Merry Christmas everyone and happy holidays! Thanks for everyone supporting my first year as an author and with my first two books. I hope to produce more books in 2015, so I hope that you all continue your support!
Have a great new years!
Books in paperback:
Shattered Soul: Elements of Lightning
Shattered Soul: Elements of Blood
You can now get my second book on Amazon and Createspace! It’s available in paperback for $10 and eBook for $.99!
It’s a sci-fi fantasy novel with a steampunk theme, continuing my Elementalist series from Elements of Lightning.
You do NOT have to read the first book to read this one. This series will be spoiler free so you can hop in at anytime!
The holidays are among us. As Wal-Mart and Hobby Lobby stocked for the occasion several months ago, Halloween strikes the first of the major holiday season.
But to pc gamers, the holidays only means one thing. SALES!
I am an active user of Steam, a DRM for pc games. They are always having huge sales you will never get with console games (sorry console gamers.) Point and case, the Halloween Steam Sale.When I began my adventures into pc gaming, I would become broke within several days of one of these holiday sales. Gabe Newell knows how to get your money.
Now, this video is for the summer sale from this past summer, but I believe it still holds many aspects to any Steam Sale survival.
As for me, I’m going to ignore the sale this time, and continue in working on my sequel getting finalized. Just waiting on the cover really. Aside from waiting, the third installment of the Shattered Soul series is coming along nicely, and so is the first extension from the series. These next two won’t be far apart from my sequel, I’m making sure of that.
Something I’ve never liked to accept as an adult. The “real world” as many adults like to call being grown up and working 9 to 5 jobs that most people dread.
As a writer, I can’t stand that I have to work part time meet ends meet, but yeah I’ll do it because I have to. But I will not stop writing or stop trying to find a job related to writing.
I want to write, like any writer should. I know anyone and everyone can write, so the market is tough.
I know the “real world” is harsh and everyone can’t live their dream, but I’m not giving up. Everyone should get a chance at their dream.
(I sound like a terrible motivational speaker)
I’m not too sure if many other writers/authors have had part time jobs at Wal-Mart like I have. It could be my love for the post-apocalyptic video game series, Fallout, but I think Wal-Mart would make a great tale for such an event.
I do believe anyone with imagination or a love for horror would have thought that Wal-Mart would be a great place to hold up in an apocalypse. Or at least a place to get supplies.
I’ve worked at two Wal-Marts in the span of almost 8 months. My imagination became like a wildfire when I began to explore backrooms and stock different departments. It’s amazing how little people know Wal-Mart has until you stock it yourself.
Just recently, I began to think of a series based on this idea. Now, I probably would never get to it, due to expanding the universe of Elementalists, such as Ace Venx in Shattered Soul: Elements of Lightning.
One of my biggest questions is, if we all think about using the store in an apocalypse, would we read about it?
Working on phase one of the editing process of my sequel steampunk novel, Shattered Soul: Elements of Blood.
Following the events of the sci-fi book, Elements of Lightning, readers do not have to read the first one before this book. The Shattered Soul series will all be connected, but will not give any spoilers to other Shattered Soul novels out or to come.
With the release of the sequel, Elements of Lightning will be re-released with a bonus chapter, the prologue of Elements of Blood.
In other news, I should finally be getting an official website soon. A lot of obstacles came up in my life so I wasn’t able to yet, and the free site setups aren’t very appealing. I may be picky, but oh well.
The editing shouldn’t take too long. I hope Elements of Blood will be out before December, or a bit into December. Hey, nothing like a steampunk fantasy novel for a Christmas present, right?
I’ve been a huge fan of Disney’s Tron for years. The idea of a world inside computers sounds so cool! The Grid was a huge inspiration for the idea of my Lightning Plane.
The Lightning Plane in my novel is accessed only by those of the Lightning Element, like Ace Venx. A Lightning Elementalist must use a source of electricity or something that has electricity running through it, like computers.
I couldn’t pass the chance to homage to my favourite Disney movie(s). The Lightning Plane is a digital frontier with a fast paced environment. Made up of things that look like the inside of a computer, the plane is probably the more unique amongst the other planes that are in the novel or future novels.
More are the come in the next books, so keep an eye out for Elements of Blood soon!
Get Elements of Lightning at these two sites!
http://www.amazon.com/Shattered-Soul-Elements-Lightning-1/dp/1494814633/
https://www.createspace.com/4591145
Follow me on Facebook and Twitter!
https://www.facebook.com/brandan.chapman.1?ref=hl
I’ve been a huge fan of anime, Japanese animation, and manga, Japanese comics, for as long as I can remember.
The first anime I remember watching was Dragon Ball Z (DBZ for short). DBZ had a lot of action and drama that made me want to keep watching as a kid. Characters held the power to fly, shoot energy out of their hands, and destroy planets! There was so much more they could do. The anime is epic. As a kid watching on TV, I had to wait a week in between each episode to air. Fights would last several episodes, so you can imagine how I anticipated each episode.
Mangas were a new world for me, when I was still in Elementary School. Being a bookworm, it took a bit to get used to reading mangas, due to having to read it from right to left, instead of the tradition left to right. Lucky each manga I read had an example at the beginning. Something that look kind of like this.
My first manga was part of a Shonen Jump issue, which had several popular manga chapters in it. Bleach, Naruto, One Piece, and Yugioh were notable titles.
Over the years, my tastes in the two have changed a bit. I started to collect less mangas, and really only watch anime (next to any of my favourite super wholock shows). Death Note and Black Butler are probably my top favourite with both anime and manga. Black Butler is probably my most favourite. It is about a kid who loses his parents and sells his soul to a demon to become his butler and take care of him. It takes place in England around the Victorian age I believe. What is interesting is that the manga form of Black Butler is pretty different from the anime, which is more reason for fans to read it. DNAngel seemed to be going that approach, being one of my favourite animes of my childhood. I could never find more than the first 5 volumes of the manga sadly. Now Death Note was an iinteresting concept as well. It was my kick start back into anime during high school. It was about a guy finding a book that whoevers name that is written in it dies. The anime covers on how that power can change people and the world around you.
I have seen a few authors make their novels into mangas quite a bit. It would be cool to have such a chance. If a manga writer every asked me about my book (or soon to be series), I would be more than happy to see my work come to life in manga form.
I’m on just about every major social media. If you’d like to follow/like me on any of them, you can follow these links!
Facebook
Twitter
Tumblr and Disney Tron Tumblr
Google+
DeviantART
Never hear about authors and video games unless it is about their books becoming one or something. So I decided to share my experience with video games for anyone who wants to know.
With the Steam Summer Sale among us, I have been gaming quite a bit. I’ve been a gamer since I can remember and it does a lot to inspire me. If I can find a great adventure/action/role-playing game that is highly fantasy based or science fiction based, I’m bound to love it. Notable titles would be Skyrim and Mass Effect. Pretty much any Bethesda or Bioware game.
I’ve always been a huge fan of stealth in games too. One of my all time favourite games is Thief: Deadly Shadows. It had a slight open world feel to it with the best stealth mechanics I’ve seen so far in most games. If I get a chance to stealth in a game, I will. Even in a shooter game like Payday 2.
I also like Real Time Strategy games like Civilization V. One of my first RTS games was Red Alert 2. Still is one of my favourites to this day.
One game that I was honestly surprised I enjoyed is Alan Wake. Alan Wake’s concept intrigued me greatly. Playing as an author and fighting with light and guns sounded amazing. When I started playing it, I was scared I was going to hate it because it had the same feel as Silent Hill, which I was terrible at. Turns out it is quite different in its own aspects. Alan Wake and Alan Wake’s American Nightmare are now on my top favourite games.
Massive Multiplayer Online games were my first PC games. Runescape and World of Warcraft. MMOs will always have a place in my heart, but it may be awhile before I get back into one. They take up a lot of time. Trying to read and write and play a MMO is tough.
I decided to reach out to gamers who may enjoy my book, or just the games I play, so I have started streaming on Twitch. Anyone interested in watching an another play video games, with hilarious commentary by me and a few friends, would love the stream. You can follow me on Twitch. My account name is Ragnosk. You can also follow me on Twitter (@Author_Brandan) or like my Facebook page to see when I start streaming, or just to keep up with my books or see writing and SciFi posts.
You can find me on Steam as Ragnosk and if you wanted to join in any multiplayer shenanigans, I use the Veritas teamspeak (http://www.veritasrp.net/). Thanks for reading!
Brandan Chapman 