Michael Andre McPherson

Beyond the Slushpile

Category archive: Apocalyptic Fiction

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And The Winners Are…

Off to the Post Office

Off to the Post Office

Actually, I can’t tell you. Goodreads is very big on protecting the privacy of people who enter—let alone win—book giveaway contests. In fact, it’s pretty much fire and forget for an author. Goodreads gave me the names and addresses of the winners so that I can mail out their free copies of Sacrifice the Living, but then I pretty much have to forget that I have the contact information of ten fans. I might as well throw these valuable leads into the garbage, because other than sending their winnings, I’m forbidden to contact them. If I do, I’ll be banned from ever doing a Goodreads book giveaway promotion again.

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What I Learned from Hugh Howey

In October of 2011, Hugh Howey noticed something odd when he looked up his sales reports in his Amazon account: a short story he’d uploaded, Wool, had sold twelve copies in the first week of the month. He was pleased and surprised that people would read a short story. By the end of the month, it had sold 1,018 copies. Hugh can be forgiven for thinking this was the pinnacle of his writing career. Who could imagine that it would go on to be a million copy, New York Times bestseller? Wool is now just part of the whole series that he wrote in frantic response to all the positive feedback.

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How I Know the Novel is Finished

It’s a weird thing because music and my writing are very closely bound. When I write a story, I need the music playing in my head, and when I’m done the story, I know because the two meld. With short stories, this wasn’t particularly challenging, but with novels and their huge scope, it’s intensely sweeping. With novels, I know I’m done when I’ve got the movie trailer in my head.

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Fans Have Been Asking

Tons of fans have contacted me in the last two weeks to ask when the hell book three of the 1000 Souls will launch. Since I was the one who said it would be ready and available in July, I can hardly blame them for being surprised that it isn’t out there yet.

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A Sneak Peak

Prologue: Margaret

Just when she thought she and mom were going home, the Redemption Brigade came for them. Margaret didn’t understand who they were at the time because she was only seven, and up until that day she had always assumed that all humans were friends, could never hurt one another or shoot one another. Only the rippers were evil. Only the night needed to be feared.

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Thanks for a Great Day

The film industry is a great place for a writer who doesn’t want a full time job. I loved it because I spent a lot of time as a daily, going from show to show on a moment’s notice, working on everything from big feature films to YTV kids’ shows. One tradition I noticed was that when the day was over, the regular crew often said to me, “Thanks for a great day.” There was always a sense of relief and it was a sincere compliment. They were happy that I was the guy the union dregged up, and they wanted me to know they appreciated my work. Eventually I did succumb to the lure of money and worked full time on a bunch of shows, and I always continued that tradition when I had extra crew out to operate extra cameras. Thanks for a great day.

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Thanks to all for a Great Week

The launch of Generation Apocalypse has been a hectic and exciting time. While we aren’t even close to breaking Stephen King’s average sales for a single hour, it has been a personal best for me, and it was fun to see the novel quickly climb to 15,000 on the Amazon best seller rank. I admit that’s not record breaking for a lot of novels (No Easy Hope, a zombie novel I keep tabs on, has been around the 1500 mark for about a year) but it’s nice to see my sales improving with each launch.

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