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Covers, Blurbs, and LitRPGs

4-star book recommendations; News about the Skytrails launch next month (with a new blurb and cover).
Lone figure next to a ragged flag looking out at a vast, colorful but muted landscape.

Welcome to the May 2025 edition of...
What I'm Into, What I'm Up To
#56

Hola Brave Reader,

I have lots of news about my upcoming novella series!

But first...

What I'm Into What I'm Not Into But Should Be According To A Close Friend

I don't have much to report about what I'm into because so much of my time lately has been spent on the upcoming book launch, digging out space for a new patio, and trying to spend time outside doing fun stuff, like riding bikes.

But I was talking to a friend last night (who shall remain nameless in case he doesn't want these book recommendations tied to him) and he had a few books to recommend, many in the LitRPG genre.

He listens to tons of audiobooks and has pretty high standards (the highest he rates anything on Goodreads is 4 stars... and very few books he reads get all 4), so when he recommends something I know it's solid.

Do you know about LitRPG, by the way?

It's a fascinating new-ish category that mixes aspects of video games with fantasy/sci-fi conventions. According to Wikipedia:

In LitRPG, game-like elements form an essential part of the story, and visible RPG statistics (for example strength, intelligence, damage) are a significant part of the reading experience.... Typically, the main character in a LitRPG novel is consciously interacting with the game or game-like world and attempting to progress within it.

So here are the books, in the order they were given to me. I believe they are all LitRPG except the first, which I think is considered urban fantasy. They are each the first book in a series:

So, there you go! New books for your to-read list if you need some.

What I'm Up To

I'm finally just about ready to release Skytrails (again)!

Is it perfect? No. Is it good enough? I certainly hope so. Is it time to put this story out into the world either way? Yes it is.

I have made some important (and hopefully not catastrophic) decisions about how to launch this story into the world, which I will now enumerate for your reading pleasure.

First, I will be releasing Skytrails as a series of three novellas. I plan to release one each month starting with book one, Spirits Of The Brinaatii, June 7th.

Second, I am currently using an AI audio generation platform called ElevenLabs to narrate the audiobook version. If you have mixed or negative feelings about artists and creators using AI tools in their work, I understand. I am right there with you.

But I am also a cheap opportunist and I believe AI tools will revolutionize the playing field for independent creatives in all kinds of fields... kind of like the internet did, for better and for worse.

And, now that I've gone through my own existential crisis about the proliferation of intelligent tools, I'm having fun playing with them, and I'd rather be having fun with them than fearing them.

Third, I don't know what the release schedule will look like yet for all these things, but I plan to release the trilogy as ebooks, paperbacks, audiobooks, podcasts, youtube videos (audio with a static picture), and eventually hardcovers.

Hopefully that way I can reach 'readers' in whatever medium they prefer to get their stories, and also not rely too heavily on any one format or website. Because, as we all know, websites are like stores in the mall—they come and they go. Or the entire mall, for that matter.

Fourth, I am making new covers for these books, which is a part of the process I really enjoy—especially with those AI tools I was talking about earlier. I'm still tweaking the cover for book one, but I would really like you, Dear Readers, to be the first people to see it.

So, here's the big reveal.

Fifth, I am working on new and better blurbs, which is the description of the book on it's Amazon-or-other-online-bookstore-product-page. You super readers out there will be very familiar with book blurbs.

Here's what I've got so far for book one (also with the help of AI tools—specifically, Google Notebook).

Enter the lands of the Brinaatii, where long forgotten secrets stir under the earth, peace is threatened by the relentless encroachment of settlers from across the sea, and ancient spirits appear out of the sky to wreak havoc.
Sharn, a chief-in-training among his Kual'iidain tribe, grew up among the Minkaera people, colonists from another land who speak a different language and view the world in strange ways. He seeks harmony between his native people and the foreigners, but tensions escalate daily, fueled by mistrust and increasing violence.
Krii, Sharn’s adopted brother, escaped his reclusive Lin’n Draali people and their citadel under the mountain as a boy, but finds himself caught up in fights he does not want, about a mixed heritage he did not ask for.
The hunter-warrior Tenka, of the Raa'sii tribe, whose women hunt and raid while the men stay back to protect the village, is sent on a spiritual quest, only to receive a cryptic message about peace and a task beyond the world she knows.
Amid all these tensions, a spirit of legend appears in the sky and descends to the physical realm, unleashing chaos, and plunging the lands of the Brinaatii further into upheaval.
Discover a world steeped in ancient mysteries, where the path to survival is anything but clear, and the choices of a few will determine the fate of many.

Because book one will go on sale before my next regularly scheduled monthly newsletter, I will be sending at least one other newsletter in-between to announce the preorder when it's up and running (I tried to set it up earlier today, but... I don't want to talk about it) and maybe another one on or around release day.

It's great to have a newsletter like this where I can talk to myself about what I'm working on and know that at least a handful of people out in the world are following along with my stumbles and successes.

As Wendy likes to say, 'We can do hard things.'

And, while writing a book or series of books is definitely hard, launching them into the world with any kind of ooomph is even harder for me.

If I could do it my way, I would post the books online without a word, probably without a price tag, and millions hundreds of thousands thousands hundreds of people would suddenly and inexplicably discover my work, throw money at me, and hail my genius from the rooftops. But not too loudly because I don't actually want to be that successful and certainly not famous, like poor George R. R. Martin and Patrick Rothfuss, hounded by rabid fans eager for a conclusion to each of their infamous series til the end of their days.

Anyway, thanks Brave Reader for following along on this journey! I'll talk to you again very soon.

As my 9 year old said to my 12 year old yesterday, Ta-ta!

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