Mark Henrikson's Blog

The rewrite is complete, the edits are done, and a great book is now published. Revolutions is available for pre-order now and will be live on November 1. Linky below. Buy it early and often and don't forget to tell a friend ;)

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B076FYBNT6/...

Well, I was planning to be done with Revolution by now and reading people's reviews on it. Instead I’ve had to go back to the drawing board a bit.

When I handed it over to the editors I had a feeling it wasn’t quite up to par, but I wanted to get some other opinions and thoughts on where if fell short. The votes are in, and as I suspected, it is a fairly major re-write. The good news is I know what to do with it now to make the book a rip-roaring page turner everyone expects, now I just need to do it.

I should be done with my part of it by mid September. Then the editors get another turn, and then I can look to get it out to the awaiting masses. Rough timing I’d say is late September Revolution will be up for pre order with a release date around October 15th.

There, I’ve put a date out there and have something to shoot for. Nothing motivates this guy like a challenge or deadlines, especially self imposed ones. ;)

Looks like I'm long overdue for an update to everyone on book 2 in the Crew Chronicles series; Revolution. I just wrapped up the first draft and am neck deep in round two of edits to get it all prim and proper.

Here are a few interesting tidbits on what you can expect: The Sons of Liberty, George Washington, Generals Cornwallis and Henry Clinton, and a certain midnight ride by a man we all revere.

Oh yeah, the Freemasons and their conspiring minds give us all reason to doubt that history really went down like we've read in the text books.

It's always a fun ride with this crew!!! I am thinking June or July looks good for the publishing date. It'll be worth the wait.

Mark

Holy crap I actually did it! I gave my two weeks’ notice at my comfortable corporate finance job and am stepping into my new career as a full time author. Barring any massive writers block, that should mean two or even three new books a year, and not just one when I had to punch the clock in the office.

I’m not sure who is really going to care about the why of my decision, but I think putting it all down will be healthy for meat least.

The Job:
To be honest, I feel a bit guilty at being so unhappy while working for a good company (Wells Fargo), with good people (mostly), and earning a good salary, bonus, benefits, etc. The thing is, I’ve worked in corporate finance since I graduated college in 1998; 18+ years to spare you the mental math.

At first there was lots to learn, then promotions to achieve , but now in middle management there is just corporate politics. One department pissing all over the next to gain standing; seriously, its like watching a really bad German porno. Then there are good people being let go and their workloads pushed onto the survivors. Rinse, repeat.

There was no big event that led to my decision, rather it was like the old story of the frog and a pot. If you turn up the temperature a little at a time, the frog won’t notice until he is good and cooked. Color me green then, because I was cooking there at the end; for sure.

The accident:
We started the year in the worst possible way with my 12 year old daughter fracturing her pelvis in 4 places. Odd as it might sound, walking the dog while wearing roller skates is indeed a BAD combination. Long story short, she was flung into the street as a construction vehicle came by and rolled over her midsection. Yes it was every bit as horrifying as you can imagine. Worst day of my life to that point, with the day my father died six years earlier as a close second. Per the X-rays, had the tire been an inch higher she would never have walked again.

By the grace of everything good in the world, following three surgeries, 4 months spent immobile in bed, 2 months in a wheelchair, and several months of physical therapy, she is good as new. I’m not even exaggerating there. Just last weekend, 8 months after the accident, she placed third in her age group in a kids triathlon and she is doing some insane feats of balance and strength in her martial arts classes. Amazing! You and I would have just learned to walk different after that kind of trauma.

The other accident:
I didn’t think anything could match the day of my daughter’s accident until I got home from work on June 3rd where two officers awaited my arrival to inform me that my mother had been killed in a car accident while traveling to visit family in North Dakota. No body’s fault, pretty much just fate kicking me right in the ding-ding for a laugh I suppose.

Two months spent with funeral arrangements, insurance companies, estate lawyers, probate courts, and clearing out my childhood home to sell to the highest bidder was…nope…still can’t find the right words. It was at least 20 hours of work per week along with all the emotions, on top of the proverbial German porn flick that was my day job, to get through that particular stretch of my personal hell. I can’t – not – recommend the experience enough. It all left me burned out beyond all recognition.

Financial Security:
Stepping away from a nice, steady paycheck takes either a great big set of balls or some solid financial security. Now I will take chances in my life, but not with my family’s well being, so it was financial security for me. Since 2003 I have owned and operated single family houses as rental properties. The first book I ever wrote was about that whole experience, but it was god-awful and I will never inflict that work upon the world

Over the years my wife and I got up to 13 properties and have held onto that bucking bronco of a business over the years until the loans on them started to get paid off. While not a massive fortune, my mother’s estate pushed us over the finish line of paying off the houses to the point that my paycheck is no longer needed. Income from the books will be extra icing on the cake.

That is really it. I’ve retired to follow my passion into a second career that has taken me some seven years to develop. Bring on the challenge, I am ready and eager.

I just returned from vacation and got the news that the official release date for Origins Discovery is July 12th. I do believe anyone kind enough to vote for the book on Kindle Scout can already download it and dive right in. Just be sure and keep the spoilers to a minimum ;)

Enjoy everyone!

Linky:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01E48W4IY?...

Pop the Champaign folks. I submitted Origins: Discovery to the Kindle Scout program and thanks to wonderfully supportive fans like yourselves, it was selected. The book will now be published under Amazon’s publishing label and hopefully their marketing muscle will propel this and the original series to new heights.

This is obviously great news for me, but also good for the many fans who voted for the book on KindleScout since they will get a free copy when it comes out.

That leads me to the potential downside for others. If the book was not selected, I would have hit the publish button today for all to enjoy immediately. Now, Amazon is going to do a pass with their editing staff and the publishing timeline is up to them. If I were to hazard a guess I would say the process will take 8 weeks or so, which pushes the publication date back until Juneish.

Sorry for the delay this will cause, but I am full-on excited about the potential here. It would be a dream come true to hang up the day job and write full time to produce more than just one book a year. If this opportunity lives up to its potential, then it could very well be the thing that makes that happen. In that case, I would have amazing fans like you to thank for that. Here’s hoping…

Here’s the deal. I am trying something new this time around with Amazon’s publishing program called Kindle Scout. It is basically crowd sourcing for publishing. If enough people vote for the sample, Amazon will publish the book with all of their marketing muscle behind it. If not, then I publish like normal.

Here is where you and your free copy come in. The link below will take you to the promotion and sample chapters. If you vote for the book and it gets published, then you will get a free digital copy when it comes out. Great deal right?

https://kindlescout.amazon.com/p/8Z90...

Vote early, vote often, tell a friend, and hope everyone likes what they see and looks forward to the full product. My little series featuring Hastelloy and his crew has done very well, but getting the Amazon machine behind it would take things to a whole new level.

Best regards,

Mark Henrikson

I always hate coming up with the marketing blurb for my books. How do you summarize a 90,000 word novel into a few sentences that are also catchy and wet the reader's appetite for more. Let me know if you think this does the trick.

“Man cannot discover new lands unless he has the courage to lose sight of the shore.” - André Gide

You know the date; 1492. You know the names: Columbus, Cortez, Montezuma, and Ponce de León. You were taught the how and why of their actions in school, but did the history books get it right? History, after all, is written by the victor.

Come explore the Age of Discovery as you’ve never seen it before; through the eyes of Hastelloy and his crew. The Origins universe breaks new ground with the addition of the Lazarus crew’s collective chronicles of our history.

I think the title is the WNBA’s line, but it applies to me and what comes next in the Origins universe. I just finished the second draft this weekend and handed it over to the peer reviewers. I got next baby, and you will too come March!

Here are a few of my favorite things that make an appearance:
1) Hastelloy
2) Christopher Columbus
3) The new world
4) Ponce De Leon
5) The Fountain of Youth
6) Cortez
7) Montezuma

It’s gonna’ be a fun romp.

Now I’d like to take a moment and vent a frustration that I now have with my history teachers from elementary school. I, and I’d bet most of you, were taught that back in 1492 EVERYONE thought the world was flat and Columbus would sail off the end. NO, NO, just…NO!

This is a fallacy perpetuated by a biography of Columbus written by Washington Irving in 1828. Every sailor, learned person, and commoner knew the Earth was a sphere since about 400 BC when Ptolemy did his work. That knowledge was not lost, in fact, medieval astronomy was based on Ptolemy’s work. Please get the word out because we look like idiots otherwise.

That grievance ranks right up there with when those same teachers made me memorize that there were 5 oceans (taught us about an Antarctic Ocean as well) and I got the answer wrong on a 6th grade geography test when the answer suddenly switch to the 4 that we all know and love today. If you want to see Mark really mad, then invent a time machine and go back to that moment in my life.

Ahhhhh. I feel better now. Got that off my chest and the book is in a great place.

Have a Merry Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, Yule, Id al-Adha, Festivus, or whatever is your thing everyone! Next is coming.

Mark

When I published “A Greater Good” in December 2014 to wrap up the Origins series I announced that I would take most of 2015 off from writing to fulfill a lifelong ambition of mine. I was going to complete a 140.6 miles Ironman triathlon.

Last Sunday in Madison, Wisconsin after swimming 2.4 miles, biking 112 miles, and then running 26.2 miles with 3,000 other amazing athletes, at 8:56 PM (just under 14 hours of racing) I got to hear Mike Reilly, the voice of Ironman, declare “Mark Henrikson. You … are … an Ironman!” as I crossed the finish line.

There are only a few days in one’s life that you know going in will be profound and special, and this was one of them and it did not disappoint. Life Altering is all I have to say about my experience. More than the accomplishment itself I am just so very glad and proud that my 9 and 12 year old got to witness their dad dreaming big and giving everything he had to make it become reality. You just can’t unlearn that lesson, ever.

Now let me bring this back to my fiction writing since that is the real purpose of this blog. I wanted to let you all know that this year hasn’t been a total loss for me writing wise. I have the entire new five book Origins Crew Chronicles series mapped out and actually managed to get a third of the way through a first draft of book 1 before my triathlon training took over. That’s all behind me now so look out. I’d wager good money that some time in March you will be able to read about what Hastelloy was up to when the new world was 'Discovered'.

Bottom line is I’m back and I have a story that I am passionate to tell again.