2012: The Beginning of the End (An honest look back)

I must mention at the beginning of this post that all can not be revealed here.  With more eyes on what I put on the web these days, I will be unable to totally rehash 2012 in full.  It breaks my heart to have to hold back on the truth, but that is the way things are.  Should I ever become a self-made billionaire writer who answers only to himself, then I can fully disclose all the obstacles I had to overcome to deliver Monarch this year.

The most disheartening thing to me right now is the fact that there are still errors in the story.  They are mostly small errors that should have been fixed prior to the release of the paperback.  I own up to my mistakes and can blame no one but myself.  

Had time not been so sensitive with this story I might not have self-published.  In truth, I was editing up until after midnight on December 8th.  Could all four stages have used a last Quality Control run through?  Absolutely!  As writer and publisher it is my responsibility to deliver the best product possible.  Had certain things, which I am not at liberty to discuss until I put them in my memoirs some time from now, happened differently over the past three years, those errors likely would not be there.  But they are for now.  What you see in the pages of Monarch was what I could do with the time restrictions I placed upon myself.  And again, it is my responsibility to go back and fix any and all errors after the new year.  

I would like to be able to lie to you and tell you that all these other great moments took place this year.  That would just not be true.  This year has been a battle for me.  While I am glad to say that I survived, I cannot say that I am better off than I was this time last year.  I would elaborate, but again I am obligated to not go into detail at this time.  

You can see my frustration.  How do I properly paint a picture of the year that was, if I cannot disclose all that took place.  The truth is I am unable to go in depth into 2012.  You will have to accept that some of what I am unable to mention involves others and I do not want to hurt them or myself by speaking truths that might affect the future for them or myself.  Such is life, no?

One reason I felt the need to publish Monarch was because of Cipher, the story my main character, Ginger, reads in Monarch.  I wrote Cipher back in 2000 as a screenplay but did nothing with it, other than make a short film trailer.  As the past decade unfolded I always had Cipher in the back of my mind.

It wasn't until 2005 that I began to notice similarities in the story as was taking place in the real world.  Sounded crazy to me, so I let it go as coincidence and as my love for Cipher potentially making something out of nothing. Years later, as I was working on the 1st draft of Monarch I implemented my perceived coincidences as those of the readers of Cipher.

Monarch has not even been out in its entirety for even a month and I have found a not-so-happy coincidence with Monarch and our present reality.  In just over 12 hours our country will be going over the fiscal cliff.  Whether we can prevent it or not, no one knows just yet.  However, there are two moments in Monarch that seem eerily similar to what may potentially take place at midnight to our economy.  I don't want to ruin the story, but if you read Monarch I hope you'll take a moment to think about the big picture when that not-so-happy coincidence takes place.

If I were not a self-publishing author, I would let someone else point such a thing out. It would surely sound better coming from someone else, but there is no one else lining up to point these things out.  So here I am.  These so-called coincidences are evident even in many of the books that I read.  My mother even mentioned a book she was reading that had a reference to something in current events. We look for relevance in all that we consume.  Hopefully our country and the world won't go over the fiscal cliff tonight.  God knows I need my tax refund just as much as anyone else.  But if we do flip the page to a new year and no agreement has been made, I will not smile and say I told you so, because I never actually did.  Symbolism and metaphors are not the same as what will be happening to my wallet.  They aren't, no matter how similar the images. While it is true my main character is a metaphor for something larger than herself, what happens to her is her journey and not the journey of all of us.

This year has been an absolute whirlwind and I am thrilled that it has come to an end.  My hopes are high for 2013.  I am no longer on the clock in regard to a writing project.  Can't even begin to tell you what a burden that was.

For those that are interested, I have two stories that I hope to do something with next year. One is a screenplay follow-up to Monarch.  The story is about James Ruth and is better suited for the screen than the page.  The other is entitled Psykosis.  It is much shorter than Monarch but touches on some of the same issues as my first novel.  These three stories make up my Psychological Apocalypse trilogy.  I find the human mind fascinating and I believe it is the frontier of the near future.  These three stories mark the old world of the human mind and memory, the pitfalls if you will.

Hope you are as excited about the new year as I am.  I look forward to discussing things in greater detail on the other side.  Hopefully, it's not as we are plummeting toward another great depression.  Take a deep breath and embrace whatever comes next. We'll face it together.

Happy New Year!

-aap

Happy Psychological Apocalypse!

Whew!  We made it.

All the naysayers will have their day of "I told you so's." And so they should.

As for those who had been waiting with bated breath for this day... slowly emerge from your bunkers and rejoin the world.  Any embarrassment will pass.

While there is certainly no shame in clinching up over what might possibly have happened, it is time to transition into another way of  using that energy.  What we do from here on out is up to us.  Because the only thing standing in our way now is ourselves.

"If only I had..." is no longer a viable excuse.  The future lay beyond this day's threshold and new plans need be made.

It was so much fun working on a story that had today 12/21/2012 as the psychological apocalypse for my main character.  Writing about the future was both fun and frustrating at the same time.  The future is much like a blank page.  While anything theoretically might take place, the hand that holds the pen that makes its mark upon the page has a history.  In that case, what is written may come with surprises but is always in relation to something that has happened prior.

The media's minimizing the importance of this day over the past few months has been intriguing to watch.  It showed how we might be coaxed into dealing with other events in the future.  Suppressing anxiety is a good thing.  But doing so by eliminating discussion is scary on another level.

As we continue on through this holiday season and into the new year, let us all be thankful for what we have right now, because no one knows when it might all be gone.

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays everyone!

-aap

FOUR

Four days and counting until 12/21/2012.  Or did you think I would let you forget?

Admittedly, I have had to begin thinking about how to promote Monarch once Friday has come and gone.  So much of my focus over the past three years has been focused on the 21st.

My surprise this year has been how willing most everyone has been to simply dismiss this Friday as if it were nothing.  It certainly is not nothing.  Another surprise is how unwilling the majority of people are to take a real look at themselves and the world around them.  Are we all so interesting and self-involved that we do not see our own place in the world?

I am as guilty as anyone of enclosing myself in a bubble from time to time.  We all do this because of the importance we place upon our goals at any given moment.  Be it a much-needed vacation, family, retirement, love, video games, you name it.  The end of a man-made cycle of time that coincides with astronomical alignments and potential earth changes just has to take a backseat.  But it is there for all of us in the rear-view mirror, so close that it's wanting to move into the front seat and drive.

Anthropologists, Sociologists and Psychologists are having a field day watching how people are reacting to our proximity to this Friday.  They are keen to see how we all deal with the much maligned day.

I watched a program on one of the science channels (can't remember which channel or what show it was) and it discussed how people pay less attention to a known potential cataclysm the closer they are to it.  People who live near volcanoes live in denial of potential disaster.  Same as those who live on a "known" fault line that is overdue for a massive quake.  The same is apparently true for most people concerning this Friday.

Why else has talk about Friday's importance to all of us been left up to a selected few archaeologists and NASA scientists the past eight months?  FEAR, that is why.  There is no benefit for a country, outside of Mexico and Guatemala, in focusing too much attention on December 21, 2012.  Those two countries are raking in mad money due to tourism.

Our perception of what that day means has been altered this year to serve a purpose.  The purpose is to maintain normalcy and suppress anxiety.  There were two big misinformation bombs that I heard over the past year.  One, the Mayan's didn't take into account Leap Years.  Therefore, they claim, the end day has passed or is yet to come.  I heard this one so many times doing research that it made me wonder if it was true.  It turns out the Maya didn't need leap years because their calendar was more precise than our own.  The second round of misinformation was the great deal of importance given to an archaeological find this past spring.  Some writings were found in a pyramid chamber that mentioned cycles after the end of the 13th Baktun on 12/21/2012 -- the supposed end of the long count calendar.  The find littered news sites on the internet and on television for two weeks.  Why?  To suppress fears.  Genius!

Many people already knew that the Maya thought of time in terms of cycles repeating themselves.  This information was publicized for those who did not already know about those cycles.  Some New Agers knew it, that was why they were talking about a new beginning and not destruction.

I am all for people not getting freaked out by something they cannot control.  It does none of us any good.  But dismissing the significance of Friday is not wise either.  The people of this world suffer many faults, myself included.  There are way too many of us on this rock and we are still growing out of control.  We have become a detriment to our own planet.  These are facts.  Anyone who thinks otherwise is either in it for the money or has been led astray by someone who is.

The only thing NASA needs to be doing is finding another planet for us to live on, because the way things are going this one will be used up within a handful of generations.

I'm no hippie-dippie peace and love advocate.  We just can't allow special interests to destroy our home planet just to pad their pockets. WTF point is there in that?  Although there may be no way we can currently stop it, that doesn't mean we should stop talking about it.  Sure, we'll all likely be long gone by that time, but is that really how we want to be remembered?  A generation of people who idly sat on their hands and allowed those who don't care about us, except for how they can profit from us, to stick a knife deeper and deeper into our collective side as a species?

There are many things to take pride in as a species, but communication is probably our crowning achievement.  A majority of our technology is communication oriented in one way or another.  It's all about our making our point.  Be it as individuals or as a species.  We are the speakers for our planet and our solar system. (Have we ever named our solar system?)  Beginning on 12/22/2012, our goals need at the very least include becoming worthy ambassadors to such an immense responsibility.  We all have greatness within us. Sometimes it's just too difficult to show.

Regardless of what you think may or may not occur on Friday, we are living in a time of great change.  What kind of change that will be is to some extent up to us as individuals. There may be no D-Day for what transpires.  It may be a gradual realization.  That is how humanity had progressed up until the start of the twentieth century.  But with the speeding up of everything in our lives these days, our old, slow way of processing new information is changing.   This change has already begun, regardless of our actual awareness of exactly what it will mean for us.

If you feel yourself within a time of great change even after 12/21/2012, I highly recommend my book Monarch.  The book is all about change.  Good and Bad.  It's about taking personal responsibility for who you are and the choices that you make.  But most importantly, Monarch is about how we are connected to one another, and how that connection can and does affect all of us.

I swear it's not a love fest.  I didn't even mention that I deliver my own brand of Apocalypse to Ginger Reed and her world in this story.  What kind of 12/21/2012 story would this be without at least a little carnage.  My being able to present that was alone worth the effort to write the story.

If you haven't picked up Monarch before 12/21/2012, don't worry, you'll get just as much out of it afterwards.  Grab a copy and enjoy the ride.  

-aap

Get Started for Free!

today is a new day

What happened before is in the past; we can can wrangle over what transpired, or simply let it go.  My ever-searching writer's ear helps me to create stories from whispers in the ether.   I can hear the questions asked in private but have yet to go public.  The most obvious is: Why read a book about 12/21/2012 with only 9 days to go until that day arrives?  The ether also offered up this one: Why not release Monarch several years earlier?

Now I'm no psychic; the whispers in the ether are of course my own.  The above questions were questions I asked myself before I started on Monarch 2 1/2 years ago in the spring of 2010.  I hear them today because these are valid questions from those who are reluctant to investigate further. How the story was written in 2010 was shaped by my concerns over those particular questions.

While Monarch takes place literally in the present, it deals heavily with an issue that is as timeless as our our own history here on Earth. FEAR FOR OUR LIFE.  It is the greatest of motivators and most basic of emotional states.  Every culture in the world has creation and destruction myths because we live on a world within an expanding and infinitely changing universe, not a glass doll house where everything is as it should be.  The threat of destruction is, and always will be, possible at any moment.

The good news is that we as humans love to be blissfully ignorant of what is going on around us, and we like to pretend that all is going to be ok.  Even if it is only for a little while.  But we sure would like for things to be kept that way for as long as possible.   These things are eternal and do not change by generation.  They are a part of what makes us human, and that is what is at the core of Ginger Reed's epic journey to freeing her spirit from the confines of her gilded cage.  (Those who have read Monarch will get the reference.)

Ginger's journey is a similar journey that all generations face when, on occasion, we open our eyes and look around and ask: What if "X" happens?  Is there anything I can do?

In short, I wrote Monarch to be a story about the enduring human spirit.  It is meant to show how all of our lives are intertwined in ways that we don't even know until we open our eyes and take a look outside.  Sometimes, all we need is a little push.

So, why read a book about 12/21/2012 with only 9 days to go until that day arrives?  Because it is about so much more than that day.  While it takes place presently, it could be taking place at any time.  The fear of something awful happening isn't going away anytime soon. Besides, as long as nothing happens next Friday, we will all be looking back on the end of the Mayan Calendar and wonder: what if something had happened? Some of us might even be asking: what did actually happen?

Why didn't I release Monarch several years earlier?  Granted, the majority of this story has been available for most of the year, except for the last few chapters.  But, in honesty, I did write the story Ginger reads back in 2000.  Cipher, however, is not Monarch.  Monarch is so much more than Cipher, and I was not prepared to write it before 2010.  But when 2010 arrived, I had to write it.  I was hell bent on bringing both Ted and Ginger to life.  I won't lie, it took a lot to fight off those lingering questions in the back of my head as I pushed through the blood, sweat and tears to deliver upon that promise to myself and to you.

I assure you that questions about 2012 will linger long after the new year arrives; and Monarch will be uniquely relevant to potentially answer some of those questions.  Haters and naysayers aside, there will be those who shall use their own experience of this time to shape a better future.

It all comes down to one simple choice: Will you at any point next Friday think about what has happened up until now and wonder what happens next?  If you do, how will you react?

While those who read Monarch will not likely share in the same experiences as Ginger, a few women and men may be able to relate to her.  That by itself would make all my work over the past thirteen years worth it.

To read Monarch, you can find it as an eBook or paperback.


EBook Retailers                             Paperback

Amazon                                      Black & White   $14.99
$4.99                                           (6x9)

Barnes and Noble                        Color        $65.00
$4.99                                           (8x10 Coffee Table Collectors Item)
                                                   *Buy the eBook and Save 38% with
                                                    coupon in the back of the eBook.   
ITunes                                     
$4.99

Smashwords
$4.99

Diesel
$4.99

I know the one book is pricey.  I had no control in setting the price.  But if you buy the eBook, there is a coupon code to use at the back of the book to save 38%.  The collectible will only be available for a short span of time and contains all of Scott Padgett's wonderful illustrations in vivid high-resolution color.

-aap

Enter The Cipher

One month in the cipher with eleven days to go until we reach the center.  That is how Ginger Reed, the main character of my novel Monarch, would frame her belief surrounding the winter solstice this year.  That focused state of concern can happen at any time for anyone one who lives and breathes.  A prophetic apocalypse need not be passed down from an archaic civilization to warrant the ecstatic state of fear that Ginger experiences.  It helps, but isn't required.  

Our perception of our own existence in reality, and how that reality can be affected by everything around us, is the crux of her crisis.  We all live in a personalized bubble.  As does everyone else in our lives.  Some of the time, with a person's age and unique situation varying the circumstances, the bubble allows information to pass back and forth freely through its membrane.   

For the sake of the story, let's just say that Ginger's bubble has become rigid -- her bubble a shield.  Action or reaction is required on her part to ward off danger.  If she were a lioness, her ears would be pinned back. She is defensive and ready to pounce.    

That is the state of mind of the main character in Monarch.  My debut novel that is now available in its entirety.  (Originally released as eBooks in four individual stages throughout 2012)

The Paperback versions are now available as well.  For those who like Scott Padgett's artwork and want to seem them represented in their full color brilliance,  there is the 8x10 version.  The cost was beyond my control, though it is cheaper than most College Classroom Books.  There is a coupon code at the back of the recently updated eBook versions of Monarch.  If you buy the eBook you can get the code and save money.  The coupon takes 38% of the sticker price.  

The second paperback is also available.  It is a 6x9 black and white version of Monarch.  The listing price for that is $14.99.  Both paperbacks are available for one or two day shipping.  

Should she and her family survive 12/21/2012, Ginger's Birthday is on the other side of the swirling cipher for her, and it's a big one.  She will be turning the BIG 40.  Monarch is an ode to the enduring human spirit inside us all. Take the ride along with Ginger and be changed forever.

-aap