Long shots, big challenges and hell.

Posted by Jaime Buckley on Feb 16, 2011 in Jaime Journal | 0 comments

This first novel has been overdue to be published for a year. Then again, I’m grateful for all the challenges we’ve had to bring out other aspects I would have missed if we threw the book into print.

Kathi and I have some big goals this year, most of which have to do with Wanted Hero.

Prelude to a Hero is cooking along and we labor for hours every day to bring this to it’s completion. It’s been a process that I love as much as I love poison ivy, boils on my butt or a bee sting on my naked eyeball. However, the results each and every time make me run back for more. Kathilynn is brilliant. She tells me to ‘do my thing’ and then she translates for the rest for the world. Using two Macs, we go over the same file at the same time, line by line to make sure the novel has everything it was intended to have.

Yes, it’s been slow, but we’re getting faster. In the meantime, I’ve been writing the second book–the first actual ‘novel’ in the Chronicles series. It’s moving faster, with less corrections and I believe by the time Prelude is done, the second novel will be ready for its last revision as well. The goal is to bring out the second book within 30 days of the first one (knock on wood).

Last, but certainly not least, I’m almost done with a mini comic called “Finding Your Why.”

It’s a Wanted Hero comic that walks you through the deeper internal issues with Wendell and how he’s taught and trained to overcome the circumstances pressing upon him. They will be in print only.

So what’s the long shot? Well, without work, Kathi and I have realized that Wanted Hero is our only business now until something else comes up. I am hoping we can make some kind of money with all the effort we have put into this for the past 20 years since I started the story. That doesn’t change what we do story-wise, but the pressure is immense.

We are planning to release the first novel on an ebook format and sell them through Amazon, Barnes and Noble and Smashwords. So it’ll be available on the Kindle, Nook and every other reading device known to mankind. I’m really excited about this, because I want to buy my whole family Nooks (sorry Amazon).

Who knows what will happen. I know there are some great success stories like Amanda Hocking, but she’s the exception, not the rule and I realize that. Instead, we are going to keep writing and planning and building everything we have. We’ve worked hard for the last 7 years and won’t stop now.

It feels good to see so much progression and to focus like this, even though life is a greater challenge.

…now it’s time to venture into the chapter Kathi and I nicknamed “hell”.

Yeah, let your imagination come up with the reasons why.

-Jaime Buckley

Projects before me.

Posted by Jaime Buckley on Feb 16, 2011 in WANTED HERO | 0 comments

With the last wisps of work gone, I spent a good deal of the night staring at a blank white board in my office. The massive board that takes up one of the walls from floor to ceiling, usually filled with ideas.

It was nearly blank and that made me nervous.

Not that I didn’t have any ideas. I was looking for the right ideas. Ones that would take me forward at lightning speed to the first in [hopefully] a series of doors that lead to opportunity to share Wanted Hero.

There are three main projects in motion while time hammers on me relentlessly, without mercy.

The first is the Prelude to a Hero novel. the precursor to the whole series of books, without a pulled punch or missed line. It’s been frustrating in getting this book done, because it should have been published a year ago.

That’s only a mild complaint because I’ve been forced to learn exactly what I needed. To learn what it takes to MAKE a novel, to see options today which I couldn’t see last year…and best of all–to know how critical this working relationship is between my wife and myself. That’s huge.

It’s taught both of us how critical this process is. The better we get, the faster we progress.

So I have the novel being refined my wife and I for the last time. We want to make sure that when it’s read…it will, without a doubt, hook the reader and convert them to the full journey of Wendell, Dax and Chuck.

The second project is the second book (first actual novel, btw) in the Chronicles of Wanted Hero. I found my mind screaming to keep going and not wait to be done with the first book. So I kept going and now I’m more than half way done with the massive book.

The last project is a Wanted Hero mini comic which is for teaching and training. It’s called “Finding Your Why” and it has to do with your inner foundation and drive. Awesome story between Wendell and King Robert III.

So what will I do with them? Well, I don’t know if this is the BEST plan, but for now, it’s a plan nonetheless.

The first two books will be put up for download as soon as they’re done. For the Kindle, Nook and on Smashwords. We are planning to sell Prelude for $0.99 and the rest of the books for $2.99-$3.99 each a download.

Once there’s enough income in a pool, I’ll publish the books in print as well and make them available online at a regular paperback book price. This will be through Ingram Books, and we’ll have each book listed in their database with 30,000+ books stores.

As for the comic book, that will be printed and then be a POD (print on demand) item for $2.65 a copy (or thereabouts). I can sell them through my sites and also through sales people who have already displayed an interest.

What’s my hope in all this…

Honestly? To have something similar happen to Wanted Hero like what happened to Amanda Hocking. If you haven’t read her story, you should. She’s a kind person with a great story to inspire.

Snip and type.

Posted by Jaime Buckley on Feb 14, 2011 in Jaime Journal | 0 comments

There’s one piece of advice I hear everywhere when it comes to writing: get rid of all your distractions.

Today was Evan’s surgery for his hernia. Poor kid has had one for 13 months and he never said a word. The surgeon thinks he’s great, which he is, but was astounded at how big the hernia actually was. When he came out (late), he had a big smile and held his hands up to calm Kathi and I.

“He’s fine, he’s fine. The hernia was HUGE, but it couldn’t have gone better. I’ve made him marketable again.”

So as a dad, I’m glad my 17 year old, 245lb baby boy will be ok now.

While we were at the hospital for a good chunk of the day, however, Kathi felt we could do more work on the Wanted Hero story. To work at home I have to have ear plugs in all the time not to be distracted, let alone in a hospital with a TV, nurses in and out, conversations, cell phones, hospital pages, beeping machines and just general traffic. My mind simply couldn’t wrap around the work.

Yet Kathi insisted and said some work done was better than no work done.

Let me give you my personal opinion on that…

No.

When you are distracted, you are more likely to make mistakes you would not normally make when it’s silent, or you have a controlled environment that allows you to get ‘into the mood’. That means second guessing yourself and having to eventually go back and make the corrections, deletions and in my case…just make sense of what you threw up on the pages.

Don’t do it. Separate your personal and writing life if you can. If you find an urge to write in a location where you can’t have that peace of mind, I would suggest you do what I did today: create notes and ideas for your story. I took my creation books and refined ideas and pondered simple aspects that were fed by a wandering mind. I recorded sparks to create sparks later on.

Always give yourself room to create, but make sure you set aside the dedicated time for writing and GUARD IT AS SACRED TIME!

-Jaime Buckley

Simplify, simplify, simplify.

Posted by Jaime Buckley on Feb 13, 2011 in Jaime Journal | 0 comments

Pain is the Universe telling you that you haven’t learned your lesson yet. That sucks, because I’ve had a lot of pain this week.

It’s forced me to take a deep personal inventory of not only my life, but my specific habits. It was disgusting and painful to hold that mirror up to my own face, but even harder to look myself in complete honesty. I still feel some weight on my heart, but I’m working through it.

I’ve been scared and reacting for the past month because of financial pressures and extreme situations in caring for my family. Just when one event seems to be handled, two more kicked my feet out from under me and it wasn’t long before it was hard to breathe. With work gone for the time being (it has its cycles), bill of course pile up and though I have learned how to juggle, my biggest heartache has been letting down my landlord.

Now that might seem like an odd thing to say, but Shawn is a great man. It was my intention from the moment we moved in to always live above and beyond approach, pay rent early and keep this property immaculate. I did all that up until the work stopped. Now Shawn could have evicted us immediately, but he didn’t. He told me when we moved in that if I was ever a day late, find a new place to live, because we wouldn’t be having that conversation. I respected that from day one.

30 days later we’re still here because that man truly cares and knew we were doing everything we could. I don’t know many people who would do that. So every moment he has to wait, I feel ashamed and that weight piles up.

Yesterday, something unusual happened. I don’t remember the actual moment, but a thought came to me.

It was time to simplify. Life, work, expectations and more. Not lower my standards, but to narrow my focus and expend all my energy in the direction I am meant to travel. That means Wanted Hero. That means caring for my family (and building back that confidence level between myself and Shawn). That means cutting out all the extra jobs I give myself to fill the time, when I should actually be concise and on track with specific goals.

All extra websites I was building/maintaining/promoting have been put on hold or redirected to this blog. That even includes Wanted Hero. The priority is getting these books written. Promotion comes after. The only exception is this blog because it’s my daily therapy. You might not need me, my friend, but I need you…whether you leave a comment or not.

It was then the pressure started to lift. I could breathe and I knew I was on the right path. I’m only one person, but my habit is to expect the near impossible as a daily routine. That’s insane! Well, the Universe seemed to be happy with my choices…

I got to spend the whole day with my baby girl as everyone else went to church. A 9 month old firecracker and do you know what she did once everyone left? She crawled up to me on the couch, stared at me for nearly 4 minutes, smiled, laid her head and arms across my belly and went to sleep. Not a fuss, not a whimper, just the sweetest smile and cuddling for over 4 hours.

I sat and held Wynnie while I watched Peter Sellers in a couple Pink Panther movies.

-Jaime Buckley

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