Life Update – Audiobook Finished, Back to the Grind

Hey everyone!

I know it’s been a while since I wrote a blog on here, and I’m so sorry for that.  I’ve been trying to ‘keep up with’ posting on Instagram and Facebook, and being the introvert that I am, that…pretty much is all the energy I have, when it comes to social media.

And I’m honestly not sure it’s worth it.

Instagram is no longer a photo app – it’s all about the videos.  Scratch that, it’s all about the reels, which are limited to a minute and a half.  Recording any meaningful content in that short amount of time?  Not easy.  And I had to take something like 30 to 60 takes each time, trying to get it right while compressing the topic to 90 seconds.

I think I might give up on that.  While my initial foray into reels proved promising, with new followers and a couple of comments, it quickly died out, and is stagnant.  Again.

I guess I just suck with social media.  *shrug*

Burning Skies Audiobook Coming Soon!

It’s…been a battle.  I intended to record one audiobook per month once I was furloughed from my day job.  I succeeded with Rise of the Forgotten!  Then I got sick for the month of November with a throat thing.  Started recording in December, made pretty good progress, buuuut….grew increasingly frustrated with the noise in my neighborhood getting worse and worse.

And, well, things just kept getting delayed.  I finally, finally finished recording Burning Skies in January, and started editing.  Editing took a lot longer, because the noise I mentioned in my neighborhood?  It meant that I had to re-record a bunch of sections.

But finally, as of last week, editing is finished!  And I spent the first half of this week listening to Burning Skies “in the wild” to see how an average listener might listen to it.  I found some minor things, about 6 chapters needed breaths removed throughout that somehow wasn’t audible during my editing phase, and a couple of lines needed re-recording, but all in all, I’m really happy with how it turned out!

Especially Nuuldan, the dark dragon?  Oooh.  I channeled Sam Witwer’s version of Darth Maul when I recorded those lines, and they came out sooooo good!  I can’t wait for you all to hear it!

Yesterday, I uploaded all of the files to ACX, and submitted for approval!  So, assuming no quality issues are detected by the ACX techs, Burning Skies should show up on Audible, Amazon, and iTunes in the next 2 weeks!

So despite the setbacks, I battled through, and completed my second Audiobook!

Now…what’s next?

Wellllllllllll….

Assessing The Situation and Adapting

So after all of the delays with Burning Skies, I knew I was running up against a wall, time-wise.  My furlough only allowed me 3 months of paid-for insurance by my employer, and unemployment only allowed a little more than that.  My plan had been to record Rise, then Burning, then start auditioning for jobs to actually get paid for my voice work.

That last part was originally supposed to start in December.

When I hadn’t finished recording Burning Skies until January, I knew my original plan was in big, big trouble.

Then I started looking into how much I could expect to get paid as a voice actor going through ACX, without an agent, without a director or producer or editor, with me doing all of it.

So here’s the thing.  Audiobook narrators, and voice actors in general, don’t get paid for however long it takes them to do the job.  We get paid for a product.  We get paid Per Finished Hour of audio, or PFH.

Let’s say it takes me an hour to record a segment.  That’s an hour of audio, right?  Not necessarily, and especially not as a beginner.  I make mistakes.  I have to re-record.  I’ve learned that, in order to keep my flow on a story, when I mess up, I just immediately re-do that line or wherever a good break is to edit later.  Sometimes that’s only a little bit, and sometimes I mess up a lot.

Then, later, I have to go back and listen to and edit that hour.  Editing involves cutting, adjusting, and generally takes 1.5x as long to do, at least for me (dunno if I’m missing some trick of the trade…)  So that hour recording actually took 2.5 hours of my time to polish, and I may end up actually only having 50 minutes of a final product.  Maybe more, maybe less.

As a beginner, as a nobody on the ACX platform, I could probably expect the lower end of pay for jobs, which is a range of $50 to $100 PFH.

Now, let’s do some math, yeah?  I know, I hate math, too.

Rise of the Forgotten came out to about 10 hours finished.  At the low end, that would mean $500, at the high end, $1000.

In theory, that should have taken me 25 hours to finish, with the 2.5x math, right?  Less than a week, in theory.

It took me longer.  A lot longer.  It basically took me a month from beginning to end.  Now granted, throughout that month, my voice started weak and I couldn’t record for 8 hours a day, so that’s probably why.  Some days I could only do one or two chapters at most, my voice was still recovering from previous days of recording for 6 or more hours.  That’s part of it, your vocal chords are a muscle that need to be strengthened over time.  By the time I finished recording RotF, I was doing pretty good!

But it basically took me a month to finish.

Sooooo…if this was for someone else’s project?  That’s $500-$1000/month.  Before taxes, not  counting medical insurance or anything.  That’s it.

That is not enough to live off of, even in a dual-income home.  Not even close.

So that has led to a…difficult decision.

Back to the Grind – Day Job

After figuring all of that out in January, and knowing that my medical and unemployment benefits were about to run out, I knew I had no choice – I had to go back to a day job.

I really, really didn’t want to.

And I’m so, so incredibly frustrated!!!!  Of course my body decided to get a new illness in the middle of all of this!  Of course I then had to re-build up my vocal chords afterwards and take longer than I should have to record Burning Skies!  Of course everything had to fight me every single step of the way!

At least, that’s been my thoughts lately.  I’m not happy about how it all played out.  This…this was supposed to be my chance.  This was supposed to be how I was able to become a full-time creative.  I didn’t expect to get rich, I didn’t want to get rich, I just wanted a sustainable income!

Maybe, someday, I still can.  It’ll be easier with ‘professional’ gigs, where I have an agent and a producer and I record my work, send it off for someone else to edit, and then move on to the next project.  Maybe, but that’ll mean trying to get an agent to represent me, just for starters.  That’s a big if.

But for now, I have to take care of myself and my family.  I have to make sure we don’t end up on the streets.  And let’s face it, with practically zero social safety nets in the U.S., that’d be a scary prospect.

So I started applying for jobs on indeed.  Sys Admin jobs.  It literally made me nauseous when I first started looking – I not only didn’t want to go back to a 9-5 job, I really didn’t want to go back to the immensely stressful Sys Admin career, where employers increasingly take advantage of employees, adding more and more work and hours without any added pay.

At one point, I started wondering about trying to find other jobs.  Maybe as a proofreader or copy editor.  I started looking at those jobs, and felt like I had a leg up on those, since my Bachelor’s degree was in English.  But a lot of it was ‘gig’ work or temporary contracts, not a reliable source of income at all.

Then I thought…what about technical writing?  I started looking into that.  It looked…promising.  I’d take a definite pay cut, tech writers aren’t paid nearly as much as sys admins, but it was more than I was getting from unemployment by a significant amount, and we’d already proven that, if we had to, we could make that work!  So, why not go for it?

I posted on my private Facebook about thinking about going tech writing as a career, not really thinking anything about it.  But then, that same day, an old co-worker called me up and said he was a manager on a program in dire need of a proper documentation program, and he knew and liked my work in that regard (I’ve always built up the documentation programs for any job I was a sys admin at), and he wanted to hire me!

A few weeks later, and here I am, about to start not just a new day job, but a new career!

I’m excited.  I’m terrified.  I’m anxious.  I’m all over the board about it!  But one thing is for sure – I’ll be glad to have a steady paycheck again.

For more than one reason.

What’s Next?

Remember how I was saying that my neighborhood was getting worse and worse with noise?  Well, honestly, worse and worse in general.  This apartment complex is utter shit, the management company that took over after we moved in is horrible (Seriously, second time Greystar has taken over an apartment while we lived there and turned it to shit!  How are they surviving as a company??)

So with a steady paycheck again, we’re gonna move to a better apartment/neighborhood.  One that doesn’t stress us out, and one that won’t interfere with my ability to record audio.

Until then?  No more recording.  It’s too frustrating.

But once I’m settled into my day job and get a new daily routine going, I will continue writing and publishing novels.  The Sword of Dragons needs book 5, and Project Sirius book 2 needs to come out this year!

I don’t plan on publishing Sirius 2 until after we move, though.

I’m going to probably pull back from Instagram – it’s just not worth the effort I put into my videos, I get no engagement.

I’m probably going to delete my Patreon.  Absolutely no one seems to give a shit about it or has any interest in supporting me through that platform, so no sense keeping it online.

But overall, for the next few months, I’m going to focus on two things – moving, and mental/emotional health.

I’ve worked for employers who don’t give two shits about me for too long.  I’m hopeful that this new job won’t be like that (the manager’s a pretty cool guy!), but either way, I’m going to focus more on taking care of me, and being healthy and better.

I have no doubt that this new year is going to be full of even more change.

I’ll try to be better about keeping you all in the loop here.  After all, this blog is a better avenue for that – I’m a writer!  Writing is what I do best :)

Assuming anyone is still around reading this, and assuming anyone has read all the way to the bottom of this rather long post, thank you for your support and patience!

Until next time!
-Jon Wasik

…And Then There Was 2023.

I thought 2020 was crazy.

Then I thought 2021 was bad.

2022 was all, “Hold my beer.”

And then there was 2023.

Long-time readers of this blog will recognize that beginning.  Except for the 2023 part, that’s how I started the annual “Looking Back, Looking Forward” blog last year.

I also talked about how every year seems to have been worse than the previous year.  This year is no exception.  Maybe not the worst, but if not, then it was a damned-tough contender.

And I’ll be honest, I’m scared of 2024.  If every year just keeps getting worse…what will come of 2024?

But.  And this is a big but.  There was some really good stuff that came of 2023, too.  I’ve always been taught to take the bad with the good, so for this first part, I’ll try to ensure I include both :)

NO SURGERIES!!!

That’s right, for the first time in three years, 2023 was a year of no surgeries!!!!  Err, for me, anyway.  Beck (my wife) was a different story, but we’ll get to that in a bit.  My hips, both of them, have been doing fairly well this year!  And though I’ll never be 100% again with them, and they did cause some minor issues during my first vacation in years, they’re both better than they’ve been in a very, very long time.

Vacation?  Why yes, I finally had a vacation!  But that’s skipping ahead a bit.  Hey, I’m ADHD, I’m allowed to jump around a bit on you ;)  For the moment, however, as much as I’d love to say I had no hospital visits this year…

The Most Pain I Have Ever Experienced In My Life

Okay, at least at this point in my life, I have no enemies.  But if I did have enemies, I would never, ever wish the pain…of kidney stones upon them.

Because I experienced my first one this year, and oh my freaking goodness, I hope I never, ever experience it again.  One night in March, I suddenly woke up in intense back pain.  At first, I thought I’d twinged a muscle, and thought, “Ah, just gotta get through to morning to see a chiropractor.”  But the pain got worse.  And worse.  And worse.

I was having to walk around, move around, ibuprofen did nothing to help, and it just kept getting worse.  I started to fear something like a burst appendix or something.  So finally, at about 2:30AM or so, my wife took me to the ER.  Around that time, we began to suspect my symptoms were more indicative of a kidney stone, and as I was checking into the ER, barely coherent through the pain, they concurred and got me into CT right away to verify.  This was also the first time in my life (yes, including post-surgery recovery) when I was in so much pain that I got sick.

That was the first time in my life that I’ve ever been on morphine, and what a strange feeling that was, but I was soooooo grateful for the pain to go away.

In any case, the stone was small enough that I didn’t need surgery, buuuuut that meant going home and enduring pain until the stone passed.  It took nearly a week.  Which meant a week off of work.  A week I didn’t really have to spare.

This was on top of soooo much else going on in life.  This was after a year of post-op recovery, strep throat after strep throat, COVID….basically, I was exhausted.  And when I finally passed the stone and went back to work…I broke down.

And I took a few weeks off of work.  Unpaid.  Just to get some me time, some real and true rest.  Because why would I ever be given enough PTO to stay home sick, let alone recover from burnout?  Oh right, we live in the United States where employees get the shaft, especially non-Union employees….

Yeah.  I’m a bit bitter about it.  And it only gets worse, but again…Spoilers.

Voice Acting Advanced Class

One of the better experiences this year was that I was able to take an Advanced Voice Over class, and at the end, I got to do some acting for an industry professional!  The class and that final experience went very well, and I went away from the class feeling very good about my future as a voice actor!

And Then More Work Shenanigans…

I’ve wanted to go part-time for my day-job for some time and focus more on voice acting and writing, and after that advanced class, I was ready to ask my day-job for just that.  I’m a computer sys admin (Windows-based) and I’d gotten all of my systems to a point to where I could safely and comfortably reduce my hours…or so I thought.

I won’t go into many details, but suffice it to say, work decided to…change things up a lot.  And then do a reorg and put me under a…difficult manager.  So that put everything in that regard on pause.

Allergy Shots and New Book Release!

On the positive side, I released the first book in a new series in 2023, Project Sirius!  The Awakening by itself, and the series in general, is something I’m very proud of and very excited to share with the world!  It’s not all good things…I’ve come to realize, starting with The Awakening, thaaaat despite getting plenty of people to read advanced reader copies (a first for me), getting them all to follow through on leaving reviews on release day is…a challenge.  And relying on others to help me out is futile.  But at least two folks did, and I’ve come to realize that I have at least three vocally-dedicated fans :)  So that makes me happy!

And I started allergy shots this year!  I knew I needed to do something, because in voice over class, it was negatively affecting my performances sometimes, even with antihistamines, so I decided to take the plunge.  Besides which, we want to adopt a kitty someday :)

Several months later now, and I’m responding well!  I’m not yet ready to pet cats, per-se, but I can be in the same house as one now without having to take antihistamines!  So that’s progress!

DISNEYLAND!

After having to put it off over and over and over again, we decided early in 2023 that we were going to Disney with out best friends from Cali!  Originally we planned on Disney World, but we had to scale back a bit for obvious reasons (see shit year 2023 above).  Still, we made it!  In August and September, we headed down to the Los Angeles area, spent three days in Disneyland with our friends, and several more days in SoCal enjoying ourselves (and getting a LOT of steps in on our step counters!)

Among the awesome surprises our friends gave us was a stay at an actual Disneyland resort, The Grand Californian, as well as an appointment to build our own lightsabers in the Star Wars land, Galaxy’s Edge!

Speaking of….Galaxy’s Edge was such an incredible experience!  It was our first time seeing that, and as a life-long nerd and Star Wars fan, it was a dream come true!  It was a sorely-needed positive in a dreary and difficult year!  I’ll treasure those memories forever, and I can’t wait to see the one in Disney World next :D  (Just…you know, no idea when we’ll be able to make it.)

And Then, Even More Work Shenanigans………

So things had settled at work enough after the mid-year shake-up that I was feeling confident about asking to go part-time again.  My immediate supervisor, who was awesome, was on-board with it, and we had come up with a plan to present it to that new manager I mentioned before.

I kid you not, only a week before I planned to do so…we had a company-wide meeting and announcement.  And I, along with many other folks, was furloughed.

Well.  Instead of part-time voice acting, why not full-time?

That was the plan after that jarring and hard day.  But life had other plans…

More Medical Fun….

After I was furloughed in the beginning of October, I decided to take a couple days to absorb this sudden, life-altering event, and then I decided to take advantage of the (albeit unpaid) break from work, and go full-time voice acting.  I recorded and edited Rise of the Forgotten in October, and by mid-November, it was available for purchase!

Buuuuut…November.  The entire month of November, I had a major issue with my throat.  We thought strep, Doctor thought strep, but all tests came back negative.  And nothing seemed to fix it.  More tests for other illnesses came back negative.

Finally, towards the end of November, my doc asked about acid reflux, and I realized then that, yeah, I had heartburn every single day, and it’s been a problem for a long time (in fact, taking all those antacids back in March is probably what strongly contributed to my kidney stones).

So I got on some meds for acid reflux, and within a few days, my throat finally started going back to normal.

But that still meant that for the entire month of November, I didn’t record anything.  I had planned to record Burning Skies in November, and then in December, start auditioning for other roles to start making an income.

Instead, I started recording Burning Skies in December.  And then…well, life.  And also, once I finished the 2-week course of meds for my stomach acid, and despite making lots of diet changes, the acid started coming back, and right before Christmas, my voice started going out again…

I have 12 chapters left to record in Burning Skies.  Maaaaaybe next week, after the new year, I’ll finally be able to finish.

But what does this mean for my future?

Beck’s Surgery

On another note, part of what’s made this year so hard, and the previous years…is the political situation in the United States.  The ultra-right-wing conservatives have been making life scary, especially for women.  And when Roe v. Wade was overturned, my wife decided that she didn’t want to risk it.

So we made appointments, and got her scheduled to ensure no one could ever get her pregnant.  Due to a family emergency with the surgeon, that appointment was delayed, but eventually we got her in and the surgery was a success!  There was a scare the next day that brought us back to the ER, but it thankfully was a false alarm, and Beck’s recovery has, thankfully, been relatively smooth.

Let me tell you, having been on the other end so frequently over the past 3 1/2 years…I never took what she went through with me for granted, but it was a scary experience seeing my wife go through that, especially when we had to run to the ER the next day.

I really really hope we have no more medical emergencies in 2024…

Speaking of 2024.

2024 – What Do I Do Now?

What do I do?

I…don’t know.

See, here’s the thing.  As a furloughed employee, I still get medical benefits, and I’m on unemployment.  But if my employer doesn’t take me back in January, I lose the insurance.  As you can tell, I can’t really go without insurance.  And buying it from the ‘marketplace’ is expensive, and, well, we don’t really have money to spare.

Do I risk it all and keep going with the voice acting, hoping I start making enough to afford independent insurance?  Or do I look for another Sys Admin job somewhere?  Or do I try to start a career in something else, knowing that, for the moment, we’re surviving on a lower income, so we could probably weather a start wage in a new career field?

The honest answer?  I don’t know.

I started a Patreon in early December hoping to get help, but, like I mentioned earlier with Project Sirius, I’m finding out that I can’t rely on anyone else to help.  Zero subscriptions to my Patreon.  No one’s interested.  No one cares.

At least, that’s how it feels.

Sooo…I don’t know what to do.  I don’t know where to go from here.  I don’t know what 2024 will hold for me.  Any plans I have are more-or-less on hold.

Project Sirius book 2 is written, but beta readers who have had it for months haven’t gotten back to me, sooo…I may just say hell with it and after another round of editing without feedback, I’ll publish it.  But that means buying new cover art.  That’s expensive when you have such a low income.

I wish I could look to 2024 optimistically, but the past 3 1/2 years have beaten that out of me, and if I’m being totally honest, that’s one of the most depressing things to come out of 2023.  I want my hope back.  I need my hope back.

I need 2024 to be the year that everything finally turns around.

I’m tired…

Finding Opportunities – Shifting Gears After Setbacks

The title I just wrote for this blog sounds like a bad advertisement.  You know the ones, I see videos for them all the time on Instagram.  “Turning Setbacks Into Opportunities!” or something like that.

But, well…sometimes that’s all you can do in life.  And here I am, facing the need to do that.

I was furloughed from my day job last week.  If you’re not sure what that is, it’s basically a temporary, unpaid leave of absence, with the intent of bringing the employee back after the event causing the furlough passes.  In most cases, that ‘event’ is financial difficulties (see Federal Government’s Inability To Pass A Budget as an example).

And like most furloughs, I’m unsure how long it’ll last.  Could be weeks.  Could be months.

So I had a very important decision to make.  After spending a day and a half absorbing and processing this difficult turn of events, I decided to do what I’ve been wanting to do for a long time – do something creative full-time.

But not writing.  Because I’m not profitable on my writing, let alone making nearly enough to live off of.  I wish I were, but I’m not even close.

Instead, I’m turning to the other endeavor I started working towards last year.

Voice Acting.

Last week, starting Wednesday, I’ve begun treating voice acting as a full-time job.  For now, I’m building my vocal cords back up on my own novels, starting with Rise of the Forgotten.  Fun fact, your vocal cords are literally muscles.  If you don’t use them much, they grow weak.

After about 5 hours of audiobook recording on Wednesday, my vocal cords were tired!  So I have to build up my strength, and what better way than to do it on my own books?

So that’s what I’m doing now.  As soon as I finish this blog and post it, I’m warming up my voice and getting back to it!  And if I can maintain the rate I was going last week, I hope to be finished with Rise of the Forgotten sometime next week, at least recording.  Editing will, naturally, take longer.

I’ve also decided to try to be more active on social media.  Everything on Instagram has turned to videos these days – if you’re posting photos, no one seems to care anymore.  Which is ridiculous, it’s freaking Instagram!  If you want videos, go to TikTok!  (Which, 90% of the videos on Instagram are reposts of TikTok, so…really, it’s stupid that this has become a thing!)

In any case, you’ll find me a lot more on Instagram and Facebook in the coming weeks!  Click the links below to find your way there :)  Already, you’ll find a video on this very topic, and my first excerpt from recording an audiobook!

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/authorjonwasik

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kataar2002/

Thanks for reading!
-Jon Wasik

The Creative Urge To Be And Do More

Hello, there!

I honestly am not sure how to start this post…it’s just something that’s been on my mind a lot lately, and I felt the need to write about it.  As you might imagine from that opening, this is going to be a little bit more personal than my usual blog posts ;)

I find myself perpetually frustrated with life, and that frustration grows day-by-day, month-by-month, year-by-year, and it feels like it’s reaching a crescendo.

You see…I want to do more.  More creative work.

But the most frustrating aspect isn’t that I want to do more of one thing – I mean, I DO want to write, more than anything else – but I want to do more of so many different creative things!

I’ve started and then had to stop so many creative endeavors outside of writing, not because I’ve lost interest, but because I’ve had to prioritize my endeavors.  I hate that I have to prioritize them.  I loath that I can’t be creative all the time.

Those are some strong words.  I don’t use them lightly.  Like I said, I feel like the frustration is reaching a crescendo right now.

What I’d Do With $10 Million Dollars

Most everyone dreams of winning the lottery jackpot, and in this day and age, with skyrocketing inflation, that desire is probably stronger than ever for everyone.

There’s a part of me that wishes we lived in an era of patrons again.  I don’t know if I could actually merit a patron or not, but I’d like to think my creative endeavors have attracted some fans (there’s at least a handful of you who regularly like my blog posts here, and I am ever so grateful for that!)  I wish an interested (and, obviously, rich) patron would just be like, “I like all the things you do, so here, live off of my dime and do what you do best!”  But I’m not sure what’s more wishful thinking, that desire or the desire to win the jackpot ;)

And I know that Patreon would net me very little – I don’t know how to market myself, so getting enough people to subscribe when I’m not actually constantly delivering stuff on a month-to-month basis?  Not at all likely to ever happen.

But what would I do if money were no object, or less of an issue?  What have I done in the past, what have I been forced to give up just to make ends meet?

You all know the first answer to that question – I’d write, more.  I’d write more stories more often, much faster.  Instead of having one or two novels in the pipeline at any given time, I’d have many.  I’d finish the Sword of Dragons saga in a matter of maybe two years.  I’d write more Project Sirius.  I’d write that Cyberpunk/Dystopian series I’ve been building in my head.  I’d even go back and try to salvage Chronicles of the Sentinels with new novels!

But what about endeavors outside of writing?

Let’s start with the most recent, the thing that has disheartened me the most to give up (for now).  Voice acting.

I had a plan to transition from my I.T. career to that, slowly, carefully.  I’m not one to dive into new things and hope I land on my feet, I don’t have the courage and I couldn’t forgive myself if I failed and sent my wife and I into destitution.

But that plan was thwarted, by a major shakeup at work that has left me burned out and with no visible way forward with the voice acting, not yet anyway.  I’ve had to postpone it, and I’ve no idea for how long.  There’s too much uncertainty now, too much chaos.

I want to narrate my books.  I want to narrate other books.  I love doing voices, and the more classes I took, the more I fell in love with voice acting!  So I’ll come back to this someday.  Once I reconfigure my plans again and figure out a path forward.  As soon as I can find a path forward.

Yes, I made this, using Unreal Engine 5!

But that’s not all I want to do more of.  Last year, I became obsessed with Unreal Engine 5, as a way to fulfill so many aspects of my creativeness!  It helped fulfill my itch to make art, for one, while engaging my technical and engineering side.  I’d spent years learning 3D Graphic Design and Animation as a hobby during my college days, but hadn’t exercised that muscle much until UE5.  I loved it, I obsessed over it, and followed so many tutorials to create an incredible scene!

On top of that, my desire to build a shareable environment of my own creation grew, and I had dreams to use UE5 to build out the world of the Sword of Dragons, for starters.  Something I’d once done before using Minecraft, but the limitations of which frustrated me and, for now, I have paused.  UE5 could have and still could be a way to build that world out.  I even had the idea of using UE5 to make new covers for the Sword of Dragons novels.

Except…when my frustrations with my career and inability to work on creative stuff more frequently reached a certain level, I had to find a way out, a way forward.  That’s when I decided to pursue voice acting, and that meant setting UE5 aside for a time.  I’ve forgotten so much about how to use UE5 that I’d have to go through all of the tutorials all over again (though probably a lot faster, as muscle memory kicked in).

Another creative endeavor?  Once upon a time, I started learning how to do leather working.  I even made a belt and a few rudimentary bracers.  But a combination of time, money, medical issues, and living situation made it impossible to follow that dream.  And my leather tools sit mostly unused for now (Beck has used them more than I have!)

I Love To Build.  I Need To Build.

It all boils down to a need in my soul to build worlds.  Fictional worlds.  I write them.  I design them before I write them.  I draw them on paper.  I build them in video games.  I build them in 3D art.  And even my interest in leather working came from a desire to cosplay as my own characters.

I need to see my worlds built, and I need to share them with others!  It isn’t a want, it is an absolute need.

So every setback, every instance of being held back and being denied the time, money, and energy to create drives me nuts!

And today, more than any other day so far, I feel like I’m being held down and forced to endure torture, leaving all of my needs unfulfilled, juuuust out of reach.  If only there was more time.  More money.  More freedom.

I am a creative who isn’t allowed to create.

Looking Back to 2019, Hobbling Into 2020

Hi everyone!

In less than 10 hours, 2020 shall be upon us, and then all of the “2020 vision” jokes can stop!  Or, you know, continue undaunted ;)

As I always do, I’d like to take a moment to look back upon the past year, and see what’s over the horizon.  So come with me on a journey through time, from past, to present, and into the future!

2019 – Self-Publishing Success, NaNoWriMo, Home Purchase, Injury and Surgery

Photo by Beck Wasik

In November 2018, I took a gamble and published 2nd editions of my first two novels, along with an anthology of short stories.  It was a risky move – why would books that have already been out sell better as 2nd editions?  But the vastly-improved covers, the better edits, and the more aggressive marketing campaign paid off.

In 2019, I made more in sales and Kindle Unlimited reads in a single year than in all of the previous years combined!  If there is no other reason to, then that alone is reason enough to celebrate!

But there’s more – I started writing more regularly again, and with one last hurrah with NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month,) I finished the first draft of book 3 of the Sword of Dragons saga!  By far, this was the most complicated story I have ever told, with countless moving parts and story threads, all converging in the final quarter of the novel.

I’m so excited!

Unlike 2018, however, in 2019 I barely traveled.  A couple of small road trips here and there, one of which was to see family, but otherwise our great focus was on finally getting out of apartments, and into a house of our own.  It was effort, time, and money well spent, and while our little corner of Earth may not be perfect, it’s ours :)

I wish I could say that all of 2019 was positive, but unfortunately, this was not so.  Towards the end of summer, as I walked through the kitchen, suddenly my right hip screamed in pain and I fell to the floor, unable to stand or walk.  While I slowly regained the ability to use my leg over the next couple of days, I knew something was terribly wrong.

After multiple visits to multiple doctors, x-rays, MRI’s, and CT scans, the doctors came to the conclusion that I had a hip impingement and torn labrum caused by a deformed femur joint.  Apparently I’ve had this all of my life, but over time it has been wearing on the labrum, until this year when it finally gave up and began to separate from the hip itself.

Which led to an arthroscopic surgery, my first major surgery ever.  In a way, it wasn’t too terribly invasive – two small cuts, one to stick a scope in, the other to stick instruments in to work on the hip.  But it required a lot of work on my hip, including ‘tacking’ the labrum up, reshaping the bone, and generally cleaning things up in the hip.  It essentially crippled me for several weeks, and a full recovery will take about six months.

It’s been a difficult time for me, someone who has always placed importance on my independence and ability to contribute around the house.  My wife has had to shoulder so much,  and I am so grateful for all that she has done.  She’s taken care of me, worked tirelessly to keep the house in order, and held me through the hardest nights.  My wonderful Starshine :)

2020 – Recovery, Publication, and Bringing Sentinels Back

What’s in store for 2020?  For starters, the long road to recovery shall continue.  As my hip and leg regains strength, it’s time to get fit again.  The injury was already starting to rear its ugly head in the 4 years prior to that terrible summer day, and I’ve exercised less and less as a result.

So 2020 will be a year that I focus on my physical health and wellness, getting back to the fitness level I once worked so long and hard to achieve.  Long hikes, climbing, that sort of thing, I miss doing all of it, and I’m looking forward to being back to my old self by summer!

Furthermore, unless I get horribly negative feedback from beta readers, 2020 will be the year that book 3 is published!  As before, it’ll be self-published, but the cover is already prototyped and ready for implementation, so it’s all a matter of editing and proofreading!

Images Source – http://bramleegwater.deviantart.com

As for the “Bringing Back the Sentinels” comment…I’ve had wonderful inspiration and ideas for revitalizing the Chronicles of the Sentinels modern fantasy book 1, Legacy!  I intend to write a more comprehensive blog on the changes coming, but I plan to fully re-write the first book to address the massive shortcomings of the original.  As an interested agent put it a few years ago, the premise was good, but the characters especially needed work.

There’s a lot of other great things ahead, including a trip for a Doctor Who convention, but that, my friends, is another story :)

Until then, Happy New Year to everyone!  May 2020 be the year of positive change for you :)

Thanks for reading!
-Jon Wasik

Going Back to the Basics

Hi everyone!

It’s been too long since my last post.  But that’s the thing about blogging lately, I feel like I’ve lost sight of some of my original goals with this blog, while greatly achieving others.

The trials and triumphs of writing, searching for an agent, and getting published.  That was what this blog was originally supposed to be about, all the way back in 2014.  I was certainly a different person then, and my life was very different.

I never found an agent, though I came close a couple of times.  I have, however, been published.  I think my decision to become self published was one of the best decisions I’ve ever made.  It’s given me incredible insights into this industry, made me realize that there’s just so much more to writing than I ever realized.

Having said all of that, there’s one part of my blog’s stated goals that I’ve greatly neglected in recent months.  Writing.

Granted, we bought a house recently, and as anyone who’s been through that knows, there’s a lot involved in that (including fixing up everything that was wrong with said-house in the first days after taking ownership.)

And we’re still not fully settled in.

But that’s meant I haven’t written anything in months.  At least since early February, if not longer.

Furthermore, sometimes I feel like I’ve spent too much time and effort trying to advertise my published books on this blog, when that wasn’t one of the original goals.  Sure, sharing my celebrations and events involved in marketing is part of it, but…well, all in all…I think it’s time I took a break from blogging.  Again.

I first started considering this after I read a blog post by Rachelle Gardner.  Her words resonated with me, and I realized that I felt like blog writing, right now anyway, felt too much like a chore.  The joy I used to feel in blogging was gone.

Thinking even more on it, I realize that is because every time that I’ve spent time writing a blog, I felt like I could have used those precious minutes to write stories.  And over the past 2 or 3 years, writing time has been scarce.

Of course, there’s a flip side to that…what do they say about writing?  That to be a good writer, you need to write from experience, and that means going out there and experiencing life.  And I certainly have done that in the past 3 years!  I’ve had more adventures, experienced love like never before, seen and done things I’ve only dreamt of before!

Photo by Wayne Adams of Death’s House Productions

It’s made me a better writer.  And now, more than ever, I feel like the time is right to take advantage of that.  Now is the time to write stories again.

That’s who I am at heart, a writer.  So I need to go back to my roots, and focus on that.  Rediscover that part of me.

Does this mean I’m shutting this blog down?  Nope.  It just means I’m taking an extended break for now.

But I’ll be back.  That much I can promise you.  My journey is still just starting, and I still want to share it with you all :)

Until then, thanks for reading, and thanks for being awesome!  See you next time!

-Jon Wasik

The Fall of 2018, The Rise of 2019

Hi everyone,

I usually finish up the year with a ‘looking back, looking forward’ post, and this, the last Sunday of the year, is no different…except this time, it is.

Nothing has been the same this year, and it’s been one of the best, and one of the hardest.  I think I said something similar at the end of last year…little did I know how aptly that would describe 2018.

It began with loss.

In the beginning of 2018, my mother passed away.  We knew it was coming, we had known for a long time, but nothing could have prepared me for how it would hit me, or how it has stayed with me throughout the year.

Even now, with Christmas, my birthday, and New Years, even when I’m not thinking specifically about her, I feel this immense, pervasive emptiness.

And perhaps the most frustrating part about it is that this should be one of the happiest years of my life.  This was the year I got married to my Starshine!!

Photo by Danielle Lirette

The saying often goes, your wedding is one of the happiest days of your life, and for me, it truly was :)  I don’t think I ever actually relayed the full story of our geeky, fun-filled, beautiful wedding.  The weather was perfect, the venue was fantastic, our hotel was great, and it was a perfect turnout, a small wedding like we’d hoped.

She is my squishy!

Then came the honeymoon, which was a mixture of good and bad.  We’ve already decided we need a do-over!  But despite the bad that happened, I hold a lot of fond memories from that week and a half, and for some reason today especially, I’ve been thinking a lot about our adventures in Orlando :)

By far, Disney World was the best!!  It was my first-ever Disney experience, and despite how bad the weather was most of the time we were there, it was a blast!  And exhausting, but in a good way :)

This was one of many trips I took in 2018, beginning with the trip to NM for my mother’s funeral, then Orlando for our Honeymoon.  Next came a trip to Los Angeles for my best friend’s birthday, and also my second ever Disney experience since we went to Nick’s favorite place, Disneyland!

While I definitely prefer Disney World due to its size and scope, our adventure at Disneyland was just about perfect!  The weather was great, there were surprisingly few people despite it being a Friday before a holiday weekend, and we barely waited 15 minutes in any line!  Topped by an amazing dinner in a restaurant overlooking the Pirates of the Caribbean ride, the food was fantastic and the company even more so :)

And then not long after came my fourth trip, a work-related trip that took me to Huntsville, Alabama.  Little did I know how much NASA stuff was out there, and being able to stand beneath a fully-erect Apollo rocket was an awe-inspiring moment!!  I only wish my wife could have been there with me for that experience.

To top off this eventful year, I ended things by publishing three novels at once!  What started as an attempt to refresh my work turned into a much longer, multi-year effort to rebrand the Sword of Dragons, and while I still am far from my goal of making a living off of writing, I’m happy to say that this venture has brought me a lot closer than I was before!

Now we come to it, the end of a truly roller coaster year (with lots of actual roller coasters!)  I look back, and realize why I feel so exhausted, and why my emotions are so crazy right now.  So much good, so much hardship.  Even my holiday from work for the Christmas and New Years holiday has been tumultuous.

What do I want for 2019?  Relaxation.  Am I likely to get it?  Well…

Looking Ahead to 2019

2019 may very well be another year without me publishing a new novel.  I’ve been working on book 3 of the Sword of Dragons series, and as of writing this, I’m 7 chapters in.  But Kailar’s story has been fighting me and I’ve basically scrapped my original plan for her in book 3.  Which means I’m kind of making it up as I go for her chapters.

I also don’t want to rush it.  I have a title and even a cover set to go for it, but I want to write the best story that I can, and I want to make sure it is as polished as possible.

What I AM happy to report is that I’m headed back to the convention scene, at least for one time.  My wife and I have officially been accepted as vendors in the 2019 Whimsy Con in Denver!  Our favorite Steampunk convention, and a worthy successor to the former Anomaly Con where Beck and I met, this will be our first table together, with me selling my books, and Beck selling her jewelry and her first book.

Yes, you read that right, Beck’s first novel will be available by Whimsy Con!  :D  Click here to head on over to her blog to find out about her latest adventures with her book, and her planned release no later than March 1st!

Shortly after that, comes perhaps our biggest move yet since we met each other – we’re planning on buying a house!  Mostly because we’re tired of dealing with sub-standard apartments in the Denver area.  Truly, there are inadequate protections for renters in Denver and property owners get away with a lot of inky moves.  We even ended up getting the FCC involved in our dispute regarding exclusivity enforcement by CenturyLink in our current apartment complex, only to discover that our apartment complex had  been lying to us about it.

So we’re done with apartments in Denver.

Beyond that?  I’m not entirely sure where 2019 will take me.  It probably greatly depends on where we land with a house.  I don’t anticipate any big trips this year, since we need to conserve money, so probably just hunker down and focus on writing and voice acting.

Did I mention that yet, voice acting?  I’ve decided to move forward with recording audio books, and depending on how that goes, I may try my hand at other related ventures.  I’m also slated to be the MC for the Whimsy Con costume contest this year :)

So, now it’s just time to take in a deep breath, and plunge into 2019.  Here’s hoping for a great year!

Thanks for reading, thanks for staying with me, and thanks for your encouraging words through the hard times.  I really appreciate all of you!!  (PS: I just noticed, 205 followers!!  We passed 200!!!!  :D )

-Jon Wasik

Go For It, Even If You Don’t Believe In Yourself

Hi everyone, I’m back!

Photo by Danielle Lirette

Our wedding was wonderfully geeky, and we were very fortunate to have some incredible people participate in it and help us out!  It turned out to be a perfect day, with weather better than predicted, and nothing major going wrong.

However, I want to tell the story with pictures, and our photographer is still working to get our photos to us (the preview pictures she has shown us are incredible!)  But what I wanted to talk about today crosses from my wedding day to writing, and why you should never give up on yourself…

I Thought I Would Always Be Alone

My best friend (and best man) reminded me of something during the reception: when I was younger, I had a dream of a woman who was perfect for me.  My definition of what that might entail evolved over the years as I grew and changed as a person, but I knew what I wanted…

Image source – google.com

And as time passed, and rejections from women grew in number, I started to despair.  I started to believe that I was unlovable.  This led me to some pretty bad relationships that only reinforced my belief that I was unworthy.

…but I kept trying anyway.  I kept searching, even though I didn’t think anyone would ever think I was worth loving.  As the years and years and years passed, no matter how much I was rejected or how many bad dates I went on, even surviving an emotionally abusive relationship, I kept trying.

Character design and model: Beck Stewart. Photo by WeNeals Photography.

And then she was there.  The one who would one day become my wife.  Of course I didn’t know it at the time, and I remember thinking, even when I asked if I could add her to my Facebook, “she won’t ever be interested in me.”

That led to friendship…which 4 months later led to dating, and six months later led to engagement, and a year and 3 months later, marriage.

After more than two decades of searching and dating and trying and failing and being rejected, I finally found what I had searched for.  Someone who loved me, who believed I was worth loving.  And when I realized this last week, I knew that I had to pass the message on to everyone else…

Keep Going.  Never Give Up.  Even If You Don’t Believe

The same goes for writing.  Hell, the same goes for everything in life, but since this is a writing blog, let’s focus on that.

Writers get rejections, from agents and editors.  But does that mean you’re unworthy, that your stories aren’t worthy, and you should stop trying?  If JK Rowling had stopped trying after her first couple of rejections, Harry Potter would not be the phenomenon that it is today.

Writers get bad reviews, on Amazon and everywhere else.  Does this mean that their novel is really horrible and not worth reading?  If you get a few bad reviews, should you take it to heart and stop writing?  Everyone gets bad reviews.  Every book.  Take a look at your favorite book on Amazon, no matter how good it is, and you’ll find one-star reviews.  Even Ready Player One, which is now a major motion picture making millions, got one-star reviews.

What if you get published, or are self-published, and your books aren’t selling well?  Should you just…stop?  No.  First, harkening back to a blog I wrote about an author who re-branded his books, his initial publication was getting him few sales.  When he learned from his mistakes and re-branded his book, he started selling thousands of copies.

If you don’t believe in yourself, but you’re still passionate, GO FOR IT!  Don’t stop!!!  Keep doing it, if for no other reason than your love of it, your passion, your desire to make it, your desire to write and get readers.

Keep.  Going.

Because even if it takes decades, one day, whether you believe in yourself or not, someone else might.  And then your books will sell.  And you’ll write more.  And more.  And more.  And before you know it, you’ve achieved your ultimate goals.

The other option is to give up.  But then you’ll be left wondering for the rest of your life, “What if?”

Photo by my new Mother-in-Law :)

If I gave up…I’d never have met my Starshine.  Never would have asked for her hand in marriage.  Never cried the happiest tears of my life when I watched her walk down the aisle towards me.

What might you risk never seeing if you give up?

What might you never get to experience if you don’t try?

“What if I fail?”  Rubbish question.  “What if I succeed?”  Now that is a question worth pondering…

Goodbye My Angel, Goodbye Dear Mother

Dear friends…I don’t really know how to start this, I don’t really know what to say.  This past weekend, my mother passed from this life to the next.

I’ve been trying to figure out what to write…and for the first time in my life, I’m having trouble with it.  I’ve been lucky in life to have two supportive and caring parents, and I’ll miss her terribly.  I do miss her terribly…

Her name was perfectly chosen.  She was an angel…  What I wrote in the dedication of my first book holds true, she taught me to be strong, to never give up, no matter how hard life became.

I hope you’ll all understand, it may be another week or so before I return to regular blogging.  Thank you for always being supportive, dear readers.  I’ll be back, I promise.

-Jon

2017 Hardships, 2018’s Promises

Hi everyone!

7 hours from now (where I live,) 2017 will become a memory, and that memory is full of mixed feelings for me.  Some of my greatest joys, some of my hardest sorrows.  Today being the last day, I thought I would end things with my annual ‘glancing back, and looking forward’ blog :)

Writing Without Publishing

After two years in a row of publishing, 2017 was the first year where I didn’t publish a single new novel.  And for much of the 2nd half of 2017, that meant depression for me…I already had a plan moving forward for my writing career, but I knew nothing would be ready for publication in ’17.

However, a recent article I’ve read by another author has reminded me that there’s something more important than pumping out novel after novel like a factory.  Writing is an artisan career, and sustainable writing is more important than mass production.  But I want to spend an entire blog writing more on that.  For now, let me just pass on the word – you don’t have to write 20 novels a year to be a successful author.  That leads to burn out.  Just do the best you can, and don’t forget to live a little.

Burning Skies Cover Preview

On the bright side, I have made considerable headway this year, especially in the 2nd half, towards the 2nd editions of the Sword of Dragons books 1 and 2, as well as finally getting the Orc War Campaigns anthology ready for print!

I’ve learned a lot about the market, far more than I ever anticipated, and I think I’m a little more prepared to move forward in my writing career in 2018.

Engage!

One of the greatest highlights of ’17 was the day I proposed to my beautiful Starshine, Beck Stewart!  Since that day, we have moved in together and begun living and planning our lives together.  After more than a year together, and nearly a year engaged, I am happier than I ever thought possible with my relationship.

Fellow author, artist, geek, and weird like me ;) She has been my rock, my muse, my voice of reason.  She’s helped me keep the demons back, helped my writing move forward, and encouraged me every single day.  Thank you, Moon of my Life!

2018 – Three Books At Once?!

Rise of the Forgotten

With everything I have learned about writing, marketing, and cover art, I came to a decision in the last couple months: when I release the 2nd editions of the Sword of Dragons books, I plan to release them together, along with the Orc War Campaigns anthology.  That’s right, 3 books at one time!

As crazy as it sounds, it’s actually not a stretch, and in fact gives me the time I need to get everything prepared, and actually make the books look like they belong together, both with their covers and their interiors.

In fact, as of tomorrow, I’ll have finished editing Burning Skies!  At least, until I read through the proof copy.  I’m sure I’ll find more to fix with that.

But that’s my system – I have a proof of Rise of the Forgotten, and when I finish editing Burning Skies, I’ll order that proof while moving on to The Orc War Campaigns.  Once I finish that and order its proof, I’ll go back and read through Rise of the Forgotten’s proof copy, and so on.

When will these three be released?  I don’t know yet.  But I’m working quickly.

The Year I Get Married!

The first half of 2018 is going to be busy for another reason – my marriage is coming up fast!  And that means more and more of my time outside of work will need to be devoted to preparations.  I’m hoping I get proof copies of all 3 books before then, but I’m not going to rush.

That’s a difficult lesson 2016 and 2017 have taught me – rushing stories out isn’t the best idea.  Working under a deadline is one thing, but as I mentioned before, sustainable writing is more important.  I don’t want to burn myself out.

I know this is a writing blog, but I hope you all will understand if I indulge now and again and post news regarding my upcoming wedding :)

Happy New Year!

Thank you to everyone who visited in 2017!  Much to my surprise, my blog has received more new followers and views this year than in 2016, and I’m so glad you all have found your way here!

See you all next year!
-Jon Wasik