My posts seem to have taken on a theme lately. A sort of jaded twenty-first century curmudgeons-at-the-gate, chicken little the-sky-is-falling kind of vibe.
It’s this issue I’ve been having with finding my groove. I used to be a table-top game master, or storyteller if you will.
Late 2015 through all of 2016, I’ve been trying to make the transition from oral, interactive storytelling to writing. It’s hard for me because my feedback loop is gone.
With storytelling in a tabletop game, I would get almost instant reviews, be they one star or five star, from the players in a scene by scene retrospective on how the story was developing. This is obviously not how writing works. No matter what the genre. (sarcasm)
At my more introspective and generous moments I see writing as standing on the beach, in the surf and telling my stories to the endless, uncaring tide as it relentlessly pounds the shore. I’ve come to believe the reality is more like yelling. I’m yelling so that I can be heard over the din of everyone else, and the crowd I’m yelling my stories at is busy yelling their own stories, or sound bytes, or spoilers, or spoiler alerts, or whatever.
Shhh…listen to Uncle Russ for a second, will ya?
We live in a noisy, crowded world and these could be considered ‘first world problems’, but for me they are very real. My passion is telling stories. I used to only be able to tell these stories to 4 to 8 people at a time in 5 hour increments, over a table filled with dice and papers. Now I have the potential to reach thousands, nay MILLIONS!!!
But all I really want to do is reach a few loyal, like-minded readers. Players, if you will. And I want to hear from them through Amazon reviews, email and comments how my story has touched them.
I’m tired of screaming…maybe I should start whispering.
I have a new release out…
Pretty cool, huh?
Check it out on Amazon. You can find it in
the usual places.
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Audio books, trilogies, novellas…Soon there’ll be movie rights negotiations and George R.R. Martin sleeping on my couch! If you want to keep up with the latest writerly news in the world of Russ Viola, there’s a widget at the bottom of this page that says: Let’s keep in touch. Put your email address in the box next to it and Join Team Mojo. You’ll get exclusive free content you can’t get anywhere else. I promise to be worthy of your trust and keep you informed of my shenanigans.
Found Objects is out now. And my very first audio book, Found Objects, drops TODAY!!
The Secret Life of Statues is book one of the Tools of Creation Saga. Check my books for links on where to buy the ebook or physical copy, and I guess you’re supposed to ‘LIKE’ me on my Facebook Author Page. Check out my tumblr and twitter feeds if that’s your thing.
