Joe Vasicek

Genesis Earth now available in paperback

For the last couple of months, all of my paperbacks have been unavailable due to some quality control problems with KDP Paperback. The quality of their product is substantially inferior to CreateSpace, unfortunately. But for now, it still remains the best option for getting my books out in paperback, so that’s what I’m doing until I can put them up through Ingram Spark.

To mitigate the quality problems, I’ve made a new cover design which I hope to replicate across all of my paperback books. The biggest problem was that the cover was misaligned beyond the margin of error in the cover template, meaning that the front cover would bleed into the spine, or vice versa. As you can see, the new design has a solid background that wraps around the whole cover, with the text and art well outside of the margin of error. If Amazon screws this up, you’d be justified in asking customer service for another copy, or a refund.

In any case, I’m going to roll out the new paperbacks gradually over the next few months, as I manage to get to them. The inside content is changing slightly, in that I’m including the author’s notes at the end. I’m also adding chapter names to my earlier books, where previously they were simply “Chapter One” or “Chapter Two.” Other than that, everything is mostly the same.

I like the way the design for this one turned out. The paperback cover itself is slightly darker than the image shown, but all I’ve got right now is the proof, so I’ll post images after I’ve ordered a few author copies to sell. Hopefully by the end of this year, all of my books novella length and longer will be up in print as well as ebook!

Buy Genesis Earth on Amazon

Tim Pool on fear and success

Tim Pool is a liberal journalist that I follow online, mostly to balance out the conservative pundits like Ben Shapiro that I listen to. He recently put out this video, where he describes some of the lessons he learned from skateboarding, and how he applied that to become a successful entrepreneur. Really great stuff, especially if you’re a self-employed creative trying to build a career.

Tolkien the movie

Future Mrs. Vasicek and I saw this movie over the weekend, and it was fantastic. Ten out of ten. It really hit home for me, not only as a Tolkien fan, but as a writer too.

A few of the critics are panning this movie, but pay no attention to them. They’re probably just upset that they didn’t receive any bribes to give it a positive review. That seems to be the pattern these days: glowing reviews from the critics, but a terrible audience score. With this one, it’s the exact reverse.

I’m not sure which part I liked the most, since there was so much to enjoy, but I really liked how the movie went in and out of Tolkien’s experiences in World War I, and used that to tie everything together. It was a really different world before that war, and the generation that fought it also accomplished a lot of remarkable stuff. You can also really see how it influenced his stories.

I also really liked how for most of his life—indeed, perhaps for all of it—Tolkien was a really unassuming guy. He didn’t know that he was going to write the seminal fantasy epic of the modern era. For years, he just made stuff up for himself, and only shared it with his closest friends.

The friendship he developed with his prep school buddies was one of the best parts, definitely. And the romance between him and Edith was also really well done. I also liked how his benefactor, the Catholic priest, wasn’t portrayed as a straight up bad guy, as Hollywood so often portrays religious people these days. They had their clashes, but you did get the sense that he genuinely wanted the best for Tolkien all throughout it.

So yeah, fantastic movie! Screw the critics and go see it for yourself!

A quick update

If life had a crazy-meter, the needle on mine would be somewhere in the yellow green right now and trending toward the red.

Next week, Future Mrs. Vasicek and I will be traveling to Iowa for my nephew’s baptism. It’s going to be a big family affair. Future Mrs. Vasicek has met everyone already, minus some of the nieces and nephews, but this will be the first time that we’re all in the same place together. Should be fun, but also very busy.

Next month, we’re getting married, and that’s a whole other source of craziness right there. Good craziness, but craziness all the same. Things are coming together one thing at a time, but there’s still a bunch of stuff to figure out, and a bunch of unknown unknowns as well. It will probably take at least a couple of months after we’re married before everything fully shakes out.

As far as writing goes, I’m making slow but steady progress on Edenfall, and should still finish it before the wedding. I’ll share more details on that in the email newsletter that I plan to send out this week, but the short version is that I seem to be over the hump and making good progress. That’s where I’m putting most of my energy, so if the blog falls off for a while, don’t worry—I’m still here.

As for the publishing side of things, I’m figuring out how to get all my books out in print, which was something I thought I’d figured out back in January until I learned just how crappy KDP Paperback really is. That said, it’s the best option for the present time, so I’m trying to figure out how to work within those limitations and design covers that their POD printers won’t mangle too badly. Still, it’s going to be a while.

An area where I’ve really dropped the ball is short stories. It’s been months since I wrote the last one, and I need to put a bunch out on submission again too. Also, marketing is an area that I need to do better in. I’m experimenting a bit with AMS ads, but it is so freakishly complicated that I hardly know where to begin.

But reading is an area that I really need to do better. I try to spend an hour or two each night reading, but the last couple of weeks that hasn’t happened at all. My TBR list is about three shelves long right now, and that’s just the print books. That’s definitely an oversight that needs to be rectified.

At the same time, I’m well on my way toward collecting all of the works of David Gemmell, mostly through Paperback Swap. If everyone has a superpower, mine is the ability to acquire books, so Paperback Swap is a really fantastic way to leverage that. The Neverending Story is my favorite book, but David Gemmell is my favorite author, so I definitely want to have all of his books in my personal library.

That’s pretty much it. Still need to figure out cover work for Edenfall. Still need to assemble my first readers and get stuff figured out for that. All of these are good problems, though. Hopefully, I’ll be trading up for better problems in the very near future.

Time is a gift

Just a quick post today. This week is already shaping up to be pretty crazy, so I may have to do a couple more just to keep up the blogging streak.

Anyone remember The Phantom Tollbooth? Great movie, and an even greater book. Definitely a classic. This is my favorite song.

Now to go make the most of my own time today…

Defying Hitler by Sebastian Haffner

I picked this one up from Glenn Beck’s recommended reading list, and found it to be pretty good. The most disappointing part is that it was never finished, so what starts as a history of the Third Reich up to 1939 actually ends in 1933. It would be really fascinating to get Haffner’s account of events like the Night of the Long Knives or Kristallnacht, but unfortunately we never will.

That said, what we do have is a truly remarkable account of the fall of the German Empire, the chaos and collapse of the post-war order, and the transformation of German society as the Nazis rose to power. Most histories try to be objective, or at least try to limit their subjectivity. Not so with this book. As Haffner puts it:

Clearly, historical events have varying degrees of intensity. Some may almost fail to impinge on true reality, that is, on the central, most personal part of a person’s life. Others can wreak such havoc that there is nothing left standing… I believe history is misunderstood if this aspect is forgotten.

This book is not quite a history, and not quite a memoir. Rather, it falls somewhere between the two, combining the best of both forms to paint an extraordinarily vivid picture of one of the most terrifying times and places in modern history.

By far, the best part of this book is the depth and precision with which Haffner describes historical events and their effects on the German people. The only other author I know who is more precise with his language is Jordan Peterson. Because of this, it is very easy to imagine yourself in Haffner’s position, and to see the struggles of our time reflected in his story.

The parallels in Haffner’s account between Germany of the 1920s and 30s, and the United States today, are truly striking. It’s not a one-for-one comparison, of course, and the people today shouting “Nazi!” the loudest are obviously dead wrong. But the trends are headed in the same direction, and some of the more disturbing nuances are starting to rhyme.

My biggest takeaway from the book was this: when we reach a point where our neighbors are getting disappeared, it’s time to either take up arms or bug the hell out. In Germany, that happened well before the Nazis rose to power, which surprised me. But that wasn’t the only takeaway, by far. The book is full of them.

For anyone with an interest in the rise of Fascism and 20th century history, or anyone with an interest in politics and current events, I highly recommend this book.

George WARSHINGTON

I’ve fallen behind on my blogging, so to keep things up here’s a picture of the most badass American ever to live, in all of his glory. Have a great day!

Gotta go fast!

So they’re making a Sonic the Hedgehog movie, and the character design for Sonic is so bad that it’s spawned a bajillion memes. Within days of the trailer’s release, it got so bad that the director said they’d redesign the animation, and suddenly thousands of nine-year-olds became drunk with power.

I have a few thoughts on the whole Sonic fiasco. The first game came out when I was seven, and even though I only ever played it at friends’ houses, stuff like the Green Hill Zone theme definitely scratches the nostalgia itch. That said, never got into it as much as some people.

The new movie actually doesn’t look all that bad. I mean, it doesn’t look great, but it’s got potential. I really like seeing Jim Carrey as Robotnik, that could be really fun. Also… well, okay, that’s pretty much all that looks good so far, but just because it’s a horrible trailer doesn’t mean the movie has to be crap. Right?

The fact that Paramount Pictures made this movie reminds me of the early 00s, when superhero movies started to get big again, and the major studios really screwed up some of the big franchises. Fantastic four, I’m looking at you. Basically, the big studios were treating these intellectual properties as cash cows instead of treating them with the passion and love of the original creators. It was also very disrespectful to the fans.

Unless I’m mistaken, that’s actually how we got the Marvel Cinematic Universe. After the failures of Hulk, Fantastic Four, and Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer, Marvel decided to do everything in house, because the major studios kept screwing things up so badly. With Blade and X-Men in the 90s, they’d proved that movies with B- and C-list superheroes could still be profitable, so they reacquired the rights to as many characters as they could and went all in on it. Thus was born the MCU, and there was much rejoicing.

It’s particularly interesting to me as an indie writer because the pattern is very similar to what’s happening in the book industry. It basically goes like this:

Technological disruption renders the legacy business models obsolete.
Independent creators start to steal market share from the old guard companies.
The old guard goes through a period of mergers, acquisitions, and layoffs.
They start to cut corners because too much is expected of the people who are left.
The old guard companies become dependent on blockbuster hits to stay afloat.
The bean counters take charge, further killing the old guard’s creative spirit.
Several intended blockbusters fail spectacularly, driving further downsizing.
The independent creators eat the old guard’s lunch.

And that’s why I’m still indie.

Is this what’s happening with Sonic the Hedgehog? Looks like it to me. We’ll have to see how this all plays out, but I’m not expecting much. On a more positive note, though, the best way to enjoy a crappy movie is to go in with low expectations. It worked for me with Indiana Jones 4, so maybe it’ll work with the new Sonic movie.

In the meantime, here’s Pewdiepie reviewing some of the hilarious memes that have come from all of this:

Trope Tuesday: Future Primitive

From tvtropes:

Evolution isn’t goal-directed. Sometimes …a species (often but not limited to humanity) will sometimes evolve into a more feral, less civilized, sometimes even non-sapient variety, regaining “primitive” characteristics. These “primitive” characteristics can include behaviors and/or physical traits…
Most basic is the scenario common to Post-Apocalyptic settings After the End, where humanity (or another species) is still physiologically more or less the same, but society has collapsed and technological and cultural regression have set in… In more extreme scenarios, the population may have evolved into a new subspecies or another species altogether… Most Scavenger World-type future settings are not far enough removed from the Present Day for natural selection to favor such drastic changes.
May overlap with Was Once a Man. Sometimes, it’s the motivation of an Evilutionary Biologist to try and take control of evolution in order to avert this fate.
Common to After the End settings. Likely to exist in Humanity’s Wake. Contrast Evolutionary Levels, Ultimate Lifeform and The Singularity (all of which tend to assume evolution’s a linear, goal driven process). Has nothing to do with the effects of a Devolution Device.

This trope has been on my mind as I write Edenfall, the sequel to Genesis Earth. In that book, this trope featured prominently, and drove the main character to question his faith in the progression of the natural world from chaos to order, entropy to complexity, and ignorance and barbarity to knowledge and civilization.

Perhaps the most prominent example of this trope is the Morlocks and Eloi from H.G. Wells’s The Time Machine. In the far future, the children of the rich elites of society have evolved into dainty, helpless, childlike creatures, while the descendants of the lower classes have evolved into dark and predatory monsters. As different as they are, though, they have both lost the drive and ingenuity that makes us human: the Eloi because it was pamperd out of them, and the Morlocks because they were repressed for so long. Both of them have lost their humanity and devolved into little more than animals.

In the Victorian era, people generally had faith in the slow and steady march of progress: that ignorance and superstition inevitably gave way to the light of science and reason, each successive age tended to be more advanced and scientific that the previous ages, and that humanity represented the pinnacle of evolution, the crowning achievement of the natural world. They rejected the notion that catastrophic and violent upheavals had any significant effect on the development of cilivization or humanity, and believed that the world was in a state of constant, unstoppable improvement.

Well, the two worlds wars pretty much shattered that notion forever. And since that time, we’ve discovered all sorts of evidence that in history and evolution, catastrophic change and violent upheaval are the rule, rather than the exception. From the bronze age collapse and the black death to supernovae and the extinction of the dinosaurs, the Victorian concept of the slow, steady, and inevitable march of progress looks very quaint indeed.

That was what I wanted to deconstruct in Genesis Earth. But now that I’m writing the sequels, I plan to subvert this trope. I can’t say how without giving spoilers, but it’s going to be a major plot point, especially in the third book.

What happens when humans meddle in evolution? When we hack into our genetic code and rewrite our place in the natural order? Can time heal the scars of our broken world, or will it take something else to fix us? Something more than human, or something so fundamental to our humanity that it lies in every heart?

Anyways, those are the things on my mind as I finish up Edenfall and get ready to write The Stars of Redemption. With luck, they will both be out by the end of this year!

The evolution of US girl names

Here’s something interesting, just for fun. The shift in name popularity over the years reflects my own family tree surprisingly well. It’s also fascinating to keep in my cultural trends as you watch this video.