Took all my mental imagery which produced the original literary descriptions for both the trilogy and the current WIP, Book Of The Bōrei, generated base artwork as close as possible, then did extensively manual and composite editing on the images using Paint.Net, some of which had several iterations in their original project before their final form, as seen here.

Artwork isn’t always consistent, I get it. Not happy about that aspect. You work with what you get. What matters here is key iconography, character vibe and narrative accuracy.

Generative imagery is the potentiator for the 21st century writer who can’t pay thousands in commission fees for what amounts to non-commercial, conceptual output. This stuff is dream-fulfilment. I get to see my beloved characters on a screen.

Any artists wondering what role they play in this, it’s quite simple:

If you like what you see, go read the books, prepare a portofolio of your art style and show me. If I think Spectral Braver would look awesome in your designs, we can work on this together to pitch to a production studio, as partner creators.

If you opt to insult me because I used LLMs to build something that is already conceptually mine, you have no future. Because you choose not to grow and adapt when things inevitably change.

Naturally, if you’re going to get into this, there’s plenty of spoilers.

Grab some coffee and a snack or something and enjoy.

Have a nice weekend.

2025 was an exhausting year for me. That’s time I’m never getting back.

The personal life side of this is none of your business. Just know that in several respects, the public side of it was just as needlessly bad. I always manage, though. I’m on my own and I’ve always been tough like that.

I started developing the core trilogy of the series in mid 2022, when I realized my persistent dreams about ghosthood and the pining for my late mother should converge into a point I could convey universally to an audience, in a cogent, entertaining manner. I was 42 and I never fully committed to a long form story, because I dreaded becoming mired in a derivative, victim-of-inspiration, nothingburger of a narrative. It seemed like a waste of time. But there it was. It was melancholic, beautiful, hopeful, exhilarating and it handily defeated Death. Just as I always felt was the highest moral position to hold, existentially: To not be afraid; to understand it; make peace with it. Because it wasn’t the transition in itself that held a grip on me, but the uncertainty which assailed me with grief since the 4th of July, 2021. What if it was scary for her? Would she be alright? When it’s my turn, will I be able to find her somehow? I couldn’t sleep with these thoughts. This story saved me and gave me serenity. It was so much fun to write.

The process had its growing pains, due to my inexperience with such a huge tentative outline to draft, but I found my way, bit by bit. Being persistent, self-critical, indulging in mid-draft revisions, every time I was done with these massive 8k word chapters. The mental imagery kept chasing me and it insisted on Japanese anime aesthetics. It had to be. The first anime to homage stuff like the Ivan Reitman and Tim Burton movies on these spooky themes, it felt like a true love letter to a pop-culture that is largely dead now, revitalized by the heart-warming and powerful vibes of Japanese media. All the more reason to press on. But I wasn’t prepared to fall in love with my characters. That definitively changed everything from that point. Now I’m responsible for these people.

Not only were they larger than life figures, they were the BEST of us. In how they grew, what they had to deal with and how aptly they kept their sanity in such a terrifying and grim setting.

“Defiantly happy, these are the strongest of this realm. No question about it:

They are the Heroes of this Tale.” ~ Book III: Calamity Breach

Their teleological job for this narrative is very direct: To prove to you that courage is not optional; honesty improves planning and outcomes; family breeds strength against Evil. All things this world has largely forfeit, while rationalizing the anti-thesis to all of us, using propaganda and mass-scale social engineering, as if that holds any merit whatsoever. Our contemporaneity is so shamefully weak. Good God…

But I figured that was just the system. People think and feel, surely they can be reasonable to not become the system-

They have become the system. Sorry. That’s just the reality. The demoralization worked, you’re all defeated and you cope in your defeat. You have NOTHING to teach me on this subject. Only that you’re lying to yourselves. Pitiful. Eyesore.

Which leads me to the months after wrapping up the draft and revisions, taking this to social media to see what people thought of it. It was early 2024. Nobody cared. Hey, perhaps it was half-baked, perhaps my marketing strategy wasn’t working (not that I really had one, but whatever), but I did notice how people would attack my work, not because they read it, but because they didn’t like the cut of my jib. And any mutuals I managed to accrue back then, really didn’t stand by me. I’m just some Portuguese anon, who gives a fuck about him or his massive 300K+ word book, right? So I took it down, worked even more revisions on the manuscript, despite having zero real feedback on the fucking thing. Then I took it to query agencies for about 7 months therein.

All form letter rejections. No matter how much I followed the guidelines, checking the genre wish lists, nobody even touched the samples. Some of these lazy assholes even responded within minutes of the query. The end result? 200+ rejections for Spectral Braver. I should stop, get a chair and a rope and not bother these people with my white straight ass set for eradication again, right? Everyone’s on board with the agenda to completely push my demographic off a cliff, after all.

NO. FUCK YOU.

I’ll go full Indie, then. Self-publish the thing, reformat the book into 3 entries so this isn’t so massive and expensive to print, then start working on all these notes I have for prequels and a final sequel. This stuff is huge. I don’t care if my society has gone feral fuck mad. I’m going to tell my fucking story, by hook or by crow.

But I absolutely need readership. This project already took so much work, even if I was happy doing it the whole time, it had to start paying off somehow. Nobody believes this stuff is a job. Family doesn’t support or cheerlead (if they really didn’t lend much of a shoulder when my mom died, expectations were not exactly soaring). So I really need to create an image for this IP, to pitch this to a potential audience. My author account was thus reactivated in November 2024.

Shit, no money. Right. But there seems to be a bunch of generative image engines popping up everywhere. Since I only have to worry about covers for a digital version for the time being, let’s try to generate some setting from the story, like the great entrance hall of Craig Manor. That actually looks gorgeous.

Done. Now let’s breathe life into these descriptions. Sure, the LLMs are dumb as rocks and have such glaring gaps in their lexicon, it’s hard to get them to do anything as I imagined it. Most anime outputs are just Studio Ghibli shit, so I’ll have to go with some CG-looking crap for now. They nearly looked the part, the characters. I could even see how they would fare as live-action versions. But that wasn’t the vision I had for it. I should hold off on working too much on this stuff, just enough to tease what Spectral Braver is.

As I climbed in followers, graciously taking in all people who showed any interest in this, I saw there were actually a lot of Indie writers who were doing their own thing. A community would surely strengthen my reach but also give me some hope - that there were other people on my boat, trying to usher in their own brand of antidote to this nihilistic, stupid mainstream culture that made everything so goddamn boring since 9/11. It felt like a rising tide. They called it an ‘Iron Age’, even. It sounded so cool. But I noticed how many of them were taking jabs at my work, without reading it. If it wasn’t about the AI covers (which never went to print, as that goes against my own personal criteria about making physical commercial goods with AI art); it was about how I’m prima-facie not a good writer. Why would these people attack my work if I didn’t attack theirs? Isn’t writing a craft? An artform? Subjective? Stylistic? The fuck is the matter with these absolute sociopaths on X?

Soon after a few of these exchanges, my published work got the first review on Amazon, on the first book.

As you can plainly see, Amazon never took this down, despite reporting it. And 6 other pieces of shit piled on. This is the ACTUAL reality of Indie. Total brand vulnerability with bad actors. Nobody cares, nobody makes noise about this, because I would have to be a very important person in order to have some some sort of Devon Eriksson month long anti-cancel culture campaign on X. Nothing on the guy, it was unfair what that group did to him. But you were on his retweets like white on rice - not because you believe in the principle, but because you’re all stinky clout demons. I get it, if you’re on your own, you’re just on your own. People who were supposedly sympathetic to me on X didn’t move a finger. A year later their fingers will not move and this shit’s only gotten worse and I’ve gotten considerably bitter in proportion.

Don’t think I don’t see your cowardice, guys.

Rest assured you’ll be on your own too.

Anyway, I kept working, otherwise this would just feel like those 200 fucking rejections from trad pub, so I had to keep moving, defeat the cortisol rise with this BS.

But people just wouldn’t read the fucking thing. Even got a few sales, but no readers. By the way, this is why your “write to market” strategy is absolute bunk if you don’t have people talking about your story in public. You go by metrics, you obsess over sales, but unless you created a dream for an audience to rave about, none of this stuff matters. It’s momentary. It pays for a few more cups of coffee. You probably should worry about your story instead and how original and powerful it is. Long term thinking.

The process to get the first book from that 1 star to 3.56 with a few more jabs to tear me down, took months. Reputation? Guttered.

This stuff made me wary about promoting my work. The more I did, the more vitriol I attracted. Several author accounts, some of these supposed Indie darlings of the community, started jumping into this. I am absolutely sure, they were spreading falsehoods about me and my work in these circles.

Spectral Braver took tears and sleepless nights trying to transform my grief into something beautiful and fun. It isn’t generative. It’s ME, you fucking asshole.

One of these unfortunate situations was with the Fellowship of the Indie Author, whose star author & promiscuously lead moderator of that community, decided to snipe the one post in months I did just TALKING about an aspect of my book. I wasn’t advertising links to make a sale. Their reaction was absolute silence, including from the author who started this community. Apparently, that was an acceptable thing to do. So I left that community.

You’re all still there. On your tippy toes, trying to get clout.

I see you. Cowardly, as ever. Don’t come tell me about principles, you have none. You let all this stuff transpire in the hopes they won’t do it to you.

I hope they do it to you. So you learn.

The next little bit of high school drama was a relatively minor account who, to my knowledge, only posted some lame poetry every now and then. Not exactly someone particularly accomplished in publishing (which is a commonality with the most vile of examples in this disgraceful community), who was watching my mentions for interactions with a prominent Indie reviewer who took a shine to me, somehow.

It seems that according to some people, men like me aren’t deserving of love or something. It’s all so mean-spirited and awful, I have to chalk this woman and her cadre of witch cunt crypto-feminists in the Indie space, as caricatures of the Mean Girls in that one movie, except aesthetically downgraded to a rather unfortunate degree. Hags, yes. Ugly fucking hags, the lot of them. And they can die mad about it. Because these people had access to my DMs they wanted to supposedly “warn me” about this reviewer being a catfish. I pushed back, because frankly that’s just not something you accuse someone of, with no evidence. Which they obviously didn’t have. Rejecting this gossip attack then resulted in the most low IQ devolution of their narrative. Now, this account isn’t a catfish - it’s me. And every other account who has associated with me since is also POTENTIALLY me.

Guys, you’re saying this stuff in your timeline sowing circles in front of everyone and sundry to this DAY - with X having regional info clearly showing all of us posting from DRASTICALLY separate, continentally distant fucking countries. You are literally Joseph Goebbels, employing the “repeat the same lie” playbook. That’s how I know you’re fucking evil. And nobody puts you in your place but me.

That’s ok. You’ll be put in your place as many times as you need, man hater.

That reviewer shows me this stuff because, well she’s a woman and I know she loves the gossip. But this destroyed our relationship. Even if she claims she loved reading my books, she paid WAY more attention to stuff like this, which was disheartening to me. Spectral Braver is my heart. It’s all there. And here’s another one who is just trying to get a nice review out and not really seeing my heart in those pages or truly living in that world. She had more books to read. Many, many more. So that wasn’t it either. This whole thing is just cumulative frustration that just makes me not want to deal with people anymore.

And so I won’t. It’s been over a year of dealing with you assholes. The lot of you.

I don’t care if you don’t read the books. But you owe me the same level of honesty at the very least. Because this isn’t about just me anymore. All this time, it’s been about them:

These are the folks who saved your useless fucking world and you don’t even know it.

It legitimately breaks my heart.

But you know what? I figured it out. This isn’t for you. You’re all cooked, your world is finished and the Devourers actually won here.

Your memories are shot to Hell and you barely understand your own History;

You’re all either overt or closet sociopaths, you’ve completely destroyed your bonds in society;

You believe in nothing and you’ve even gaslit yourselves into thinking we’re living in some kind of simulation-

YOU’RE MORONS!

You’re Godless, lost and doomed fucking morons.

So I’ll keep working on Spectral Braver and I’ll absorb all the falseness, the injustice and the antagonism, fart it out into the void and keep on working some more, doing everything you don’t like and don’t respect, such as using generative images to create my concept work, tell you to fuck off when come to preach to me on how to tell a story, how to brand myself and to “play nice” with you fucking degenerates. That will be the day, indeed. You might want to sit your ass down.

That will never happen.

Spectral Braver forever.

Some “erm, ackshually” exchange - which I’ve made abundantly clear in the past, I do NOT welcome in my mentions - well, this guy thought it would be ok to drop a fake review, for a book he would have to purchase in order to read (by the way, Spectral Braver has been pulled from KU). Obviously, he didn’t. Didn’t know me, still dropped the review on the same day as the comment. Prima facie, wow, that’s a lighting fast reader, I’ll tell ya that.

This is absolutely spiteful misuse of a facility which was made to inform readers. Not to weaponize against authors - or favor them as the winds of one’s whims blow. But this keeps happening in either direction. This is dark triad psychotic behavior. This guy doesn’t have a conscience and if he wouldn’t get caught, I have to wonder what sort of things he would do to people. This is a hint of an unravelling. My conscience doesn’t let me do this, even to writers I find abhorrent, fraudulent and scummy on this site. Principles abide by said conscience and so the action is to be the “bigger man”. Eye for an eye is therefore unthinkable. Screw him, but I’m not lying to his readers like he did to mine. Still, not attacking his work doesn’t mean I’m giving him a pass. And if you read this and think this isn’t your problem - your apathy should make you ashamed. This happens because of that blind eye you choose to turn because it wasn’t done against you.

This is the absolute STATE of the Writing Community on X. It’s provenly no longer tenable to have a presence on that site, promote your work or network with writers, because here’s what’s in the pipeline. It’s becoming a routine nuisance, which long term, only becomes a bigger issue and I’ll not be the only one affected. When people do this and no acknowledgement is made to the grotesque misconduct that is weaponizing reviews, you are building up to situations where the higher you go in notoriety, the more this evolves from this one jackass trying to take a decimal or two off your review score to full blown brigading of your reviews by a fiendish mob, adding the slanderous insult of calling your craft “100% AI generated”. Without reading it. Tom here just decided it would be a good idea to lie to harm me. He will do the same to you if he doesn’t like you. Amazon won’t help with this. They are an abysmal publisher in their relationship with self-published authors and it’s their sheer size which affords them the callousness.

If this makes you angry, you know what you need to do.

If not for my sake, for the sake of yourself and your peers who will come to face this eventually over the impunity this kind of behavior currently enjoys on social media.

Moving on doesn’t work. It just makes the behavior banal.

Cancel them back. Cancel anyone who does this.

Scorch their social media footprint with their crimes.

I’m telling you they would do worse things if they could.

DON’T look away.

It is a tacit inevitability than when you create in a social context, you will be pressured to lie. And lie often you shall. Because for every post and article that you make within a community, it will be primarily in service of your social reputation. It won’t be the honesty of your takes; it won’t be the merits of your work; it won’t be to make waves. Otherwise the community shuns you. We all know this, happens routinely on X.

See, I don’t function socially when it comes to my creativity. You would assume that by default when it comes to writers. I don’t ask for help on matters both personal and professional. I write alone and logically, as an extension of the TRUE nature of my craft, I stand alone beside it as well. I regard this as the true ontology of writing.

Doesn’t mean I don’t have friends. But we seem to be operating on different criteria to define what those are. See, I expect my friends to be able to reciprocate on 3 things:

• Be honest with me;

• Stand by their word;

• Be present for both triumphs and failures.

As soon as you employ this set of criteria, that big crowded room gets awfully quiet, doesn’t it?

Let me explain this to you like you’re 6 and I’m your Dad:

People say they are many things, Timmy, but they don’t even do a third to prove it. Get used to it, try not to waste your time. It’s not that these people are bad… They just don’t know any better. Now go on, go play.

Now for the grown-up side of your brain, let’s get into the brass tacks of the issue. Why is it that in the wider community context, with follow counts around the 1K followers or more, you seem to have a lot of supposed supporters but nothing happens with regards to expanding your readership and reach? No, it’s not Elon’s fault. Is that you and everyone else consistently labor in things that simply do not help anyone in the Indie creative space.

FIRST PROBLEM:

You don’t read or review nearly enough of your peers’ work. In fact, you recuse yourself when you can tell that review is probably going to be negative. You’re not helping that author. By starving them of feedback, they will not improve, ever. You care about them, right? You want their books to succeed?… Why did you go quiet all of a sudden? Kinda weird.

The other side of that cowardly coin, is when you absolutely know you’re going to be jealous when reading someone’s work. You get your panties in a bunch, find like minded people in the community, get into these passive aggressive conversations with the author and get some dogpiling going, then signal to the rest of the herd “See, he’s an asshole, his books are crap, don’t read him, unfollow.”

No matter from which angle you slice this, you are weak if you do this. It spells profound insecurities - that you cannot hold your social standing by being honest, that you cannot hold your work to higher standards. In your small bubble, doing everything you can to not make waves in the group, means you get devoured by said group, in its meager aspirations. In your mediocre clique of gossipers and bullies, trying to bring other authors down, means you are desperately competing for relevance amidst the similarly unaccomplished. It’s thus very unfortunate for you, that artistry and creation are definitionally NOT competitive practices. They are cumulative. Your zero sum game bullshit only exists in your head and you look like a fool indulging in those mistaken notions. Understand this plainly: Nobody REALLY cares about your books if you do this. In the longest timeline, no one ever will.

SECOND PROBLEM:

Your idea of Indie support is signalling on social media that you’ve added your peers’ books to your TBR. You show a screenshot of the purchase, complain how big that list is growing, never touch the book again. If you’re doing this with a kindle or ebook copy on Amazon, prepare to be upset, because you’re not only harming other people, people are harming you in this game of throwaway quid pro quo. Turns out Amazon looks at every digital purchase in 108 day intervals to determine if those books are “good”. What does that mean? If you bought it and didn’t read it immediately (the faster, the better) the more the algorithm kicks that book down the listings. You bought the author a coffee. That’s what you did. That’s cool, you’re a very nice person.

If you think I’m pulling your leg here, read this article by someone who did their homework on the subject:

The Hidden Rules of Amazon ~ Joe Solari, 2025

See, you have a bunch of sales on your books, but all your Indie “friends” did was buy you a cup of coffee in royalties, at most. Surely that’s a nice gesture, but you are a published author, are you not? Do you care about the money or people enthusiastically experiencing your brain child, that you toiled over for years?

This question alone should define everything you are in this space. Anyone can open a donation channel somewhere, if that’s the actual point. Real authors want people to get their stuff and read it like they mean it. This absolute swamp of false support is great for people struggling without food stamps; not so great for serious authors, turns out.

THIRD PROBLEM:

Your book link threads don’t do jack for an author’s engagement with their work and you know it. I’m sure you’ve done enough of these by now to see that your metrics are great on the original post, the vast generality of authors who propped you up there got crickets. This one really gets stuck in my craw, because you’re seeing those metrics, aren’t you? You know this is true. Pretty self-serving if you ask me, but the way you advertise this to your circles, it seems like “wow, he really gives a shit”.

You’re not getting a pass on this and it’s about high time people avoid those posts of yours like the plague.

Hell is full of good intentions, goes the adagé. But to me, being a naturally controversial, opinionated man of strong character and even stronger words and attitudes, you can imagine the ease with which I expose these truck loads of bovine excrement, on a space which consistently spells the overarching ineffectiveness of its performative motions. I know most of you wonder why the hell Indie can’t break the bubble, with these many authors, these many posts, these big communities. Why you can’t attract audiences and business partners that would help your visions flourish.

The reason for that, is that you forgot you work alone. You mixed the waters. We’re not here to “make friends”. You are mistaken. When you come out of that creative cave, what you need is sincerity and genuineness when people interact with your work. They DO NOT have to like you. Get it through your head.

I can absolutely tell the difference between that vapid, steaming bog you navigate in those writer groups; and the rapport I establish with other authors on an individual basis: These people have been AMAZING to me and I hope to help them in any way I can. My rising tide will raise their ships, because I remember who actually cared about my work first and not who I am as a person. You will find them saying “He’s rough, but he’s a good guy.” You will also see them singing the praises of my story because they want to read good stories and you can tell they love reading. Most of you don’t, stop lying. You don’t read for shit.

They also put that cherry on top by not feeling in any way like I’m stealing away their thunder with Spectral Braver. Those will become close friends of my characters, which is what I actually hoped for. The friendship with me is a product of my immense gratitude. Because they actually helped where it mattered. Even when they reviewed my first book pointing out the issues with it. The Second Edition exists today because I took them seriously. And it paid off. I’m as proud of my work as the people reading those editions today are. It is the victory of self-reflection and hard work. I didn’t lean on clout to make my flawed work make the rounds like you did.

And I’ll never forget that valuable, REAL support. Make sure you have those stories to tell yourself in the Indie space. Ignore the communities, talk to people like you’re decent. Try that. These groups aren’t taking you to that glorious place where you start to see that your story actually matters.

These writer groups are not your readers and sure as Hell aren’t your friends.

Lie all you want. Cope until it looks like that bends your reality.

But you can’t really lie to yourself now, can you?

There would be a time each year, just before the arrival of a new Spring, whence the decay of the dead would waft, as far as the southern shores of Bushū[1]. This phantom stench… It was a reminder of a great tragedy, far removed from everyone’s eyes, yet often somberly whispered as a cautionary tale to children, by the elderly who swear by its veracity. The western ends of this province, neighboring the Hōjō Clan’s domain of Sagami[2] are the place of darkened, treacherous forests, swallowing a cursed hill none dare approach, in spite of its constant vigil over their fields. For at the foot of this hill, the village of Kageoka[3] once stood. Many hold to the belief that it still does… In a different manner.

In the 3^rd year of the Daiei[4], ceremonies over this strange phenomenon, were no longer held in the surrounding villages. It was the belief of many priests and diviners, who were called upon this place to ward against this ominous influence, that a darkness this impossibly dense, could not be eliminated. Thankfully, nothing ever sprung from the depths of those forests. But whomsoever decided to risk their fortunes in such a grim direction… Would never find their way back. ‘Spirited away’, some claimed. ‘A place of banditry’ was also posited by the wary. So it was settled in common sense, that it would be best for the populous to live on, as if forgetting it, would thus starve this curse of any power that would allow it to advance. Whether devised by the living… Or the Dead.

Still, that stench always returned.

Ensuring that whoever neglects the thought long enough, is sure to be reminded, just before Life returns to the fields for another season. But this year, it wouldn’t be the crops that would be floating the murmurs of concern, reaching all the way to Edo Castle…

It was wartime.

常

A boy, just 6 years old, with a muted green robe and barefoot, stomping about, is once more aiding the village in the early morning, at the behest of his mother. Carrying a large bundle of rice at his back, it won’t bend. For this is the day that everyone at Tabikimura[5] pitched in with their supplies to purchase some dietary variety. This is very important and he understands the weight of his charge. This only happens when there’s surplus rice. And it had to happen the day that awful smell invaded their lands once again.

The fishmonger’s cart just arrived at the edge of the village, looking to trade. The man, accompanying the dark ox pulling the goods, is on foot. Clad in a dirty gray kimono and shorts, wears a bandana around his shaven head. The trek from the shore was a long one and yet, his initially exhausted disposition swiftly shifts to great cheer, seeing the boy approach – “Yūta[6]! Ah, always the tough back! This is the second year in a row I’m met by you, the villagers sure place great stock on you, boy!”

He bows in response, forgetting the bundle is tightly balanced on his upright posture. The trader darts to his aid, taking the weight off his back – “…There.”

“Thank you, Sachi-jiji[7]…” – Collapses to the floor, hands and knees.

“Ah don’t mention it. You’re still small, you know? Have to be careful carrying such a burden for all the elderly-“

“I’m like a bug, they carry a lot on their backs and they never complain.” He waves him off – “Ha, sure. Just don’t be an ant for all these… I mean, look at this dusty road, no one comes out, even!... How is your mother doing?”

“…Her sake still isn’t any good.”

“Oh, hahaha! These things take time, boy! It’s a good thing she took your father’s trade, but he should have left directions for her!”

“…Yahiko-jiji said his sake wasn’t great either.” – The boy is downcast while the man reassures him, letting off a cackle – “Strong as you are, with this much will to help everyone, I’m sure the Kami[8] will bless your brewery, when the time comes for you to take up the trade…” - He inspects the bundle – “This looks about a quarter of a koku[9], no wonder you look so beat. I had a great haul, so there’s some extra fish for you and your mother, for the hard work.”

“Thank you. She’s been feeding Yahiko-jiji since last Winter, he… Doesn’t work anymore.”

“He’s getting worse, huh?”

“He doesn’t even remember my name. Mother says his mind is becoming wild, like pampas grass…” The fishmonger notices a distant silhouette, walking to the other end of the village as he carries the bundle to his cart – “Ungh… Seems like he’s already up and about, look.” – Tilts his chin in that direction. Yūta turns around and sighs – “Oh no… I-Is it alright if you bring the fish to my house? I have to go get him, if not-“

“He’ll be fine!” – Starts collecting a batch into a basket – “I still have to go around with this cart for the rest of the day… Here.” – Passes a much lighter burden to the young boy and adds a fistful of horse mackerel – “Send my regards to Gin. If I manage to sell everything, I’ll still drop by and see if her sake is as bad as they say, hm?” The boy is flustered – “Um… Alright.” – Bows and starts his sprint to his house, leaving the main road.

“Watch the fish!... Geez. They put too much on this kid, wonder if they even let him play at all.” – Shakes his head and turns the ox around. Takes a whiff… Indeed, this was the day of the massacre. Proceeding up the town, he can still spot the old man, he doesn’t seem in a rush… Might be useful to the boy to see where he goes.

He turns a corner on the last house, to the left. Sachi rushes the beast – “Go on, make time…” – With a couple of taps.

The last house ends in a bamboo forest, stretching into a V.

“Uh. Just gone.” - Looks back to the other end of the village. Wind blows, shading the place suddenly with rain clouds. The Sun was just shining, moments ago. There’s the old man, going back home… Right? He’s boggled by this, how did he…? Takes a couple of steps before realizing that it’s not the same man… Why is that person darker, undefined…?

Sachi feels the urge to say something, yet freezes.

This figure stands in the middle of the road, slouched. Staring.

The fishmonger is momentarily transfixed by this vision, before walking back to the cart. Dares to look back one more time.

Still there… Perhaps there’s more than one mentally ill elder.

It is an aging population after, all. But looking back, it’s gone. That’s actually creepier. Moving on…

The sharp bamboo forest extends further up a wilding path that evidently hasn’t been used for many years.

He can see it before leaving it behind, as the road he takes is around that hill, not through it. Feels someone’s eyes on him… Now that old man is up there. It looks exactly like the other man, doesn’t it? That can’t be possible, he would have to fly, to be standing there this swiftly! The Sun flares the village again, causing the figure to vanish.

A chill invades Sachi’s body… That was not a man. Curses may lie hidden from the casual passerby, unless beckoning for attention, much like this… The boy. He must warn the boy. “MuuUUU!!!” – The ox is suddenly startled and bolts up the path, as the cart tilts side to side from the rush. “Hey!!!” – Takes off after the beast in a frenzy. 3 villages are still up and that thing will end up tossing the merchandise to the curb if he doesn’t wrangle it – “WHOA! STOP!!!”

Swiftly turning the curve, the fishmonger vanishes from line of sight of Tabikimura’s main road. With nary a witness to this concerning turn of events, it is nonetheless clear, that rumblings of an old Death are descending from the hillside…

…A forgotten path leading to Kageoka.

常

[1] old regional term for the province of Musashi, current day Saitama Prefecture, Tokyo.

[2] current day Kanagawa Prefecture, Tokyo.

[3] ‘Shadow Mound’

[4] Imperial Age, corresponding to the period between 1521 and 1528 AD.

[5] ‘Bonfire Village’

[6] a male name meaning ‘of gentle greatness’.

[7] ‘old man Sachi’

[8] ‘gods’

[9] a common currency in this Age, it was a measurement of rice corresponding to a person’s single year servings, 330lbs worth.

Right, so you just bought your groceries because otherwise you’ll starve.

You paid your bills lest you’re in the dark, can’t do laundry and bathe.

You paid your rent too, because living with the parents sucks.

The student loan never eases up, so gotta take care of that...

But self-actualization is important too, you don’t just live to survive, right? I totally get it- Oh, crap. Looks like your bank balance barely affords a cup of coffee. It’s bad. It’s been bad for a while, for many people. I feel your pain. Every day.

I wish I had disposable income too.

So, when it comes to books, which should be a relatively low entry-level cost for your entertainment, well, turns out indie authors also have the aforementioned concerns. They have day jobs and they still end up with barely any money - while spending their free hours writing, editing, designing covers and promotional material, reading their peer’s work, posting reviews, writing articles, building audiences. All for the sake of the craft. That’s how we’ve been getting by around here, so you can imagine that when we publish our books, between publisher royalties, printing costs and the bare minimum margin for income, those books still need to cost SOMETHING.

So when someone posts something like this…

…I get it. I’m not one to discount one’s struggles and make aspersive commentary on anyone’s living conditions. Remember this quote that is often attributed to Robin Williams:

“Everyone you meet is fighting a battle you know nothing about. Be kind. Always.”

Now, here’s where taking things at face value ends:

Have you tried asking the author?

Because if you were to ask me, I would tell you - my story is for the world. It matters to everyone, by virtue of the themes and the messaging built into my narrative, I think it was created to make your view of the world better. To heal things which pain us all. I absolutely believe that even the people who can’t fork up the 3 bucks for the digital version, because that’s the difference between having bus fare to go to work that day, should still be able to read my story. The more people know it, the more the possibility that it becomes a big thing in the culture, inherently emerges. Win-win.

Someone mentioned that allowing books to be pirated cultivates a fanbase. See, I think that’s a load of crock. What I think piracy actually does is allow for cultural work to be disposable. You stole it, so you won’t talk about it, surely. You won’t say how good it was, how it made you dream. You really didn’t go to any length to acquire it, so why should you bother, really?

But your authors are largely all on social media, most are regularly active in promoting their work. You could just ask.

If you cannot afford a book, here are the steps I propose:

1. Reach out to the author on social media;

2. Be nice and glaze them a bit, they like that;

3. Tell them you’d love to read their story in exchange for a review;

4. Give out your name and contact once you’re in touch;

5. Read the Author Review Copy they sent you;

6. Write a thoughtful review. If you feel the work needs improving, tell them where. Now you’re playing an active role in the medium you enjoy;

7. If you truly feel every single one of your friends needs to read this story, share your reviews with your followers, tell them where to get it;

8. If someone is in your situation and they can’t buy it, share these steps with them. The author is a cool person and they will be overjoyed to do this with them as well.

With this, you got yourself a free book and you only needed to write a few paragraphs on Goodreads and your social media of choice. You helped the author, you came out virtuous and helpful and nobody is going to judge you for the freebie. I promise you.

What you can’t do, is advocate for masses of the faceless to take someone’s hard work, consume it silently, share it to more faceless people as if you own it and let it dwell in ignominy, for as long as you take advantage of a system wherein you really did nothing but steal intellectual property. Because what you signal clearly with this is disdain, disrespect and lack of character.

When this comes from people in the booktok or booktwt communities, frankly, you all come across as a bunch of miscreants who are proudly out to hurt Indie creators to make it so that most of them stop creating entirely.

For those, I have this to say: It won’t work. If that’s your intention, I promise you that what’s going to happen next is that your accounts get blocked and your social reach eventually reaches zero. The understandably allergic reaction to this callous discourse of yours has been resoundingly definite: If you do this, you’re not our peers. You’re not our readers. And while you can enjoy the impunity of stealing someone’s work while supposedly creating your own, you will do so constricted in a very tiny box, where all the others thieving losers like you lie cramped, elbowing each other for crumbs of relevance in a niche that everyone will forget about in 6 months time.

I’ve seen no shortage of people talking about “community” in the arts by the mouthful. But it would seem to me quite frankly, that you and all the other supposed “writers” we share these spaces with, who seem to labor on nothing other than slander, derision and social toxicity, don’t write good enough books to warrant a spontaneous read. So your choice tactic has been to consistently attempt to demoralize and discourage those who are doing this stuff for real and for the right reasons.

It isn’t the money.

It’s principle.

If you go around acting like you don’t have money or principles, there’s nothing you have to say on anything that I would care to listen. And that includes your own work.

For the hundredth time: High school is over. Grow up already.

Herd mentality works both ways. What I’ve ultimately noticed is that Left wing people tend to quickly and unashamedly espouse moral cowardice and behave in ways that affirm this consistently. Leftists behave like high school mean girls, so they are inherently feminized, but in a rather strong toxic version of femininity (GSR - Gossiping Shaming Rallying).

Envy is also very common with the idiot Leftist. Most of their animus in fact, seems to spring from this. So while they affirm this supposed higher consciousness of the world, it is in fact an unfortunate result of their poor ability to parse environmental threats. They are lemmings, but also extremely petty people who possess at the base of their urges, this all-consuming need to take things they haven’t earned.

Not saying people on the Right don’t do similarly stupid and entitled things because I’ve seen them being petty to similar degrees. They just seem less retarded most days. But you can immediately tell their world view is strictly a la carte, based on whatever existing peer pressures they are subjected to. And apart from a vapid observance of God as a moral authority, they don’t really have a sincere world view, they merely employ it as cover for their own improprieties, which the Left is very keen on pointing out to them. Two retards fighting, in essence. Entertaining, but increasingly dangerous as current times indicate. The cognitive dissonance with the average conservative can be as strong as the average woke, but for different reasons, possibly more legitimate ones, as they are more loyal to those close to them, which is evolutionarily recommended. Leftists have very poor self-preservation, that’s why they look dumber overall in how they talk and sure end up looking dumb in outcomes. But if these two get in a fight, they’re really not fighting in our reality. They fight in spite of it, to everyone else’s detriment.

What’s actually terrifying about this, is that most people you know are dumb and worse: They hate you just by looking at you. It’s sinister when you don’t even understand why. It’s like they’re angry, demon possessed children, under the surface as they try to wrangle that deranged toddler from view in social interactions. I can see this CONSTANTLY in other people. You should understand that these cases you doubtlessly are confronted with on the regular (assuming you’re not the idiot to whom the shoe fits and is about to insult me in the comments because you have no emotional control), ultimately are a representation of the lowest common denominator. These are your ‘zombies’, per George Romero’s allegory. But even the Left’s highest socio-economic samples don’t impress, that’s probably why everyone thinks the Left is worse. Their elites are fucking deranged and moronic and they actually believe the stuff they do in the culture and in the pulpit looks good. Yikes, talk about overconfidence in the stupid. It may just be that they don’t have ubermensch at all on the Left and only the Right is capable of producing masculine, capable, sharp and ultimately rational leaders who play intelligently into the natural selection struggle, by having a clear talent for threat assessment. But more importantly: CAUSAL context as to why things are the way they are, which is at the very core of the lowest common denominator’s existential inefficiency. Unavoidably so.

There’s a reason we have ethics and it wasn’t the average joe shmoe off the street who came up with those. Philosophers conceptualized these under the strict observance of cause and effect. Without bias. This requires the ability to depersonalize the observer. No solipsism occurs here. In order to be objective about the predictable impact of any cause, you can’t afford to have that reflex because you obviously don’t want anything happen to you. That bias is powerful. That’s why ethics were created by the classical Age thinkers, who had less neurotic existentialist “noise” in their lives. Nature was a lot more present for them. They could easily remove themselves from the causal process to observe it for what it was, uncontaminated by fears or feelings. It is by all means transcendentalism - the only one of any consequence for real world outcomes because from it came our ethics, therefore our system of values and our laws. It’s actually a big fucking deal.

When leftists tell you they are “unbiased”, they are lying. What they are telling you in truth, is that they overcame the empirical observations of that which is causal and switched from that vital and rather difficult to master descriptive reflex, into an entirely prescriptive one.

Any idiot can tell you “oughts”. Very few people can tell you straight that which “is”.

No wonder morons coalesce predominantly in that alignment. It’s very easy to have silly wishes as to what the world should be.

People who operate entirely on prescriptions fall on the same group as Dunning-Kruger Effect brainlets. Ultra confident in their cursory knowledge of matters, disastrously unprepared for reality. In natural selection terms, these majority people, out of both groups, are simply not meant to survive. So why do they? That’s the existential asymmetry of humans, in how they organize to stave off needless cruelty. Some of us are to be as lesser gods to all the fools who really only think they understand their reality. They live it poorly and in disconnected glimpses of sobriety. It never truly sticks. They will always need help: Leaders. Those who, by virtue of discipline and depersonalization, can truly dabble in seeing how things function in the world. They become that which is and determine what works and what doesn’t. Actual problem solving, absent the human factor. This is why things like Democracies can never work, you silly leftists. This is why, rather than talking about rights, we should be talking about ROLES. To direct energy in ways that are productive, instead of scattering it, by the ineptitude of the masses. Societies with clear assigned roles to individuals are inherently hierarchical and unerringly so, ensuring everyone finds their way, even if sometimes they don’t exactly know why. They couldn’t know because most people simply DO NOT think that way about things, at all. And that doesn’t have to be bad. But it definitely has to be curbed.

We, who are not as others, should inherently take stock of what things are and ignore all the stupid people who are consistently threatened by us. They will try everything they can to make sure we do not attain “power”, which is what they truly care about in outcomes. Fools like this don’t understand that some of us out here are trying to do it PROPERLY. Not out of ego, but to ensure things function for everyone. Because they can, provided reality is the compass for Mankind, not stupid, petty wishes of fame and riches.

Thank you for coming to my TED talk.

You should be aware that over the years, there’s been a dismally fluid and organic tendency to acquiesce to extremely vocal people on the Internet, whose agendas always rely on blind conformity via peer pressure and Maoist-style struggle sessions, where one or several individuals are put through the wringer, as soon as they express anti-conformist views on social media.

The problem with this persistent phenomenon, is that it’s not only the malicious actors who perpetrate this harassment, under a guise of political correctness that are at fault. It’s everyone else, who readily buy into the false premise of a supposed “greater good”, wherein acquiescing to what amounts to harassment and bullying, because the people doing it don’t want you to say “bad words”. This is a low scrutiny attitude that puts you directly at odds with people who understand the facts and are trying to protect those at the core of this evident ire that forms around this malicious conformity.

One thing you should be painfully aware of, with regards to your personal character, is that you are a mere bad decision away from being the guy who throws people into a train car to unknown destination, as your compulsion to “follow orders”.

Conformity is and always will be a VERY dangerous inclination of the human spirit. It opens paths which you’d never tread, were you listening to your conscience.

I don’t care that you privilege politeness if you are morally weak. It means to me that you are a betrayer of principles and a fickle, unreliable person to support anything other than your self-preservation in the face of ostracism.

Real courage is about the strength to stand, when the odds are against you. It would seem to me though, that even this is a matter of perspective. This latest target of the cancel mob who almost destroyed this author’s account? Well, in a SINGLE day, multitudes of free thinkers in the writing community brought her back from the brink.

That which is loud, isn’t necessarily numerous.

That which is loud, isn’t necessarily strong.

So as you acquiesce to loud people, you immediately show your real face as a coward and a weakling, who readily flinches at loud noises.

You Internet “friends” in the writing community aren’t your friends if they convince you to defend rabid sociopaths to “keep the peace”. They are spiritual parasites, constantly attempting to exploit your social presence for their gain.

And most if not all, don’t even BOTHER to read your books. So much for the wages of your supplications for acceptance, within groups with the exact same dynamics as high school cliques.

Grow a spine, hold to real principles and hey - perhaps people will care about your books. In this new paradigm where the author acquires readership on a strong personality, wit and ability to stand on business, is the future of your craft. The ivory tower and their scurrying rats, attempting to keep you in the wreckage of the declining traditional publishing paradigm are not capable of pushing you into the Future. Only you can do that.

If you’re strong.

For those well into the core trilogy of this Dark Fantasy IP, you would have probably realized by now, that the first arc’s rather western themes soon give way to a multicultural adventure, exploring the supernatural folklore of various regions. Some will have more preponderance on the storyline than others.

I believe the first time I was exposed to the Shinobi / Demon Hunter archetype in Japanese fiction, was with Namco’s Soul Blade. Among its roster, there was a curvaceous and deadly red shadow named Taki. The year was 1998.

That 1v1 fighter had one of the best story modes in the medium, with tons of lore to learn and multiple endings to see. Having devoured the game’s every possible piece of content, the deadly and nimble Taki easily became my main choice when playing against friends. Her arc in that first instalment that later became Soul Calibur, led her in pursuit of a demon sword called Soul Edge, which in itself is not remarkable, playing by numbers into the main conflict of the game. But her lore and endings further hinted at her occupation as a slayer of ghosts and yōkai (demons), in service of the Fu-Ma clan. This was familiar to me. Over numerous mentions of ninja in popular fiction, the name Fūma would sometimes emerge. At the time, I just couldn’t find any mentions of demon hunting shinobi, the Internet was still in its infancy back then.

That concept stuck in the back of my mind, though. Who were the Fūma?

Further exposure to this came later in 2002, once more courtesy of videogames, with Koei Tecmo’s Dynasty Warriors spinoff, Samurai Warriors. Turns out, historically the Fūma-ittō was a clan of shinobi from Sagami, which were vassals of one of the most important families of the time: The Hōjō, having been the primary choice to take the Shogunate during the early years of the Sengoku conflict. So these were the ninjas working for big shots and their representative in the game’s roster was rather… Odd.

Easily looking more like a demon than a ninja, Fūma Kotarō The 5th was their leader. It became readily apparent in my cursory research, that this group of shadow warriors were rather inclined to the esoteric. In my mind, it’s rather easy to make the leap from there into the supernatural. Further portrayals of this along the years would reaffirm my impressions on it: They could easily and safely be re-interpreted in a congruent historical fiction as a clan of Demon Hunters.

Therefore, it is very early in the concept stage of Spectral Braver’s core narrative, that I started with considerations about a fun international roster of ghosts for this adventure, with significant roles, which one day could be adapted to a videogame based on my IP. The Demon Hunter shinobi had to be big in that framework. And so the Kanagawa Arc was born. Formerly known as the old feudal province of Sagami, these would be the old stomping grounds of the Fūma-ittō.

Once the site of a blazing tragedy…

…Now a haunting, which overpowered a 1980’s high school.

This would become the foundation to introduce new protagonists, a couple of allies to our western ghostly heroes: The Demon Hunter Kogetsu of the Fūma and the famed spider yōkai Jorōgumo as his travel companion and main squeeze. Quite literally.

Though I’ll be sparing on the details, it became quite clear to me at the time, that the sharp contrast in culture of origin would make for some fun moments and introduce the kind of action aesthetics which would reaffirm this property’s strong anime leanings.

As the arc was being outlined, a ton of notes resulted from this push, which I could easily see becoming the original story behind the incident at Hōjō Manor. Hundreds of years before the construction of Kanagawa First atop those accursed grounds, there would be a painful journey of acceptance of one’s demise and forgiveness for the things one cannot change.

These are themes, amidst the embers and arterial haze of a relentless war for control of the highest military seat in the Japanese Imperial court, that would establish the emotional core soaring above the intrigue and conflict surrounding this unfortunate yet resilient odd couple.

I can tell some pretty warm and hopeful stories amidst the most grim of scenarios. That’s my own authorial fancy, it would seem.

So, this timeline is what I’m tackling at the moment:

From a traumatic childhood event wherein the protagonist is first made aware of the Afterlife; to his recruitment as a specialized shinobi under the ‘red dogi’ esoteric sect of the Fūma-ittō; through the unfolding of his deathly tragedy; witnessing key historical events as an exorcist bōrei; finally arriving at the unavoidable exodus from the Land of the Rising Sun and into the arms of Felicity Craig’s heroic family.

I believe it is not only my desire, to realize a full supernatural historical fiction around the feudal Japan setting, which compels the writing of this first entry in the prequel arcs for Spectral Braver. Most people stop what they’re doing when they see samurai and shinobi doing their thing. It always provides the kind of stylish action one would hope to see in any fantasy.

Well, forgive me the indulgence, for having found the perfect excuse to weave this aesthetic into the story. Ghosts exist for a long time, seeing the passing of Ages, and no matter where they hail from, or what their notions of things may be… When something genuinely good is emerging upon the Greater Realm, they would be able to see it and pitch in to make it happen.

Kogetsu and Jorō went through a lot together and their fading wish of ever finding true Hope in this strange world, would only come to be revitalized much later…

When all things were meant to finally be healed.

So prepare yourselves, read up on the core story and once you find yourselves asking if you will get to see Kogetsu and his monstrous babe taking center stage, you won’t have to wait long for that. It is due Halloween 2026 and it will blow your tabi socks right off.

Very early in my life, I had this persistent haze of fancy that would roll in, whenever I heard a song or soundtrack I enjoyed. I would imagine my own take on a MTV video or a scene, whether it was emotional or action-packed, allowing the beats, harmonies and crescendos to set the motions of what was happening for me ‘on screen’. I could tell short stories in my brain, some of which I periodically penned and subsequently scrapped, perhaps because I felt it was too embarrassing or not good enough.

But that never really went away. Regardless if it was 8 or 16bit videogame chiptunes, soundtracks from big movies, music from bands I enjoyed or anime (the latter having become easily my core inspirational muse), the concepts spontaneously rolled in. Nowadays, I tend to consider that my attempts at literary conversion of those ideas (later on adopting screenwriting while I was in college), were fundamentally missing something.

That ‘something’ was a push for hybridization. I just didn’t understand quite clearly how that would work, even.

It is already assumed that the reader employs a mind’s eye during the experience, resulting in the commonly dubbed “brain movie” that a lot of people describe ‘seeing’ while reading a book that provides suitable immersion. Alas, we are in an Age of unfettered access to gigantic collections of visual and interactive media, which has entailed in this sharp reduction of readership. Why read if most of this stuff gets adapted in some shape or form? “Just wait for the Netflix show, bro”, most would say. Reading compels the kind of abstraction that requires a measured sense of time, which current generations scantly possess. The overstimulation has made it fleeting in the perception of the contemporary mind. Reading, a waste of said time. This is perhaps why considerations over the pacing of a story are so predominant.

The truth is, most books aren’t written in a fashion which allows for 1:1 adaptations to visual mediums. A lot of what counts as exposition or depth-enhancing scenes in literature can be compressed into the action of the story, often as rather miniscule references to what is actually one or several pages of content. It’s there, but not really ‘there’. So the old adage of “the books are better”, remained mostly unchallenged in the culture. Is there a way to translate a book’s pacing to match a tv show, 1:1? Well, a lot of anime does it, actually. Visual novels, Comics and Manga, by virtue of their merger of literary and visual mediums, tend to bridge the gap quite handily. So why can’t a novel achieve this?

Because a lot of people don’t seem to be willing to try it. Perhaps deeming it a lesser styling, a cheapening of the craft. Naturally, I had to be the one guy who disagrees.

When the concept for SPECTRAL BRAVER emerged, the sheer amount of scenes I was creating in my mind by hearing the soundtracks of anime like To Your Eternity (Fumetsu no Anata e) and The Rising of the Shield Hero (Tate no Yūsha no Nariagari), made it clear that I had solid narrative grounding to move this stuff to an outline.

But I had a bit of a world building challenge: If I was going to write about ghosts, clouds of energy who would doubtless be capable of things like telepathy, the delivery of the inner monologue had to be seamless in the prose. I wouldn’t employ italics for that, as it is by most understood as the formal way to present those - as regular dialogue, only formatted distinctly. Thus, I decided the unspoken would be integrated into a 3rd person omniscient narration, freely delivering multiple character POVs on scene, amidst their interactions, action sequences and more. Terribly confusing, if I were to adopt standard novel styling for this. So I started leaning into this idea of how this would be delivered with the exact same rhythm and scene structure as a TV show.

It wasn’t long until I saw paragraphs as my directorial stage. Each one would be a continuous camera shot or a scene block in a storyboard. To this end, I had to forgo how speech tags were delivered with commas and went for the Em dash to tether each piece of dialogue to the actions and thoughts of a character. This way, when it would occur that a ghost thinks something and another ghost hears and it responds, you would be able to tell the perspective cut-off on the same camera shot, by means of a clean break between lines of dialogue. Screenplays do this, but they’re not good at establishing a continuous sense of mood. It’s just not a very good reading experience on its own, unless you’re someone in a production, like a director or an actor.

This isn’t as simple as it sounds, because on top of this, there is a layer of voice quality in narration that needs to be present and can only be acquired by familiarity with the characters. Which was an error in judgment I had to correct in the Second Edition of the books. It’s not that the story would become wholly incomprehensible as to who is speaking, thinking or acting, but I could see that this wouldn’t work fully unless I frontloaded due context (again, like a screenplay would do it), which I believe to have done effectively with these latest edits.

So rather than present a nebulous story with multiple perspectives, on top of what already amounts as a nebulous form of storytelling that is a novel, I merged the beats of a TV show with this and came out with what feels paced like an anime in book form.

You can either enjoy one episode at a time, or binge the whole thing if you’re so inclined. But I’m not going to assume you know this, so all books in this series come with this Note to Readers:

My hope with this stylistic wager, is that even people people who loathe reading for what feels like a constant stream of things to pay attention to, such as subtext, will actually give this a chance and see that it’s just a Netflix show for the brain. I believe we need to bring a lot of the gamers and social media addicts back to this medium. Trying to convince them to read traditionally structured and formatted novels is mostly a losing battle, because they’ll “just wait for the show”.

Well, there may not be one. Most books don’t make it that far into the public consciousness. But I sincerely hold to the position that my story needs to be known. It was created to heal things such as grief and broken bonds. I had to do something to bridge that gap, offer some incentive to reconstruct the path to that evident disconnect and hopefully get people into reading, not only my story, but many more of those in the Indie space. There is a direly needed breath of fresh air in fiction, which the mainstream currently and painfully lacks, over its obsessions with entirely manufactured trends, dwelling on destructive malaises and pining over things once great, now irrevocably overspent.

We are a species of storytellers. It’s how we’ve always solved our problems. It’s how we can invoke empathy in a void, using make-belief things. If for some reason this stops working for the generality of the public, as the kids say: “We’re cooked”.

I want you to read SPECTRAL BRAVER’s core trilogy, in full. Then tell me if you didn’t feel like you were inside a crazy anime full of heart and optimism. I seriously doubt you’ll miss the vibe. That’s what I bring to the literary world. And while this clashes with firmly established sensibilities in the reading and writing community, consider that which was once repudiated for going against the grain, eventually became culture. I’ve adapted, evolved as a creator and will continue to do so. It is up to you to gauge on your own merits as an author, if you want to do something which breaks with the Past, so as to move on to a Future where you’re still relevant. It’s AI generative content that sets that clock for you now. If you write like everyone else, it means this tech will eventually write books like you do. It’s the supposed obsolescence of human artistry, which casts a shadow you can easily vanquish - by taking real chances with your craft.

It isn’t hard to see the writing on the wall.

Upon entering the main hall of the Manor, it becomes evident to any visitor, that this solemn abode had its share of tragedies.

The first would be Anna Craig’s death during childbirth.

As the house was still being finalized in construction and the décor was predominantly in red, there was no stained glass window at the top of the stairs. It was a house bu…

Read more

After a comprehensive run with edits, the core trilogy narrative which props up the mythological Greater Realm (Afterlife) as a subdimension of our reality, is now moving on to its Second Edition. Therein, you should find clearer character interactions and dialogue during scenes, improved aspects in the world building and tighter prose styling to match the elected Novel Cinematic presentation.

A fanciful tale of ghosts breaking the ‘creepy’ rule to their characterization, my wager is to use this as an allegory to talk about us as people and the sort of things we can achieve, when we don’t allow fear to rule our hearts, thus battling an oppressive status quo, while proudly flying the banner of Love.

”(…)these people fight the terrors of the Abyss, over this Joy they hold in their Souls. There is no concern for a sense of balance, one which would be permissive to its Evils, in meager hopes of being spared. Defiantly happy, these are the strongest of this realm. No question about it:

They are the Heroes of this Tale.”

Exploring notions such as the spiritual might of Motherhood, Understanding as the core foundation to romance and shared goals as the strength of a family, this story is the antidote to the spiritual and mental health malaises of contemporary life.

Ghosts, more often than not, struggle with poor spiritual integrity, being the echoes of Will which sadly emerge from untimely and unfortunate deaths. A lot about this condition feels confusing, terrifying and deeply sad. We have to wonder at points, how many of the living are not existing under these very same conditions today. Over time, to exist in such grim squalor, begets the warping of the human soul into what my characters dub ‘Ancient’ ghosts: Feral, barely sentient, covetous dark spirits desperately seeking to return to Life. Non-human spirits will exploit this handily, allowing these negatively charged manifestations to open paths into their hauntings by which demons and other Ancients may reach out to the living they share a space with. Consider the following: Isn’t spiritual decay the means by which Evil sees an opening to destroy a person’s life and spread like a disease?

It does seem that way, doesn’t it?

In the face of this, I bestowed my characters the power of imagination and optimism, to become a solid bulwark against this encroaching Evil, which does not mind rendering its own flesh to inflict it upon the world, far and wide. With imagery based on videogames, anime and other soaring flights of fancy that our culture has so generously given our contemporary generations, these spectral warriors emerge as a paradigm shift so sharply defiant of the demons, that for the first time in millennia, they actually become worried with the implications of having to share this sad dark realm, so easily dominated thus far, with a bunch of wise cracking, big hearted humans. Such spirits full of joy and life, can only really bring the Light to bear and finally end what for us has been endless.

Playing around in this sandbox of infinite ethereal possibilities, you’ll start to witness the Truth: By being smart, loving and faithful, you can easily break most boundaries imposed by those who would seek your harm. It is in fact the very opposite that would defeat us and our current civilizations allowed that wisdom to slip away from our cultural and social consensus.

For this to be healed, I decided that only iconic heroes would usher in change.

Over the past 200 years, our world struggled with cruelty and inhumanity. And during that time, the answer has been consistently the celebration of the metaphysical hero archetype (post WWII, you had Superman, for e.g.). Not as an aspiration to godhood, but as an exercise in Will as the ultimate engine behind Causality and its outcomes. Great iconic heroes aren’t so because of their strange origins in other worlds. They are so over their values and the drive to protect and save. We all can be that in our seemingly insignificant, normal lives.

To this end, I serve you a faithful and caring Mother; a sharp and kind hearted Nerd; a righteous and principled Demon Hunter; and a ferociously protective and affectionate Monster.

Together, these two couples cast an impossibly large shadow of valor upon all realms.

It is up to us all, to absorb these notions with our hearts, as we weep and laugh out loud at their crazy exploits, to come out with fresh eyes as to who we are and what we should aspire to.

We are not this crude matter, as Yoda once sagely pointed out.

We can be so much more.

Believe them; and by extension… Believe yourself.

Welcome to the After.