Archive for August, 2009

I’m surrounding by sleeping felines and one small, softly snoring dog. The sun is bright but not baking, and the wind is howling through the trees with enough force to make me smile.

It’s a good day to start.

My name is A. I’m a writer and a self-published author of The Demon-God of Jubagh. This blog is going to chronicle my journey from writing-as-a-hobby to writing-as-a-path – maybe not a career path, but a path nonetheless. Over the next two years, I aim to finish at least four major writing projects (read: novels) and find an agent. Failing luck with an agent, I’m going to continue down the self-publishing path. I’m a marketer by day (among half a dozen other things), so I’m no stranger to getting the word out and making my name known.

Along the way, I’ll be blogging about a variety of things related to writing. Inspiration drawn from various sources, including real life and fiction; my particular writing methods and foibles; the creative worldbuilding process that I so love; and, of course, what I’m writing. You’ll find brainstorming, musing, exultation, flailing, excerpts, and shared experiences all contained within this little webspace.

As an introduction, let me give you an impression of where I’m coming from. I was born and raised in West Virginia, moved to Colorado for three years, and am currently meandering around in western Nevada. (I went from the Appalachian, to the Rockies, to the Sierra Nevada range. I’ll never live without mountains.) There are four cats and a dog in the household that I share with my love, J, as well as a houseplant, two motorcycles, and about fifty gazillion musical instruments. (Seriously. We have four guitars, six drums, a fiddle, a keyboard, a dozen harmonicas… need I continue?) J and I are both avid martial artists, animal-centric people, and deeply bound to the natural world around us – you’ll see these influences creep (or, really, lunge) into my writing and worldbuilding. I write sci-fantasy, occasionally wandering off my hybrid road into science fiction or high fantasy; I try to buck stereotypes and cliches as often as I twist them into something new. My day jobs normally involve graphic/web design, marketing, or customer service management. (Read: I like shiny things, and I speak kindly and politely to people.)

You can find me on Twitter under @authormancuso (amancuso was taken!) and right here on this blog. I also have personal worldbuilding wikis for the Gurhai universe (setting of the Jubagh series) and the Lavanaverse, as well as a wiki for Uhjayi, a language spoken by the inlanlu tahori of the Gurhai ‘verse.

The next two years hold incredible promises and adventures. This is only the first exhilerating step.

Let’s go!