An Ending is a Beginning is an Ending

Sometimes this whole thing is so weird to me.

Right now I’m promoting Iconoclast; or, the Death and Resurrection of Lazarus Keaton.

The book I’d been kicking around merely called ‘Lazarus’ was one I started in 2016, but was too ‘weird’ to be a part of my indie publishing oeuvre. Indie publishing has largely required books to conform to certain standards, increasingly so in the last few years since the boom of BookTok, romantasy and the like. That’s not my world, but it does help illuminate how voracious readers (especially of indie fic) view work. It’s filtered through a lens of their likes and dislikes after consuming massive amounts of the same basic stories for years. On a logical level, it makes sense to me. On a personal level, I don’t understand it at all, nor is that how I view fiction.

The delay of Lazarus was that there was no room within the narrow framework of indie science fiction for a weird book, so I’d work on it between projects. By the time it was finished, I had decided I was going to step back from what I had been doing from 2019 to 2023 (although I indie released Godslayer in 2013 and Terminus Cycle in 2015), and tried to find an agent for it. There were plenty of positive reactions, which were followed by “… but I don’t know if it would sell right now.”

So, here I am. Still going the indie route on a project that doesn’t fit into a neat box. That’s a strength of indie publishing (you can do whatever you want), which I’m already feeling the stressors of (it doesn’t fit into the box for indie books that sell well), making it a mixed bag. Not the book. The book is great. But, frankly, a lot of that success relies on you reading this right now.

I also feel this sense of responsibility to put my money where my mouth is after publishing pieces like this one, where I talk about how the publishing industry won’t change unless people take risks. So, here I am, taking risks.

This is all rehash, of sorts, because it’s not what’s currently ‘weird’ to me. What’s weird is I finished the first draft of a novel last night. That doesn’t mean it’s done, not by a long shot. If I was still forcing myself to keep a strict indie schedule, I’d do a quick few passes, zip it off to my editor, have a cover made, get my blurb ready and be off to the races. Instead, I’ll give it some time and really focus on the smaller details. That’s much more my speed. ‘Lazarus’ was the first book I gave that kind of treatment to. There’s another one complete that I’m still trying to shop around, although it’s very, very weird.

This one I’m working on now is perhaps the project I’ve worked on the longest, if you want to count when the idea started spilling into actual words. In late 2008 I created a blog where I was going to serialize the version of this story I had been kicking around back then, which can be found here.

There’s not a lot meat on those bones, nor is it edited at all. This is raw, 2008 me, trying to write something about pro wrestling. This was in the wake of the Chris Benoit murder/suicide incident, and fresh in my memory was how Vince McMahon, knowing details that Benoit had murdered his family, rushed to create a narrative on TV of a tribute show to pop some ratings. This helped to bring to the surface some of McMahon’s past, including his role in Jimmy Snuka potentially murdering his girlfriend by covering up abuse allegations against Snuka.

That original book idea was a young kid with a future ahead of him, violently sucked into the world of professional wrestling after a famous wrestler traveling the same strip of highway in the opposite direction had a heart attack and veered his car into the kid’s. The kid, of course, had a buzz on, and the promoter saw an opportunity to take a headline grabbing high school football star and use him for his own nefarious means.

It’s been almost 20 years and the idea has taken a few different forms since then. Looking back at the winding road it took from creating a seedling of an idea to what I have in my hands now is so interesting. While there are shared ideas (wrestler in a car accident), it’s so different and more reflective of the life I’ve led since then. If anything, it really hammers home how that creative process is so amazing.

Without a shadow of a doubt, I can say that I strongly dislike the publishing industry. It drives me mad. Yet, I love writing unlike just about anything else, and the act of creating remains what keeps me going. Allowing myself to write without worrying about commercial intent has been so freeing, even if it always leads me to the same place, which is when the book is done, I need to find a way to get it into the hands of readers. Those glib assholes whenever someone says “publishing is a mess” or complains, rush in to say, “you know, publishing IS a business” can fuck off into the moon. They’re in a different universe already. They should stay there.

Please pick up a copy of Iconoclast; or, the Death and Resurrection of Lazarus Keaton. I’m not good at the “ask” part of any of this. Tell your friends. Read the damned thing and enjoy it.

My job is to be passionate about my work. To create stuff that matters at the end of the day. Zero generative AI (LLMs) are involved in my process. I’m not trying to sell you on a brand or an idea. I’m selling you on art created by and created for humans. There’s no sequel or series here. I can’t sell this one at a loss in hopes you’ll stay along for the ride. The ride is the book. There’s no cliffhanger. I don’t want you, when you’ve finished reading, to say “okay, on to the next one.” I want you to sit with it. To ask questions you don’t have immediate answers for.

What I’m presenting to you is a vision of tech oligarchs gaining unchecked power and why it’s dangerous. It’s the regular people who need to find their own ways to fight back, never let go of their curiosity, and when they’re back is against the wall, to look for someone else for help. A vision of how to stare down fun, mindless propaganda and see through it, to see it for what it really is.

Thank you for trusting me. I won’t let you down.