because it felt too conventional, too much like what you’ve already read, and I felt book 4 was already the best Time Burrito novel. It’s like what George Lucas must have felt when he went to make the Star Wars prequels. “How am I going to top that?” (Spoiler alert, he didn’t).

But then, I suddenly realized, this one needs to be like the first, no filters, no stops. Just a piece of comedic art. I know that I’m not going to please everyone with this book. For those of you who think, “he should have stopped at 4.” Then here’s a short short story for you.

JB and roboClara are sucked into a time portal and die. The end.

Or if that is dissatisfying, grab your copy of Time Burrito 4 and cut out the Epilogue. It’s unnecessary to the ending.

However, if you are ready for the weird, outlandish, and incredible, then stick around for Time Burrito 5. I can promise that it will be unlike anything you’ve read.

And now that I got that out of my system, I can go back to my more conventional series like Office Maxi and Misfits of Carnt.

Also, you can get all five Time Burrito books for over 50% off, and that’s only through me.

Books to Consider

The entirety of existence is collapsing. Luckily, the multiverse has Clara, Pete, Unk, and Misako.

Read Time Burrito 5 today!

Immerse yourself in “The Skull Collector,” a short story set in a Pacific Islander village where ancient rituals and haunting secrets collide.

Read The Skull Collector today!

Being a slave in ancient Rome is bad. Being a slave and a one-legged assassin? Even worse.

Read Scipio the Sciapod today!

Before we start, free fast paced Sci Fi and fantasy and free regular paced sci fi and fantasy. Also, the book above has a 50% off at B&N with this code: BNPSAMAK50. I wrote one of the stories in it and the short is a never released before short story in the Office Maxi universe that stars Maxi’s mom at the height of her power.

Also, another short story of mine is in the first Keystone Codex free Sci Fi magazine. You can get it for free on the Keystone Substack. The theme for the first issue was My Cozy Apocalypse, and that more or less describes most of what I write. Anyway, it’s free and meant as a way for indie authors to share audience. On with today’s email:

My spouse and I are going to take our son to his first concert. The Barenaked Ladies and Fastball. Back in the 90s, I enjoyed both bands, but will admit that I didn’t even realize they were still making albums and touring. I suppose many musicians tour and create music long after their hit songs are paired with the term “classic.”

I used to joke that Native American casinos were like elephant graveyards, rockstars go there to die. They play their songs to the stalwart fans who are there to capture a little bit of their youth after taking their evening pill from the pill planner and sneaking Metamucil into the venue after nostalgically remembering when the bag hidden on their person used to hold other substances. When I heard the Barenaked Ladies and Fastball were going on tour, I thought this is it, this is the 90s going through its death throws, but then I realized that it’s not a casino, but a big venue.

It was large enough to have a lawn, and for us to pony out a little more for the tickets so we don’t have to be on the grassy area in the back. When I was younger, the lawn in the back where the rockstars are like little ants on stage was fine. Now that I’m older, I look up such need-to-know information like proximity of our seats to the bathroom. I’m not quite to the point of sneaking Metamucil into the venue yet, but give it some time, I’ll be there. I mean, I already take fiber gummies each morning.

Now, my son already likes Fastball, we have this routine where he gets four songs every night before bed time and The Way and Out of my Head are regulars. In fact, if those songs ever appear on the charts again, I’ll know my son has had something to do with it. Whereas Barenaked Ladies, he hasn’t heard much of them. My spouse and I were fans, owned multiple albums, and she even sang to him a Barenaked Ladies song when she was putting him to bed. But admittedly, we hadn’t listened to them recently.

So, I decided to play some Barenaked Ladies while I cook, which sometimes equates to music playing while we eat (honestly, it depends on my son, he’ll sometimes hear the music and dance to it at the table. Other times he’ll say, “Alexa stop.”). While we were eating, we were wondering if the concert was related to a new album or something and a short trip to Wikipedia later, realized that there were many albums since the last one we heard, Maroon. 

Anyway, we decided to have a listen to what they were doing recently and had realized something. Fucked up people really do make the best art. I mean, I know that’s a stereotype, there are plenty of writers, artists, musicians, actors, and so forth who have great mental health and healthy relationships with their peers and others, but those people don’t make the news.

Steven Page of Barenaked Ladies fame wrote a lot of those songs that I loved. And he had his fair share of mental health, legal, and drug problems. Classic musician stuff. I’m not sure if he was kicked out of the band or left, but either way, he is no longer a Barenaked Lady. Now maybe the album we had chosen to listen to wasn’t the best of the post Steven Page era, but it just didn’t have the spark that got me listening to the band. That’s not to say it was bad, it was a good album, but sounded like any other album from that era of music. It was the difference between stadium filling music and perhaps local movie theater turned rock venue.

We tried Steven Page’s solo stuff next, and were immediately struck by how much the spark was there. We were like, that’s what we love. This is what got us into the band in the first place. But the funny part was that it was a little too out there. Nowhere near the level of John Lennon and Yoko Ono making weird noises for an hour and a half, but still, you could tell that being in the Barenaked Ladies reigned him in all the best ways.

While there are some notable exceptions of musicians achieving new heights in their solo career, a vast majority just don’t have the magic. Listening to Steven Page was like hearing Wings or John Lennon. They have their moments where you understand the genius they brought to the band, but that lone genius is almost always never as good as the collective.

I have a theory about this. A group of talented individuals like the Barenaked Ladies or The Beatles, where each member could probably have their own solo career, and would make decent music on their own, make something truly great when working together.

Groups of people working to a common goal always makes something better than the loan genius ever could. I don’t know if Steven Page would have shined so bright if he hadn’t had the others in the band smoothing out his edges. I think the same happened with The Beatles.

I think the same is true with television. There was something I knew to be true as a kid. The movie was almost never as good as the book. But then recently with TV series like Silo and The Wheel of Time, I’m enjoying them far more than the books. I think the reason for that is that a writer can only put so much into any given project (I’ll be honest that I sometimes am on my third or fourth book when I have ideas that would have been great in the first book). But a team of writers, as is true with most TV shows, can put their collective creativity to work and make something better than the source material.

I think the reason why television has the opportunity to outperform a book where movies failed in the past is rather simple. TV has more time to explore the world like a book. Movies must fit it all into an hour and a half to two and a half hours. TV can afford to explore all the most interesting parts of a book. Then add the power of collective creativity, and you get something better than the loan writer can do on their own.

The lone genius is a powerful myth in our culture, but a myth, nonetheless. The Steven Jobs of the world only achieved what they did because of the talented people around them. Robert Jordan’s wife was an editor, and I would guess had a lot of influence on his books. There’s even some question about how much was Einstein’s ideas and how much was his wife.

Just like Steven Page and the Barenaked Ladies sans Steven Page had something magical when they were the Barenaked Ladies. And yes, there are Beyoncé’s of the world and Michael Jackson’s whose true stardom didn’t come until they went solo. However, I’m guessing that they have surrounded themselves with talented people and what better way to be able to harvest all the top talent then coming out of a successful music act.

I’m not arguing that geniuses don’t exist, I’m just saying that they are better in a group then they are in isolation and that when we look at the success of individuals, there are people working with them to help them achieve that success and when we put on a pedestal the achievements of one individual, we minimize or in some cases miss the contribution of the people around them. 

With that being said, I wouldn’t be writing if it wasn’t for the people who helped me get here. I would like to name them all but the list would be long, and the email has probably already gone on long enough. And I’ll be honest, memory isn’t perfect, especially mine. I fear if I did make such a list, I’d forget someone. But thank you to everyone who has helped me over the years, if it’s a minor grammar correction to full story editing, I appreciate all of you. 

Books to Consider

The entirety of existence is collapsing. Luckily, the multiverse has Clara, Pete, Unk, and Misako.

Read Time Burrito 5 today!

Kore, a daughter of Demeter and Zeus, has never been so happy. 

Read Wrath of Persephone today!

An empire’s betrayal sparks a daring alliance. Destiny burns in the fight for freedom.

Read Last Ember of Azrith today!

In this tale of space opera and cosmic adventure, the Ambassador of a mysterious and ancient family must forge a path through chaos to overcome the terrible enemies that desire humanity’s destruction.

Read The Survivors today!

Zoe Calloway is about to unravel the secrets of time travel and her father’s mysterious disappearance.

Read Zoe Galloway today!

She is opposed by agents of the Confederation of Peoples Governments, who will do anything, even risk starting an interstellar war, to seize control and take possession of the asteroid.

Read Carrie Piper today!

The clock is ticking to stop a second asteroid from striking Earth, and Elliot Adams is humanity’s only chance.

Read The Aftermath Terra today!

First off, a giveaway featuring strong women in sci fi and fantasy.

It’s finally here. The end of the series. Time Burrito 5 will be the last book (I think). I always thought to myself that Time Burrito will be my 72-book series. If I ever run out of ideas, I could just write another Time Burrito novel. With time travel, there is pretty much a never-ending supply of plot ideas. Look how long Dr. Who has been running, not to mention all the books in the universe. Pretty much a Time Lord in TARDIS or Burrito Vendor and Physicist can have limitless adventures.

But then I wrote Time Burrito 4, and I realized that Pete and Clara went through their emotional journeys. SPOILER ALERT (at least up to book 4), Pete earned his respect in the cooking community and found the love of his life. Clara earned respect in the Physics community and found the love of her life, lost the love of her life, found the love of her life again in a different body, and they saved the world again.

After that book, I realized that I wrote myself into a corner. I promised another book with a teaser ending, and didn’t have an emotional plotline for our characters to go through. Well, I kinda found one for Clara and one for Pete that make’s Time Burrito 5 work. What’s with this emotional plotline anyway? The Doctor doesn’t have to have an emotional epiphany every episode?

Yes, true, characters don’t always need to be going through some things or sorting something out, but I enjoy my characters having complex inner lives even though they may be in a novel with a cat on a flying space burrito on the cover. As a writer, I enjoy exploring people who aren’t perfect, but do the best with what they have if they are the hero and make poor choices based on fallacies if they are a villain. Because TB4 (that’s how they are named on my computer) had explored that inner life, I didn’t think I had any more to write.

I realize now that I’m just not a 72-book series writer. I enjoy beginning, middles, and ends too much to keep churning out books with the same characters. Misfits of Carnt will probably turn out to be my longest series only because there are so many characters but there definitely is an end in mind, I just have to get there. Not to mention, writers never really run out of ideas. For every book I’ve published, there are maybe about 7-10 that are only just a few sentences in an ideas folder, a few pages because I had to write it, or in one case I got through the first 1/3 before abandoning it. The point is that I’ll never run out of ideas. So, I just don’t have the time to write another Time Burrito novel because I’m bored.

That’s why I said Book 5 is the last one, maybe. Perhaps one day, I get the Time Burrito bug, and I just must write another one. Or maybe Time Burrito becomes a Tubi original (see book for joke), and I do write a couple more books because suddenly there is hot demand for Time Burrito novels. I will never say never, but I can say that I’m way more interested in finishing Office Maxi and Misfits of Carnt right now, so I completed the series in Book 5.

It will not end on a cliff hanger. There is no promise to write another one. And I feel that if you enjoy the series, it’s the best one. It’s the weirdest thing I’ve ever written.

The Complete Time Burrito Series (eBook bundle)The complete Time Burrito series!With great burrito comes great responsibility.$12.00Shop now

Books to Consider

The entirety of existence is collapsing. Luckily, the multiverse has Clara, Pete, Unk, and Misako.

Read Time Burrito 5 today!

The galaxy is engulfed in a fierce war. Four injured sailors stand together, watching ships dock and eagerly anticipate the return of their loved ones.

Read The Sailors Left Behind today!

In this tale of space opera and cosmic adventure, the Ambassador of a mysterious and ancient family must forge a path through chaos to overcome the terrible enemies that desire humanity’s destruction.

Read The Survivors Today!

Before we start, a Sci Fi and Fantasy Giveaway and a survey to help me improve this mailing list.

People have been asking me this for a long time. What’s the best way to support you? My response has always been Amazon. The reason behind choosing Amazon as the best place to get my books was that when a book sells well on Amazon, it helps other people find it.  This used to work for a while. I’d publish a book, dump a lot of advertising dollars to prop it up for a week or so, and then the book would have decent sales for a bit and then be buried under the crushing weight of all the other books that are out there.

Those months of higher sales have been getting shorter and shorter and now are almost non-existent. It’s not hard to see why. There are more books than ever before. AI is writing them (though to what degree of success, I couldn’t say) in addition to hopefuls like me that it’d one day be a career.  Gone are the days of the solitary genius who writes a world changing book (none of mine fall into that category btw). The writer now must not only write a good story, but be able to edit one, understand marketing to be able to market the hell out of their work, and at least have enough artistry to make a good book cover or know what one would look like when they get it back from the cover artist.

All I’m saying is that in order to achieve success as a writer, it’s insufficient to merely write a good book. There are many other skills that go into being a writer and if you don’t nail them spot on then the consequence is being buried in the avalanche of work that’s being published. While I strongly believe that every writer could eventually find one million who’d buy their work, the challenge is reaching those customers.

Yes, I fully understand that not every book is equal. For example, I’m sure wouldn’t take long to find a published book where if the author was paid per spelling and grammatical errors, they would be millionaires (or thousandaires at the very least). There are also books with cover art that must have been sourced from a 2nd grade class and not the cutesy look at what my kid drew way, but they were digging through the dumpsters of elementary schools looking for cover art sort of way. I think those authors too could reach one million sales. They just have more work ahead of them than a person with a polished manuscript and fantastic cover art.

The subpar cover and error riddled manuscript can get better. I know because I had books published under those conditions. But I learned from my mistakes and sot to better myself. Overtime, anyone can improve if they put the time and effort into it. But even when the book is ready to be sold, the story is fantastic, the cover art is compelling, the description makes the reader just want to dive in and read more, the book can still not sell.

The simple reason good books go unnoticed is that people don’t see them. We live in an economy that is now driven by algorithms. Please the algorithms and you sell. Displease them and you are buried. It feels almost like being an ancient farmer trying to figure out how the gods make rain. Human sacrifice? That so last season! Praying and piety? Move over marketing gods. Throwing a bunch of shit at the wall and see what sticks? Sounds about right!

In effort to throw the proverbial shit against the wall and see what sticks. I’ve decided to sell my books direct. What that means for me, I keep most of the purchase price (88% more or less on a $5 ebook, a much higher % on a bundle). What that means for you, is any book that is fully edited and ready for publication, it drops on my website first. Time Burrito 5 is there now. Misfits of Carnt 4 and Office Maxi 2 will be there as soon as it takes for me to finish writing them, getting them edited, polish up the edits, and load it to site. If this experimentation in direct from me goes well, I’ll continue to post books to my website way before you get them anywhere else.

Don’t worry, anywhere else will still exist too. They’ll be on Amazon, Google Play, B&N, and all the other places too. I’m just going to focus my advertising on direct sales for a while to see how it goes. And I can’t see how much I’m pleasing those algorithm goes unless I sell direct.

Also, in effort to please those gods, I’m going to start offering book bundles. I even have a few of them up already.

Before I go, I have a quick survey, and like all my surveys, there’s a little silliness as a reward for taking it. But with this survey, I’m going to find out what you want from this email list. It should help me write better emails because while yes, I’m here to promote my books, I want to give you something more for your reading time, so help me figure out what you want.

The Complete Time Burrito Series (eBook bundle)The complete Time Burrito series!With great burrito comes great responsibility.$12.00Shop now

Books to Consider

An ancient evil lurks under the city of Albuquerque and it’s coming for Caroline…

Read Playlist of the Ancient Dead today!

His silence was never empty—it was a weapon waiting to be unleashed.

Read Shattered Silence today!

Time Burrito 5: The Fifth Book! eBookAnnouncer: Time Burrito 5: The Fifth Book! Coming to an eReader near you after you hit that purchase button.$5.00Shop now

Greetings from the wilds of Montana!

Before we start, have some free Sci Fi and Fantasy books.

I don’t usually talk about my personal life, but I heard people enjoy reading that from their authors. Who is the person behind all these books? I would say I’m fairly average, good at some things and not at others. I’m very good at thinking, abstract reasoning, and all the skills needed for a writer, but I’m not good at sports.

In fact, I suck so bad at sports, I tried to avoid them much in early life. During soccer, I was the last kid picked. Younger brothers were picked over me, and we are talking the kids who are just good at being a target. I wasn’t even good at that. I had asked my parents to quit soccer so I could have piano lessons.

The bullying and bad memories during PE growing up in the 80s affected my adult life in that I don’t even watch sports. When I was in college, I’d watch horror movies in my room while my roommates watched football (one girl who was over grilled me in the kitchen about it because she couldn’t understand why I don’t watch football). Every single year, my wife and I have the same conversation at Costco.

Me: Why is it so busy? There are so many people.

Wife: It’s the super bowl.

Me: Is that happening this weekend?

Or my favorite was when we happened to buy a grill on Super Bowl Sunday:

Random Stranger in Costco Parking lot: A Traeger! I know who’s house I’m going to!

Me (after the stranger was out of earshot): That was so weird. Why would she come to our house? Did she just make a joke about stealing our grill?

Wife: It’s the super bowl.

Me: Is that happening this weekend?

My sucking at sports all comes from the fact that I have very little depth perception. Catching a ball is really challenging. My hand goes up too early or late, very rarely when it needs to. That depth perception thing also affects me while I’m driving, mostly when I’m turning. Because I have trouble seeing how fast objects are moving, it’s hard for me to judge if I have enough time to turn.

My wife refers to this as my hate of turning left (that would be right for all you UK folks). I’d much rather have a green arrow and have been honked at on more than one occasion for my caution while driving. I even had an asshole whip around me (nearly causing an accident) because it’s hard for me to judge things like speed and distance, and I wait till I know I can turn.

The funny thing is that the same dysfunction that makes me bad at sports and an overly cautious driver, may also affect my ability to edit grammar. So, when I said all the skills needed for a writer, I may have been exaggerating. When I read, it takes me a long time to comprehend what’s on the page. As a result, I’m slow at reading, and not very good at catching mistakes.

I’m so slow at reading, I’d be lucky if I could get through maybe 10 books a year, and even that is lofty. When my wife and I first met, I had hundreds of dollars of store credit at a used bookstore in Albuquerque, and she spent it all in less than a year (at my request, I certainly wasn’t going to use it all).

How do reading troubles have anything to do with poor depth perception? I’m pretty sure there is a short circuit in my brain with the visual processing centers. The reason I know this is because that thing that makes words seem more like a puzzle when I’m reading them, it goes away when I listen to audiobooks.

I can burn through an audiobook in the amount of time it takes to listen to it. I use up so many audible credits that we buy the bundles in addition to a high level credit plan. With audiobooks, I can “read” at the same rate as my wife (she does about 100 books/year), so it was never a comprehension problem. 

There is just something about my visual processing that’s not wired quite correctly that makes me bad at sports, drive super cautiously sometimes to the annoyance of others, and read at snail’s pace. I thank whoever invented Text-to-Speech, I probably wouldn’t be a writer without it (all my editing is done with it, needless to say I’m worse at homonyms than any other form of mistake). 

One last story before I let you go. One of my friends growing up was the star football/basketball player of my high school. Despite going to high school in the 90s, I was the nerd that didn’t get beat up by jocks. Mainly because the supreme jock sometimes would stop me in the hall to ask a Magic the Gathering question.

Anyway, we’d play DnD on weekends (think the kids from Stranger Things), and one weekend my football/basketball playing friend said, “Aaron, you’ve shown me a lot of your world, but I want to show you my world.”

We went over to his house which was a sports temple. His dad was a former NFL player, so of course they had everything for every sport. My friend tried to teach me basketball. After a while he got frustrated and said, “Aaron, you are really bad at this.”

I shrugged and said. “We all got our talents.”

We went over to my house and played DnD.

A couple of updates: I’m finally opening a store where you can buy direct from me. I only have a few products while I test it out. One of them is the brand new release of The Robin Hood of Couches. The book was one of my best stand alone novels, a murder mystery in the near future. 

I also made some predictions in the book about the future of AI and subscription based services in addition to other ideas of what the next 50 years may look like. I also experimented with what a better world may look like that reinvents what it means to work. Especially knowing that AI may cause there to be less jobs than people to fill them.

So if you want to help me out, or you want less of the money you pay for my books to land in the hands of the tech moguls, then consider using my direct from author store. I also plan to do a bunch of discounts and bundled 3 books. You’ll get 66% off what’d you pay anywhere else if you get the bundle.

Which brings me to my last announcement, Time Burrito 5 is finished! You can read it right now if you buy it directly from me. It’s also up for pre-order in the usual spots. I also have the Complete Time Burrito series up for direct sale for $12. All 5 eBooks for just $12. So if you want a deal and want to support me directly, you can now.

Okay last last announcement. Office Maxi book 2 and Carnt book 4 are almost done. Carnt book 4, I hope to release this summer. And Office Maxi book 2 will be everywhere 1/1/26 but direct from me sooner. So stay tuned and thanks for being here.

Looking for something to read? The Complete Time Burrito Series (eBook bundle) $12.00 Add to cart View cart Office Maxi 3 eBook Bundle $5.00 Add to cart View cart Time Burrito Paperback Bundle $50.00 Add to cart View cart Time Burrito 5: The Fifth Book! Hardback $30.00 Add to cart View cart Time Burrito 5: The Fifth Book! Paperback $20.00 Add to cart View cart