Kane Gilmour

Award-winning thriller author, Brett Battles has just thrown his name into the ring along with other published authors who are seeing the possibilities with self-publishing their work as e-books. His new thriller, LITTLE GIRL GONE, has just been released. His new paperback, THE SILENCED, is out this month as well. Plus he has a few other surprises for us.

Thanks for taking the time to answer some questions for us, Brett. What made you decide to release LITTLE GIRL GONE as an e-book?

Several factors actually. I’ve been keeping a close eye on the growing e-book market, and the ability for authors to get their work out there faster and in a way where they control everything. That had a lot of appeal to me. I write a lot faster than my books have been coming out, and this gives me the opportunity of getting that work out there a lot sooner.

What came first—the idea to start a new series with Logan Harper or the idea to release a book directly as an e-book?

I’ve been kicking around the e-book idea for over a year now, so that definitely came first. As I was writing Logan, though, I wasn’t sure if I was going to send it around to publishers or put it out myself. But when I finished, I no longer had that question. Self-publishing it just seemed like the right way to go.

Do you plan to use this approach to experiment with writing in other genres?

Definitely. In fact I have a middle school book, HERE COMES MR. TROUBLE, that I’ll be self-publishing in early May.

You’ve also got some short stories available as e-books: PERFECT GENTLEMAN and JUST ANOTHER JOB. How are those doing? Are those your only short stories? Any plans to create an e-book collection of shorts?

They’re doing much better than I had even hoped. JUST ANOTHER JOB, in particular, is selling very well, but I think that’s because it’s a Quinn short story, so there’s a built in audience. I’m also planning to write several more shorts (many Quinn based) and release those, too. Collections will
definitely be in the future, some with just my stuff and some
where I team up with another author,
like my friend Robert Browne.

How many other books do you have with your publisher and what are your plans for the Jonathan Quinn series once that contract is up?

I have one more book coming out from Bantam in January called NO RETURN. It’s
a standalone that I’m very excited about. That’ll be the last book through them, at least for the time being. But that
doesn’t mean the end to Quinn. In fact, I already have the next story figured out, and if all goes to schedule, I’ll have that out sometime next year. There actually might even be two Quinn books next year, but no promises.

You seem to be really prolific. I watched your Facebook posts as you were pounding away at your recently completed novels. How many books do you see yourself writing in a year, now that you have an outlet to release as many as you like?

My hope is that I can write three to four books a year, possibly even five if everything goes smoothly. That means sitting at my desk ten to twelve hours a day most weeks, but I don’t mind. I love to write.

Granted it’s only been a couple of weeks, but what are your overall thoughts on the process of self-publishing e-books vs. the process of getting published with a print publisher?

Both have great aspects to them, and both have drawbacks. For self-publishing, I would say the best part is the speed with which I can get my work out there. Instead of waiting a year or sometimes more from when I finish a book to when it comes out, it’s now only about two months, and I can even see that coming down to less time.

Knowing what you know now, would you still have tried to get THE CLEANER published through a print publisher?

Absolutely. Times were different then. There was no viable self-publishing route. If there was then, though, I would have probably still tried to get a publisher just because that’s the way I would have thought it needed to be done. But back then, I ended up getting at least seventy rejections from agents and publishers for THE CLEANER, and sold it to the very last place I submitted it, too. I was very close to putting the book on the shelf and moving on to the next one. So if there’d been this route then, and I’d been soundly rejected as I was, I would have jumped at it.

Would you recommend the self-published route for newbies?

I think I’m still a bit new in the self-pub game to be saying that. I have the advantage of having a name so that, I know, has helped with sales. There are plenty of others with more experience that could answer that question better than I.

With all the talk lately about established authors going the e-book route and with the recent successes of many first time e-book authors, what are your feelings on the professional writers’ organizations out there? For example, you are a member of the International Thriller Writers association. Many of these organizations set up their membership criteria to prevent the kind of authors that used to be labeled as “vanity authors”. But now with new writers hiring professional editors and cover designers for their direct to e-book novels, is it time for organizations to rethink their membership criteria?

Interesting question, but I’m not sure how to answer it. The book world is in the middle of an evolution with where things will end up still an open question. I think I know, but others who believe the opposite think they know, too. So what’s the right answer? That’s what these organizations are going to have to figure out. My guess is they’ll take it slow and see where all the dust settles. And that’s fine. Either way I’m still going to write books, and I’m still going to get them out there.

Are you going to prepare print versions of your e-books? Through CreateSpace or other vendors? What about hardcover POD books?

Absolutely going to put out print versions. I’m planning on using CreateSpace, and should have LITTLE GIRL GONE, SICK, and HERE COMES MR. TROUBLE available that way sometime in May. Hardcovers are another question. Perhaps.

Will you tour to promote your e-books specifically or will you just tour to promote the print books and mention the e-books while on tour?

I think it’s hard to tour to promote e-books, at least at this point. Any touring would be to promote my printed books. Though, honestly, as much as I love visiting the different bookstores, my time is probably better spent writing than touring.

I’m of the opinion that e-books and print books will coexist peacefully side by side. What’s your view? Is the e-book market really going to put a hurt on the print market?

I think there will always be print books. I, personally, love them and will always buy them. But I also think that e-books will become the dominant option for readers. And I’ll be buying those, too. My 79 year old father got a Kindle for Christmas and now he reads everything on it. He loves it. And several of his friends have e-readers, too. It’s spreading like wildfire.

You priced LITTLE GIRL GONE at $2.99. Have you given thought to pricing experiments like what J.A. Konrath does with his books? Or did you decide on the figure and plan to stick with it?

I haven’t locked myself into any particular method yet. I’m going to see how $2.99 does, then decide. I may do some experimenting, too. All depends.

THE SILENCED just came out. It’s the fourth book in the Jonathan Quinn series. Can you tell us a little bit about how Quinn came to be?

He came about from a desire to write a book in the international espionage area, but to not use a typical secret agent or assassin type character. I wanted someone who was different, who came to missions with different goals. I’ve said this elsewhere. I’m always fascinated with “what happens after.” Meaning what happens after an accident has happened, or a robbery has occurred, or an assassination has taken place. We always get the news articles about the events, but seldom the follow-up “what happens after” article. Quinn is my response to that. He’s the ultimate “what happens after” character.

With three noun titles (THE CLEANER, THE DECEIVED, and THE SILENCED), what happened with Book 3 in the series: SHADOW OF BETRAYAL? Great title, but it seemed like you had a theme going there and then last year your titling theme jumped the shark.

Actually, the title for SHADOW is really THE UNWANTED. That’s the title I came up with, but my U.S. publisher thought it sounded too much like a western, so we had to come up with an alternative. Thankfully, my U.K. publisher didn’t have the same problem, and the book is called THE UNWANTED there. I was glad Bantam was cool with THE SILENCED.

What’s the long-term story plan for Jonathan Quinn? Do you have a set number of novels in mind for his series or do you continually come up with new ideas for him?

Not a set number of books, but several for sure. He’s evolving, starting to question his job and life, so things are going to be changing a lot for him in the coming books. I’ve actually been playing around with the idea that eventually Nate will take over and become the focus of the stories, with Quinn more in a supporting role as mentor. We’ll see.

What’s the long term plan for Logan Harper?

Also nothing set yet. I’ve just started to get into his world, but I can see it going on for quite a while.

What else have you got coming out soon?

I have a new book, e-book format with POD to come, coming out around April 22^nd. I’ve mentioned it above somewhere. It’s called SICK, and involves the desperate search of a man trying to find out what happened to his family all set against the background of a deadly flu outbreak that’s far from natural.

A couple weeks after that I have my middle school book HERE COMES MR. TROUBLE coming out. It’s about a fourteen year old kid whose entire world seems to be out of whack—either that, or he’s going crazy. And things don’t necessarily clear up when the Trouble family arrives to help him with his problems.

I’m very excited about both books!

Thanks for the interview Brett! Best of luck with all the new books!

____________________

Brett Battles’s books can be found at the following links from Amazon or Barnes & Noble. His books are also available from Smashwords and THE SILENCED is available in print from stores (maybe give your local Indie book store a shot for that one). Some of his e-books will be available in print through CreateSpace (for sale on Amazon and elsewhere) soon:

The Silenced (Kindle)

The Silenced (B&N NOOKbook)

Little Girl Gone (Kindle)

Little Girl Gone (NOOKbook)

SICK (Kindle)

SICK (NOOKbook)

One of the blog posts I have in mind to write here (and haven’t even started yet), is a listing of essential books for the writer–whether that writer is published or pre-published.

One of the books on that list (and perhaps the most important one) is The War of Art: Break Through the Block and Win Your Inner Creative Battles by Steven Pressfield. I haven’t read any of Steven’s fiction yet, but that little slim volume of non-fiction is worth its weight in gold to a writer.

Today I discovered that Steven has a new book available on the Kindle for free. That’s right. Free. The new book is called Do The Work, and it’s more of a step-by-step workbook to getting through a project. GE is sponsoring the book for a limited time, so go snatch it up now, while it’s free. It could end up being the most important book you read as a writer, whether you are a seasoned pro or a newbie. It will most certainly be a useful tool if you are thinking of jumping into the fray of the newly self-published in the world of e-books.

Ignore the bizarre 1-star review on Amazon from a reader who received the book on their Kindle without requesting it–when that person gets around to reading the book, they might find it useful.

The War of Art is possibly the most motivational book for writers I’ve even seen. Do the Work, with it’s stated intent to walk the reader through a project from start to finish should be even more enlightening. Go get it now. Then read it. Then get started on your own project today.

_______________________________

Do the Work by Steven Pressfield.

Could you be getting in your way of producing great work? Have you started a project but never finished? Would you like to do work that matters, but don’t know where to start?

The answer is Do the Work, a manifesto by bestselling author Steven Pressfield, that will show you that it’s not about better ideas, it’s about actually doing the work.

Do the Work is a weapon against Resistance – a tool that will help you take action and successfully ship projects out the door.

“There is an enemy. There is an intelligent, active, malign force working against us. Step one is to recognize this. This recognition alone is enormously powerful. It saved my life, and it will save yours.”

Available free from Amazon right here for a limited time.

Brett Battles has a new book out called LITTLE GIRL GONE. Directly self-published to e-book format. If you haven’t been following his Jonathan Quinn series about a “cleaner” in the espionage business, then you are missing a great thing. With that series, Battles turns a tired genre on its head and gives us an interesting and compelling character with a career that we have little seen in fiction—the guy who comes in after the fact.

Now, Battles has a new series character and is throwing his name into the ring of those who have chosen to embark on self-published e-books as a way of getting more books out in a year (and of making a larger royalty to boot).

Like with the Jonathan Quinn series, Battles turns a few more tropes on their heads with LITTLE GIRL GONE. For about the first half of the book, the action takes place in and around southern California. Makes sense, since that’s where the author lives. The thing is, I tend to shy away from books set in LA. Not my favorite city. So in the author’s favor? He makes LA an interesting setting for the book. When the book suddenly takes a turn about midway through and the action moves to Asia, I was surprised and delighted. Instead of giving the reader an expected stay-in-LA book or a globetrotting adventure, the author picked his locales carefully and delved into each with just the right amount of texture to bring them to life. Nice. I haven’t been to the Asian locales in the story, but I’ve been to similar ones and the detail of those Asian scenes rings true.

Next, the main character. Who at first seems like the everyman character. Then we have a hint that he might not be the everyman character. Now let me digress here: I generally don’t like reading about the everyman character. I’d rather have my hero more heroic. What irks me most however, is when the former Special Forces super-hero character acts like an untrained everyman. (I’ve seen that in too many books to count.) Coming back to Battles, what he has done here is brilliant—he’s designed the character of Logan Harper as a little bit everyman and a little bit heroic badass, and what’s more, he gives us a compelling reason for that dichotomy: guilt. Not the typical, yeah-I’ve-seen-that-before guilt that the stereotypical brooding FBI agent-who-is-one-step-away-from-getting-kicked-out-of-the-agency usually displays in a thriller, but rather in a simple, elegant, and real way with which the reader can identify. The source of Harper’s woe is, as it is with Hamlet, his own indecision.

The plot moves along a little slowly at the start, as the reader wonders why Harper is reluctant to be involved, why the supporting cast are withholding crucial information, and where the whole thing might be going. But then people start disappearing and apartments are quickly sanitized. Lead after lead turns up dead, and before you know it, Battles has you in the palm of his hand and he’s taking you on a realistic adventure to a few places you weren’t expecting.

Looks like the start of a great new series. Keep your eye on Battles. He writes so fast you’d think his chair were on fire. He’s got two more novels coming out in the next few months and his latest in the Jonathan Quinn series just came out too!

LITTLE GIRL GONE
Logan Harper’s quiet life is upended when he finds himself in Los Angeles, searching for the missing granddaughter of his father’s friend, and uncovering a sinister plot connected not only to the friend’s Burmese past, but also to the boardrooms of corporate America. Logan must use skills from a life he’d rather forget to try and bring the girl home alive.

Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Little-Logan-Harper-Thriller-ebook/dp/B004TGUUVA/

B&N: http://search.barnesandnoble.com/Little-Girl-Gone/Brett-Battles/e/2940012368300

Smashwords.com:http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/49059

One of Ray Bradbury’s many famous quotes rolling around on the Internet this week is the one about Writing being 99% thinking and the rest being typing.

As I try to get the word count up on Monster Kingdom, it certainly feels like writing is sometimes 5% thinking and the rest is typing. And typing. And typing.

Whether you are an artist or a writer, the hardest part is always getting the greatness to transition from your brain to your media.

7000 words and counting. YA novels tend to range from as low as 40k to as high as 90k or more in length. Typical is probably around the 50k – 60k range. I expect Monster Kingdom to come in around the 65k region. Quite a bit to go yet, in other words.

[Note: I'm making some streamlining changes here on the site. Gonna be fewer pages overall and more posts here on the main page. Instead of maintaining a static Writing Page, I'm just going to drop updates in here from time to time. I've also done away with the inspriation page--I'll be placing reviews of things I like here in the main section as well.]

Writing Update:

Novels:

I completed Resurrect on 10 Aug 2010. I finished edits on 30 Dec 2010. The book is now with my First Reader. The book has been proofread and I’ll incorporate my First Reader’s feedback, then I’ll be sending it out to agents.

After Resurrect:

I’ve started work in earnest on the next book. It’s a YA paranormal adventure called Monster Kingdom. I plan to self-publish it as an e-book.

I have one other novel I hope to knock out (a Mystery) before I turn to Frozen, the sequel to Resurrect.

Short Stories:

I’ve completed a couple of short stories. “The Firmament of Night” and “The Wound in the Woods” are both a bit Lovecraftesque short horror tales. I’m still looking for a home for both.

Web Comics:

Warbirds of Mars is coming near the end of its first arc. Scott launched the website on 22 July, 2010. Feedback has been positive. He came up with the idea for what is now Week 9 and also for what is now Week 20. I’ve plotted out Week 24 is out now and Week 26 will wrap this first story arc. Scott expects to have a printed version of the comic ready for the Phoenix ComicCon in May. He’ll be there. I might be but it isn’t looking too good right now.