Sean Allen's Blog

Well, I’ve been thinking about this for quite some time—hemming and hawing, so they say. I’m not the kind of dude who likes to pour his guts out to folks I’ve never had a beer with (no offense, I’m just kind of private that way), so I’ll spare you all of the “my struggles” crap. But I will say that what I’m about to announce didn’t come lightly.

I’m pulling “Death Drop” off the market. I wrote the story at a time when I didn’t know that all I really wanted to do was write for a living. That said, there are some shortcomings that I’d like to remedy for the sake of the tale and the future of the D-Evolution series. At a minimum this will entail rewrites, editing, and a new cover. And I’m very much considering splitting the book into two: one novel following the Dissension storyline and the other detailing Dezmara’s adventures. But that has yet to be decided.

The website and Facebook page (and possibly the Twitter account) will be decommissioned. Finally, and perhaps most painfully for those who have been patiently awaiting the next installment of the series, I have decided not to publish another novel until the entire D-Evolution series is completed. There’s no telling how long this will take, but it will certainly be several years.

I’d like to say thank you to the fans of “Death Drop.” Your positive ratings, comments, letters, and words of encouragement have helped me more than I can express. Until next time, amigos.

Sincerely,

Sean

So you haven’t joined the throngs of people who have a snazzy ebook reader yet, huh? Don’t worry. Here are three links that will allow you to download and read the most popular ebook file formats on your PC (and one for Mac too).

Kindle for PC (read ebooks downloaded from amazon.com on your PC):

http://www.amazon.com/gp/feature.html/ref=kcp_pc_mkt_lnd?docId=1000426311

Kindle for Mac (read ebooks downloaded from amazon.com on your Mac):

http://www.amazon.com/gp/feature.html/ref=kcp_mac_mkt_lnd?docId=1000464931

Nook for PC (read .epub file formats on your PC):

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/u/nook-for-pc/379003591

Nook for Mac (read .epub file formats on your Mac):

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/u/nook-for-mac/379003592/

Adobe Digital Editions (lets you read .epub file formats and .pdf file formats on your PC or Mac):

http://www.adobe.com/products/digital-editions/download.html

 

These three programs should allow you to read a large number of the digital books out there, without having to shell out the dinero for a Nook, iPad, or Kindle. If you want to test any of the apps that you’ve downloaded using the links above, might I suggest a FREE 1/2 copy of the Death Drop ebook?

Happy reading!

Sean

I had a very interesting conversation with a friend of mine recently. We were talking about the geeky things that we both enjoy: comic books, anime, science fiction, fantasy, video games, and a few other geekish activities that escape my memory at the moment. Anyway, my friend made the comment that people like us are rare. “How so?” I asked. “Well, take gamers for instance,” he said. “Most people who consider themselves gamers spend most of their free time gaming. They don’t dabble in comics, spec fiction novels, or anime because that takes time away from playing vids.“

Interesting theory here. I wasn’t born into the console gaming generation, and I’m reluctant to mention the days of the Vic 20 and Commodore 64 because I don’t know how many folks out there will know what the hell I’m talking about. But if you are hip to my old school game jive, those two computers are where gaming (at least outside of the classic Dungeons & Dragons RPG) started for me. They didn’t consume my life, but I did enjoy them. Same thing goes for comics. I started collecting when I was in middle school, but it was an activity that I happily added to all of the other stuff I was into. I guess I’m wondering how many of you out there dedicate your time (or a vast majority of it) to one particular geeky activity. Or do you consider yourself well-rounded in the art of nerdism?

Drop a line and let me know what you think.

Cheers!

Sean

I know I promised to blog more often, and I wanted to give you a quick update before too much time passed since my last post. The reason for my lack of communication has been yet another move. My wife and I recently packed-up our house and relocated to her hometown of San Jose, CA. We’ve been busy unpacking, painting, and getting situated in general.

On a book related note, my publisher is offering Death Drop for 50% off the cover price over at amazon from now until October 31. I hope to be able to get back into my daily writing routine very soon so that I can deliver book #2 in the D-Evolution as soon as possible. Until then, I’ll see you around cyberspace. Thanks for being a fan!

Cheers!

Sean

After I decided to publish Death Drop (I didn’t start off with that intention) I knew that I wanted to do an audio book version. Now, I tend to do things that I think are cool, and I don’t always consider all of the challenges that go along with producing a major work of art. But I have this hang-up where if I compromise on an idea, I end up being disappointed. And then I own this thing that I’m disappointed in. That’s never a good feeling. That said, I wanted to do a full-on, crazy theater-of-the-mind production of Death Drop (that means soundtrack and sound effects). I reached out to a major studio that specializes in this sort of thing, and it looked promising: one of the big cheeses at the company contacted me and said that they were looking over the half-download on my site to explore whether or not they would be interested in doing the project. Many months passed and I reached out a couple of times with no response. No worries. Death Drop is a big book with an ensemble cast, and both of those characteristics pose a challenge when it comes to the audio book version.

I recently posted the project on the Audio Book Creation Exchange website. I had a couple of awesome auditions (one of them gives me goosebumps; it’s amazingly good). Unfortunately, I can’t reach a deal with any of the narrators/producers. The upfront costs for real-deal narration and production are way more than this indie author dude and his small-time publisher can swing. So I’m facing two decisions here: do it myself or see if I can’t raise the money through a Kickstarter project.

I have some recording experience from my music days, and luckily, I still have some good quality gear. The major obstacles here are time and performance. I’m certain I can do a decent job, but I’m not a trained voice actor. And then there’s finding the time to do it while working  on getting the next book out…and the one after that and the one after that. Chances are the audio book version will take me 5 to 10 times longer to bring to market than it would a professional publisher. Here’s a sample of me fooling around with the Prologue to the book. Please feel free to let me know what you think. Please keep in mind that this track hasn’t been mastered for maximum audio quality, so a final version would certainly be tweaked to sound better.

A professional publisher can supply an amazing voice actor and deliver a finished product in less than six months. The problem is that voice actors and production are not cheap. In addition to paying for the studio and their mastering services, most actors want a share of the royalties from sales. I’m kind of torn. I would love the challenge of producing a Death Drop audio book myself, not to mention the immense satisfaction I would feel when it was all completed. But there’s the quality and time to consider.

What do you think? Drop me some comments with your thoughts.

Cheers!

Sean

 

So there’s been some buzz in cyberspace about a gentlemen (I use the term loosely) who formed an entire business around posting stellar reviews for authors on amazon.com (for a fee, of course). Unfortunately, it appears that the venture was wildly successful, and the folks snapping up the so called “review packages” were…you guessed it…indie authors. This incident has led to some pretty heated discussion online about book ratings, specifically on amazon, and I’ve heard several calls for the website’s review system to be revamped so dishonest ratings can be minimized or even eliminated.

I don’t condone what this particular person did, and the authors who purchased these so-called “services” just make it harder for indies who actually want to improve at their craft and connect with readers on a personal level. So as a true-blue indie author who is genuinely interested on improving your craft (not just scamming folks out of their hard-earned bucks), what can you do to convince readers to take a chance on your work? Three things come to mind:

1) Get some bloggers who review books in your genre to review your book on their website. Now why is this a good move to convince readers that you’re not a fly-by-night hack who has been purchasing reviews? Because bloggers need to deliver quality content to their audience. If they don’t, their audience will bail and the blogger won’t have a reason to blog anymore. So they’re not going to give a fluffed-up review of your book to their readers, it’s not in their best interest. They’re going to be honest about it, and honesty is what we need to make us better writers.  Oh, and these folks are BUSY. So ask early and be patient!

2) Offer several chapters of your book for free on your website and leave them there—forever. What does this do? It lowers the risk for your reader and shows them that you have confidence in your work. You’re giving them a chance to sample before they make the commitment to buy. Now how much you put out there is up to you. However, the more you give the more likely people are to trust that you’re not pulling the wool over their eyes (e.g. posting a single stellar chapter that isn’t representative of the rest of your book). Also, if you put enough of your book out there to engage the reader and then end the sample on an intriguing high-note, you might convince them that they HAVE to find out what happens next (and thus buy the entire book).

3) Now and then, offer an entire copy of your book for FREE. Host a giveaway or find a blogger to host one for you. The fact is that “free” is the opposite of dodgy fake reviews, because dodgy fake reviews are meant to sell books that otherwise wouldn’t sell. So do a giveaway once in a while, and make sure you blog/tweet/Facebook about it. Congratulate the winner and if you’re truly interested in improving your writing skills, ask them if they would consider (low pressure) writing a few words about the book on one of the popular review sites.

That’s it. Now go out and write, get better, and most importantly be honest with the people. I think you’ll find that the relationships you’ll develop and the things you’ll learn about yourself (and your writing) will far outweigh any gains you might get by doing otherwise.

**Mild Spoilers**

If you didn’t know already, I’ve seen a metric sh*t ton (mathematical term) of movies. My noggin’ is stuffed full of movie quotes from random flicks, and I get a kick out of throwing around a quote or two that I think is appropriate for a given situation (And sometimes the folks to whom I’m quoting have a little fun as well.) But as I started writing more seriously I decreased my exposure to other stories, including books and movies. It jams up my creativity to see a concept in another person’s work that is even remotely similar to something I’ve been thinking of doing. However, I can’t totally ignore my addiction to cinema, and when my wife brought The Hunger Games home from the Redbox the other night I couldn’t say no.

Let me start by saying that I have not read any of the HG books by Suzanne Collins. Based on its wild popularity and super high ratings on every book site you go to, I have to imagine that it’s not too shabby of a tale. But I had some issues with the movie. First, I felt that it lacked depth. There weren’t enough of the little details (for me, at least) that made me want to connect with the characters on an emotional level (again, talking about the movie). Lenny Kravitz’s character Cinna shows up briefly in a couple of scenes, and then, when the main character (Katniss) is about to ascend into the “arena” to battle to the death against her fellow “tributes,” he’s having what I assumed was supposed to be a very dramatic, heartfelt moment with her. And it should have been a heartfelt moment: there was a distinct possibility that she would be killed very soon. But it didn’t work for me. I actually turned to my wife and said, “Now what is his role again (Cinna) and what is he supposed to be doing for her?”

Secondly, the action bits were jammed together with very little build-up. Youngsters (all the “tributes” are between the ages of 12 and 18) slashed at each other with silvery blades that glinted in the sun, and arrows zinged through the air. They even managed to blow some sh*t up, which I appreciated. But as odd as this may sound, I never felt like the main character was in any danger. There are some proven techniques of plot structure (storytellers and writers should check out the wonderful blog of author John Robert Marlowe for detailed descriptions of these) that either didn’t seem to exist in the screenplay, or were simply mushed together, which doesn’t really work either. For example, the inciting incident is supposed to be the event that changes the protagonist’s life forever, while the midpoint is the “point of no return.” In The Hunger Games movie, these two items occurred simultaneously at the beginning of the film. Now this is okay, as long as the midpoint takes the form of an unknown element being revealed (not a requirement of good storytelling, but this is how it usually works). I guess that’s where I have issue with the film, there’s no midpoint: there’s just a start and a finish and my resulting disappointment.

Lastly, there was an amazing lack of technological explanation. Now before you go off all half-cocked and type a message to me in all caps that says, “HEY, JACKASS! YOU DON’T EXPLAIN THE TECH IN YOUR STORIES IN ANY DETAIL EITHER!”, allow me to explain. My stories do have some tech sprinkled here and there, but there is a vast difference between the engines in a ship that allow characters to fly at super-duper speeds and a god-like command center that enables its users to conjure living things into the present plane of existence (remotely, mind you) by making a 3-D model of said creature and then touching a button. Ships have engines; it’s logical. The other thing, while cool, provided a significant element of danger throughout the flick, and nary a word was said about it. It just WAS.

I realize that this is a trilogy, and you can make the argument that these elements could show up over the course of the next two movies. But to be quite honest, I don’t think I’ll even bother with the other two films. Perhaps I should read the books. I hear they’re usually better than the movies that they inspire anyway.

Cheers!

Sean

 

As far back as I can remember I’ve always been one of those “I don’t care what you think about me” types. I did what I thought was cool and if folks didn’t like it, that was just too damn bad. Well, all that changed when I published Death Drop. Suddenly, I was reading critiques about my book from complete strangers, and I found myself on this weird emotional roller coaster that, as far as I was concerned, was not my style. Compliments about great action and well-developed characters had me grinning like a crazy person (and turning my wife into one of those bobble head dolls from continuous head shaking) one day, and quips about heavy-handed description had me slumping on the couch, eating buckets of chocolate ice cream and watching Lord of The Rings for the 600th time the next.

Why this sudden sensitivity to what others think? Because over the course of writing the book I became attached to the characters and their struggles. I’m not a parent, but I can imagine that publishing your first book and then hearing that it sucked is like sending your child off to school for the first time and then receiving a call from the principal saying that little Jonny is the spawn of satan and should never be allowed around other children. After a couple of consecutive low-rated reviews, instead of heading for Middle Earth via my remote, I Googled some of my favorite authors to see if I could glean some wisdom. It was kismet that led me to this little gem from one of the authors that I look up to most in the speculative fiction world.

“The main rule of writing is that if you do it with enough assurance and confidence, you’re allowed to do whatever you like. (That may be a rule for life as well as for writing. But it’s definitely true for writing.) So write your story as it needs to be written. Write it honestly, and tell it the best you can. I’m not sure there are any other rules. Not ones that matter.”                      —Neil Gaiman

I love this. It appeals to my rebellious side, while providing comfort against poor opinions of my work (which I know is bound to happen, but I don’t think I’ll ever reach a point where it doesn’t bother me at all). I found myself asking, “Did you write your story honestly, and did you tell it the best you could at the time you wrote it?” And my answers were and always will be a resounding “YES!” This quote now resides in the little notebook I carry with me for writing down any authorial epiphanies that come to mind, and I’m sure I’ll be referring to it many times over the years to come, not just for writing but for everything I endeavor to accomplish. I don’t think you can really go wrong with doing everything honestly and the best you can. It’s simple advice, and I find that more often than not, that’s the best kind. Thanks, Mr. Gaiman!

Cheers!

Sean

Death Drop by Sean Allen

Greetings All!

Well, it’s been almost a year since Death Drop was published, and I have learned some things here and there. One of the things I would do differently would be to focus my review efforts specifically toward Amazon.com. Like it or not, the juggernaut has a major impact on the sale of books (particularly ebooks). And, to be quite blunt, the more books I sell, the more time I can dedicate to finishing the next book (it’s also not bad for the writer ego, and let’s face it, when you feel that people are digging what you’re producing, it motivates you to be more productive).

That said, I’m thinking of offering a free paperback copy of Death Drop to **anyone** who is willing to read the story and give an honest review on Amazon.com. This will be done on the good old fashioned honor system. Tell me you’ll write a review on amazon, and I’ll take you at your word and send a book. Please message me and let me know if you’re interested. I’m going to limit the books to the first 50 responses and adjust the number from there, depending on demand.

**You’ll have to agree to pay for shipping through my website (I think media mail rate is $2.82). I’m sorry, but only those in the continental US are eligible. I haven’t figured out international shipping through my website store. Also, I’m excluding close personal friends and family from this offer – folks tend not to like it when an author has friends and family post positive things about their books. I still love you guys and appreciate all of your support!

So you’ll be getting $19.95 worth of book for under $3.00. Email me at sean@devolutionnovels.com or respond to this post if you’re genuinely interested.

Now before I sign off, I’d like to advise you on a few items that might make this experience enjoyable for you and me. Here’s a short list of things that might tell you whether or not you’ll actually enjoy reading the book.



If you’re a diehard fan of hard science fiction, this is NOT the book for you. The book is 100% space opera. So while there are some science fiction elements (e.g. space travel, mostly). A vast majority of this book, I’d say 98%, is fantasy in a space setting.
If you tend not to like a lot of detail, this is NOT the book for you.
If you’re an editorial nazi (e.g. he should’ve used oblique text here instead of plain italics, and prose books shouldn’t have onomatopoeia-words like “bang” and KABOOM!”). Definitely NOT the book for you.
If you don’t think pop culture styles and genres should be melded together, DON’T bother.
If you can’t handle violence and language, that’s a big negative ghost rider, the pattern is full.
If you think comic books, video games, or movies are awful influences for writers, you won’t like my book and please stop reading my blog. In fact, you shouldn’t even be here on this page. Just go ahead and hit the back button and kindly never return. Thanks.

 

I sincerely hope some of your bibliophiles out there, who might like a different style of story, will consider taking me up on this offer.

Cheers!

Sean

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I’m sorry for being a sucky blogger

It’s been so long since I’ve written a post that I forgot what my blog looked like. It also shocked the crap out of me that I remembered my password on the  first try (not something that happens often, even on the sites I login to regularly). With the state of our hyper-communicative society, this is a bad omen for an author. You are expected to not only tend to your craft and produce stories, but also connect with your fans and potential fans on a more personal level. Alas, I admit that I struggle to juggle (ha!) all of this, and I must apologize.

It’s not that I don’t want to talk to you out there; and in fact, it’s what I enjoy most about the whole writer gig. But I prefer to shake your hand, swap geeky stories, or maybe even grab a beer. I’m an in-person sort of dude. I’ve also discovered that I’m an abysmal multi-tasker. I’m not making excuses. I just want you to know that I suck at doing some things, and blogging is one of them. My bad. Please give a dude another chance.

I’m going to set a goal of posting something (words, pictures, snarky comments about the next crap movie reboot starring Justin Bieber as an action hero, etc.). I know, I know. Another blogger with another goal. Can I do it? Only time will tell, but I certainly appreciate your support.

Feel free to post some comments here or on the D-Evolution Facebook page.

It’s always a good feeling when somebody drops a line. See you around the cyber universe.

Cheers!

Sean