T.C. Martin

Fantasy writer of epic-length tales. Waveborn's Wake is on sale at Amazon. Working on a long arc of stories within the world of Vyr.

[T.C. Martin @TCMartin_Books]

Sail into the depths where Chaos tears free.

When the world itself turns predator, few dare to defy its hunger.

She can steer through tempests and shipwrecks…
but no magic can shield her heart from what’s coming.

From the eye of the storm to the edge of the world, one choice will drown or deliver them all.

A tideweaver marked by the waves. A berserker with nothing left to lose. A voyage none of them will survive unchanged.

Climb aboard Shimmering Swell and sail with Thalrenstride into the adventure of...

Waveborn's Wake!

~~~~~

Sailing aboard Shimmering Swell, Agnes dreams of glory as Lady Nebula, Ace of the Seas, and with a clever proposal to her father, she aims to step onto dry land and chart a course for a master worthy of such a legend.
In the capital of Cresthia, in a time of inebriation and praise, everything shifts for the adventuring band, Thalrenstride, when a woman claiming to be an upstart swashbuckler intercepts Maddox. Hungry for a mentor and drunk on her own imaginings, she calls herself Odyssea Stormchaser and talks her way into becoming Maddox’s apprentice. Thalrenstride soon learns the world in this girl’s head is brighter and grander than the one around her, and when that bright world insists on overshadowing reality, it becomes dangerous.
What begins as an unusual apprenticeship becomes a bond reshaping who they are in ways neither expected. Time bends, trials mount, and under Maddox’s hard teaching and fierce protection, Odyssea rises as a woman not chosen because she’s without equal, but one who survives because she’s armed and cherished.
Will she emerge as the adventurer she dreams of, or will the tides of fate claim her? Dive into Waveborn’s Wake, a thrilling saga of courage, camaraderie, and the call of the deep.

~~~~~

I used two months worth of credits and revised my promo video. The imagery and frame changes bothered me, as well as the inconsistencies. I spent the last few days finishing it up, and I think it came out well enough.

For those that dislike generated imagery, give me the funds and we'll do it right. LLMs are not involved in the book itself.

[T.C. Martin @TCMartin_Books]

@TAR_Kirk I wish I could be excited for the new Fable game. I wish the devs didn't do dumb things. I wish a lot of things...

[T.C. Martin @TCMartin_Books]

@MillerDakotaJ I was told I was center-left when I was in high school. I thought this for many years and believed many things.

I was told to not get involved and to let them do their thing. I was told many things.

It turns out I was always right-leaning and everything I was told was a lie.

[T.C. Martin @TCMartin_Books]

@BHolshouserUS Gives me vibes.

[T.C. Martin @TCMartin_Books]

@TiltAtGiants I prefer standalones, but if I really enjoy it and learn there's more, I get excited and buy them all.

[T.C. Martin @TCMartin_Books]

@BWoostersauce @DanNEO_SS I removed speech tags but included character actions in the paragraph.

"Let's go to the beach." Christie adjusted her swimsuit, heading for her car.

The only time I removed everything completely was during back and forth. If there are two speakers, paragraph breaks are enough.

[T.C. Martin @TCMartin_Books]

@DanNEO_SS Let's play a game.

https://t.co/xfGi1HFg0c

[T.C. Martin @TCMartin_Books]

Thanks to a certain Danish cookie loving reviewer, I'm thinking about character voices again. If anyone likes games and wants to talk about their book, pick a few characters, pick a few lines, and we can guess who said what. We'll see if we named our characters to match their voices, or if we need to work on such things.
Take a scene, erase actions and speech tags, and drop just a few lines.

Vandyr / Yip Yip / Lord Lushington / Adjreanna

1) "Let’s make you functional and fabulous." "Stay here in the Luxe Gallery, My Hero. Feel free to browse. When one dares BECOME fierce, privacy is key.”

2) “Daring regalia, dear." "You look adrift, care to be my muse for a verse or two?" "Seeking a swell to weave your birthing tide into shimmering waves?”

3) “Ah... There it is. Fey work is not charity, Mr. Vandyr. When we take something from the aether, we must put something of equal weight back. In this instance, a life for a life will not suffice. The scales are… more intricate.”

4) “Move. Please. I like you very much, but you are in the way of the part where I argue with Death again.” “This is suboptimal cardiology. Hearts should have insides.” “Come on, dogman. Do the profoundly inconsiderate thing and cling to life a little longer.”

[T.C. Martin @TCMartin_Books]

Waveborn's Wake is officially available on paperback! 🥳

It comes complete with a Table of Contents, Chapter Titles, Maps, and an unnecessarily complete Glossary!

My cartographer and I should've formatted the map colors differently, but too late now😆.

https://t.co/tUBSKqTnoB

[T.C. Martin @TCMartin_Books]

I called this being Americanized.
You can take women from countries (where they care for the home and help the man so he can get back out there and earn for the family), bring those women to America, and within a month of talking to American women, those women will do nothing, demand everything, and hate the men who provide for them.

There's also Hollywoodized: An attractive woman becomes famous, loses 50+ lbs, and then looks like the Crypt Keeper while claiming to be more healthy.

There's more, but🤷‍♂️.

[T.C. Martin @TCMartin_Books]

@jmgwritten "Personal experience."

What they don't mention is that they chose horribly and continued to choose horribly and refuse to take responsibility for their choices. The good men were there the whole time. They just got shamed and/or friend-zoned.

[T.C. Martin @TCMartin_Books]

@SDDonovan I've lost touch with many of my first follows. I think it's because I engaged with others, so my feed is more the current engagement, not past engagement. So I engage with what I see and it becomes an unintentional lost contact.

[T.C. Martin @TCMartin_Books]

@GSJennsen Awesome! I knew there had to be something there. Thank you!

[T.C. Martin @TCMartin_Books]

To those who order their own books from Amazon:

Is there a special way to do it for some "It's my book" discount? Or do you buy it retail, sell it for what you paid, and collect royalties from Amazon as if it were purchased by those you sold to in person?

Before I make a large order from a 3rd party supplier, I wanted to grab a few copies off Amazon to give out to friends and family.

[T.C. Martin @TCMartin_Books]

Got it. If you wish to delete, go for it 😉.

I understand your conflict. You have everything you need to explain it, but even then it would tell what you wish to hide. Indifference may not be the big seller. Perhaps you can point to other works without exposing too much. Like where Dragons are the reason for magic, and with the last dragon gone, magic will be too. It is a struggle.

It's funny you mention this. The story I've been working on since the 90's is somewhat like that, but God's absence is the problem. God (Bob) creates. God makes the Primordials (eversors). Primordials help shape the solar system syphoning God's powers. God makes the first man (osni). God leaves the solar system. The primordials go dormant to preserve the remaining God power. Some osni learn of the primordials and plan to awaken them for their power. Primordials get pissed and make spawn to wipe out the osni. The primordials go dormant again. Hundreds of thousands of years later the new man (asuva) evolved. The spawn (eversorlings) are still around doing bad things. The story begins. I describe that one as DBZ inspired (because it was) with an omni-genre story (devised before Ready Player One was a twinkle in Ernest Cline's eye). It has ki-like powers but with 32 aethers (love, hate, fire, water, etc.)

Back to you. If something hits me, I'll toss it at ya. But, yeah, you're in a rough spot with this one🧐.

[T.C. Martin @TCMartin_Books]

The fact remains he chose to be where he did not belong. He carried a weapon where he did not need one. And he instigated a confrontation that did not need to be had. If you look at his history, it was clearly premeditated to incite an incident. The outcome was fantasized until it became reality. Even a moron like me saw this the second the news struck, before learning all the proof. Patterns are easy to identify once you've seen them.

[T.C. Martin @TCMartin_Books]

If only I had my book on there already.

But, if you like fantasy adventure. The Fall of Radiance by Blake Arthur Peel. I enjoyed that one. It's a 5 book series. Two MCs: man and woman. Dual narration. Dual perspective.

Another one I started listening to is Pillars of Reality by Jack Campbell. Similar fantasy adventure, but only one narrator. Two MCs: man and woman. Dual perspective. I have yet to finish it because my ears free time has diminished, but I plan on continuing the series.

[T.C. Martin @TCMartin_Books]

I think we all think about jumping, not because we're looking for the end. We really don't know why we do. It's a weird feeling standing at the edge. Perhaps to end the suspense.

Some things exposure therapy cannot help. Like trypophobia (if you don't know, DO NOT look it up). Fear of compact spaced holes. Usually staring at things numbs me to the effect. Like researching spiders and understanding them and which ones are aggressive, dangerous, or cohabitable. Looking up trypophobia and perusing hundreds of images one night set me at a level of unease for weeks including nightmares. It didn't make me fear, it just disrupted my homeostasis; like crossing wires on your car so your signal turned on the radio and the brake pedal turned your wheel.

Each image made it worse, not better. And though I have my guesses why it's a thing, there is no definitive answer. Which makes it worse. At least we know how heights, spiders, and snakes can and have historically killed us.

But, I got what I needed and my next book will be good😆.

If you do decide to finish that project, I recommend brainstorming with a few people daily. It helps work through any unease and takes burden off your shoulders. And BSing is a good way to move past lingering thoughts.

[T.C. Martin @TCMartin_Books]

I'm just spitballing here. Sometimes a bit of back and forth helps me epiphonitize (I know) what my story needs.
Could Indifference be your Chaos? God's indifference to collateral damage? Or more vague: what kind of harm indifference can cause.

To elaborate, my primary antagonist is the God of Chaos. But the reason is due to how chaos in general destroys more than it creates. And without Order as the dominant element, Chaos unleashed is just plain bad. Though the embodiment is the god, the true enemy is the aspect. So I don't say Nergaloth is the antagonist, I say her domain is.

[T.C. Martin @TCMartin_Books]

@AndreaMyon Cliché

[T.C. Martin @TCMartin_Books]

Understandable. I'm a bit odd on that front. I can describe in detail and weird out/disgust/horrify my friends while feeling nothing as I say it.

For a long while I couldn't comprehend why actors would break down after certain roles. I thought it was a difference of experience, but now I believe it is a combination of that and more. If anything, I hope the following helps.

I wrote some DARK things in my book. Then I deleted them. Not to remove the darkness, but to erase the exposition. The antagonists are pure evil, and what they do... it's shown, but it isn't. Unless you're paying attention, you won't know the description of the victims and the true level of evil portrayed. I did it to fit the theme. It's a fantasy adventure, not a horror meant to scar the reader.

Yet, when I describe, I do not think. I go on and on with vivid scenes, actions, and emotional words. And as my listener thinks, imagines, and dwells, I do not. I move to the next and brush past with little more than an analytical word search to evoke the desired result.
Describe eating dookie and I'm fine. Think about the smell, texture, and ensuing reflex, and I gag.
Watch DiCaprio swallow a loogie in Titanic and I'm fine. Think about the times I've done it; the slimy contrast and rough bits of dried pieces scraping, sliding, and snagging on its way down🤢.
The trick is not to focus, to remove oneself, like a surgeon working on a man as if he were a vehicle.

You can work when you're too close to see the whole picture, or too far to see the details. When you stand between is when mornings start beginning with nightmares.

Or maybe I've spent so long removing myself that there's nothing left🤷‍♂️.