Chapter 2 – Bloody Friday

May 17, 2013, by No comments yet

bloodyfridayI’ve finished editing the second chapter to this series. The editing process has been entertaining to say the least. It’s quite interesting to experience something you started writing almost two years ago for the second time. I’ve made some major changes to the characters. As like me, they are a little older now and just a little bit further along in life to help drive their connection. How can you fight the world for someone if you haven’t already fought it with them?

I was concerned about the placement of this chapter when I first wrote it. It throws the reader back into the very beginning of the story – even before the time line of the first chapter. It’s like a flashback, to add depth and meaning to the plot-line. The next chapter will actually jump ahead in time as well by a few weeks. I know some linear-plot lovers may not like this chaotic style of storytelling, but I felt that it was a fitting way for me to introduce the characters more after giving the reader just a brief overplay in the first chapter. Life is chaos in Zach’s world, so it should be told that way. I’d love to hear how a reader might feel about this method.

At the schedule that I am going, I should hopefully be able to get a chapter edited and published every two weeks. Slow coming, but that is the life of a part-time writer.

You can download Chapter 2 of ZNA by following the link: Chapter 2

Happy reading and as usual, any feedback or comments on the chapter is appreciated.

Moving forward (and welcoming a new storyline)

May 1, 2013, by 3 comments

ZNAcover

Since my last published work on Kill Log, a lot has happened personally. I worked rather hard on completing the fourth story in the series, only to find myself questioning some of the writing and the general idea of the story. It just wasn’t providing the underlying comment I wished for it to about the predisposition of violence in society and our recent numbing to the horrors of those types of actions.

With the awful events of Newton and most recently with Boston, I finally decided to take a hiatus from finishing the series (don’t worry, I do plan to still finish it!) and focus on editing and releasing a much larger project that I’ve been working on for almost three years and that has been shelved for the last year or so.

ZNA is a little bit different than my previous work, but hopefully still quite enjoyable. Due to the amount of intense outlining and writing for it that I’ve already completed, I am currently planning on releasing it in a similar episodic style as with Kill Log. This time though, most of the work (around 150,000 words of it) has already been done. It’s just a matter of editing, revising, and rewriting some portions of each chapter and then releasing them.

To give you a bit of an idea of what the story entails, check out the synopsis below:

What would you do if the love of your life was hundreds of miles away when the world came to an end? What if you had no way to get to them? No way to know they were safe? For Zachery Travis, his worst nightmare became reality the day a mysterious and deadly virus hit the West Coast. Stranded in the capital of California as civilization rapidly collapsed around him, Zach was forced to hope and pray that the love of his life could somehow survive the fall of humanity in the very heart of the initial outbreak, Seattle.

As he finally begins the harrowing trip to find his fiance, Zach is prepared for the dangers of the road and the infected monsters that lie ahead. Little does he know though that his search for his lost love will lead him on a journey to discovery the truth behind the cause of the infection and reveal to him a nefarious plan that was put into action over 50 years ago.

This isn’t just a story about the end of the world. This is the story of the Z Prophecy.

Interested? Then feel free to check out the first chapter of the story below. And please, let me know your thoughts on it.

Chapter 1 – Silent Night

Kill Log: Hitman

May 29, 2012, by No comments yet
Kill Log 3

I’ve finally released the third story in the Kill Log Series. Kill Log: Hitman is about an ex-demolitions expert known only as M. Halle. He is an established player who has quickly allowed himself to be sucked up into the bloody lifestyle of whatever the game demands. This round though, he will have to learn that he may not be as well liked as he once believed.

In this novella there is: gambling, high speed car chases, hand-to-hand combat, explosions, shooting, and (as expected) murder. Read up on the next stage of the Kill Log series with this suspenseful technothriller.

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New Look with some updated News

May 21, 2012, by No comments yet
Kill Log 3

C.J. Greene.com has got a new look, and with it comes a new announcement on the progress of the Kill Log series. As the third piece in the series, Kill Log: Hitman expanded beyond the normal scope I expected for each story and I began to worry that I would not be able to get  the budding novella published soon enough. It has been nearly three months since the second story in the series and as such, I have decided to finally bite the bullet.

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Kill Log: Hitman Cover Art

April 21, 2012, by 2 comments

So the third story in the series has expanded in scope a lot more than I anticipated. As a result, the editing process has been a lot longer than planned. I’ve had this cover sitting around for a while now and may tweak it before final publishing.

What do you think?

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Glitch in the KDP Select Matrix

April 6, 2012, by 2 comments

While my two stories aren’t in the top 1000 kindle books at this moment, there was a brief time when my first one, Kill Log: Vigilante, was. It sat up there for about a week, selling copies and making me very happy. Nothing makes you feel more accomplished than having your work rank above professional authors published by the big publishing houses. Of course, all good things must come to an end and I saw a drastic fall in ranking as the weeks progressed. It probably hasn’t helped that I haven’t really gone around advertising my series actively, but I have plenty of time to do that later. Books are forever. My immediate need for writing comes first.

Today I wanted to share a little trick that one can do coming off of a KDP Select promo to help boost their sales rankings (albeit, only temporarily). Of course this comes at the risk of shooting yourself in the foot if you’re not careful. So I am sharing it more for information’s sake than actually recommending it. Knowledge is always good, so take it as you may.

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Amazon KDP Select Payout – Worth It?

March 6, 2012, by 14 comments

I’m roughly a month into my first month of Kindle Select and I have been diligently recording details of my progression so that I may provide a detailed report at the end of the 90 day period. During this time, I’ve been keeping track of KDP Select’s Lending Library payout announcements from Amazon and calculating the numbers to see whether my participation in KDP Select puts me at an advantages or a disadvantage. I did a KDP Select Terms and Conditions post a few weeks back which covered the legal pros and cons of the KDP Select program. Today, I wanted to cover the numbers side of the game.

Breaking it down as simple as you can go, the following people are the types who will likely benefit the most from participating in KDP Select:

1) If you are a new author looking to try to get some exposure in the market place.

2) If you price your books under the $2.99 (70% royalty) threshold.

3) If you are Amazon.com

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Kill Log: Three Blind Mice

March 1, 2012, by 1 comment
Kill Log: Three Blind Mice

I recently released my latest story in the Kill Log series, titled Kill Log: Three Blind Mice. This Kill Log is from the perspective of a female player in the game, named Lily. Lily travels to New York City to play a game of cat and mouse with two other players. There’s stalking, surprise attacks, knife play, a chase scene through Central Park, and even a high speed shoot out!

It’s been published on Amazon.com since February 26th, 2012 and is currently on promotion for free until the end of Thursday, March 1st, 2012.

Check out the description below:

“Welcome to the game; a sport so dangerous and morally questionable that it must remain a secret for those who have the courage to join. Run on the deep recesses of the internet, the game is highly illegal and extremely deadly. The rules are simple: kill or be killed; just don’t get caught. The players are anonymous; the victims chosen seemingly at random. And every move is logged for the audience to track. The game is the ultimate sport of urban warfare. This story was collected from one of the various Kill Logs of those who played and died.

A young woman visits New York for the first time, but she isn’t there to see the sights. Lily has come to the city for the sole purpose of playing the game and this time it isn’t going to be as simple as before. Two other people are playing with her as they hunt one another around the Big Apple. Lily must fight for her life and eliminate her opponents as she plays a deadly round of Three Blind Mice. ”

You can buy the story exclusively from Amazon.com or borrow it for free from the Lender Library if you are a member of Amazon Prime.

Happy reading!

Kill Log: Three Blind Mice Cover Art

February 11, 2012, by 1 comment

So, if anyone isn’t aware already, I do all of my own cover art. You can say it is because I’m a bit of a control freak perhaps. But I like to think my ten years of experience with Photoshop allows me to produce reasonably professional looking covers for my stories.

Either way, I’ve finished designing the second cover for my story and I’m fairly happy with the result. It follows the same theme as the first cover.

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KDP Select – Terms & Conditions

February 4, 2012, by 6 comments

As a freshman author in the self-publishing world, I’ve been putting a lot of thought into what would be the most effective distributing system for my work. I started with my Smashwords and enjoyed seeing the initial spike of 80 views within day one. Sadly, there were no takers on following through to purchase. My views dropped to 20 in day two and then only 1 view on day three. By day four there was nothing left. Amazon fared no better on the purchases. Their tracking system isn’t very effective so I could only see the number of downloads, not page views. I honestly didn’t expect anything though. I didn’t do any specific advertising on purpose and had simply let my work sit on the sites.

I’d heard some really good and really bad things about KDP Select, so I was cautious to use it right away. I haven’t had much experience with self-publishing and it seemed foolish to completely exclude a distribution system for 90 days. After my views through those alternate distribution systems stopped showing any signs of life, I decided to take a closer look at the Terms and Conditions for Amazon’s exclusive program.

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