It is my privilege to introduce Tom Barczak. I have found Tom refreshing, both as a writer and person. His writing has the ability to transform the mind, placing the reader in the moment. Tom has been busy finishing up his new novel Mouth of the Dragon, and readying his first audiobook, the release of Veil of the Dragon.
Thanks for the interview Tom. Could you tell us a little about yourself?
You’re welcome. My privilege. And yes, I can.
I’m an Architect in Norman, Oklahoma, where I live and raise my three sons. I paint, write poetry and music, and I also write books. My novel, Veil of the Dragon, along with the Illustrated Kindle serials, Awakening Evarun, Fall of the Chosen, and Wolfbane. I have short stories published in the anthologies What Scares the Boogeyman, Nine Heroes, and Terror by Gaslight. I am also a twice published author in the award winning Heroes in Hell series by Janet Morris. My first Audiobook, for Veil of the Dragon, will be out within the month.
As an architect and painter are you making something from literally nothing, the same as a blank page?
Honestly, I’ve always liked this idea that the story, the painting, whatever, is already done. I just get to see it where others don’t. What I get to do is translate it in a way that honors it and hopefully does it some justice. So the kicker for me is in the listening and the seeing. I don’t know if that’s so much me not taking responsibility for the story or the work, but rather staying humble about where it comes from. I find I do better when I don’t make it about me and simply accept the story as a gift that I just happen to get to tell. Certainly takes away a lot of the pressure of the blank slate.
What inspires you?
Everything. Mostly honesty. Truth. Funny thing about fiction is you can never really lie. Certainly my truth is going to be different from somebody else, but that’s the point isn’t it. If I try to tell anything else, I’m a liar. So long story short, I find inspiration in life as I live and have lived it. Sometimes it’s cloaked, veiled as dragons or werewolves or heroes of old, but in the end, I believe it’s our own hero’s journey that we scribe. I don’t know any other story I could tell. For me, honestly, I only got serious about writing after my daughter died. She was my only child at the time. Her name was Olivia and she was 2 ½ and the love of my life. So very much of that, and everything that has happened in my life since then, it is the absolute foundation of my work. It’s just a part of who I am. I will never be able to not write about that.
When I read Veil of the Dragon I was surprised by the dragon. What is your take on the dragon?
It’s fear.
Is Chaelus your type of hero?
Yes and no. Yes, in that his spiritual / hero’s journey has been mine. No, in the sense that sometimes I want a hero to help me escape, and he will never do that for me because he’s just too close. What he’s been really great for is being someone, I can explore new parts of myself with. In that sense he’s the perfect hero for me, in that he helps me to reach beyond what I know.
You write for the Hell series, how is that going?
It’s Dante’s Inferno meets the Screwtape Letters.
It’s amazing. The series draws upon such a pantheon of great writers. All of them with such widely different skill sets.
I’m still in awe that I get the privilege of writing for a series that has been ongoing since I was in High School. I remember first seeing them too, on the shelves of Walden Books at Quail Springs Mall. And the creators, Janet and Chris, are both amazing as well and I can’t imagine being where I’m at now without their being a part of it.
Tell us about your werewolf shorts.
Wolfbane. It’s a campy irreverent, sexy, urban fantasy serial. I was a little nervous about it at first. But fell in love with it fast. It’s a great departure from the fantasy I normally write. And I love writing serials like I first did with “Awakening Evarun”.
Tell us about Evarun.
Awakening Evarun is a 6 part illustrated epic serial and prequel to my novel series Prophecy of the Evarun, of which part one, “Veil of the Dragon” has been released.
Evarun is the mythology around which most of my fantasy work centers. The Evarun are a race of people who left the world as a protection of their own perfection. In doing so they plunged the rest of the world, the Pale, into unending suffering. The only hope for those left behind lies in a prophecy that was left for them and a prophet repeatedly sent back to try to save them. But it’s like throwing a few scraps of bread to a starving man when you’re the one who took all of his food to begin with. All the while it’s the Evarun never should have left.
The story line of Awakening Evarun itself, is what started it all for me and I didn’t even write it first. I had finished up Veil of the Dragon and sending out queries, and had a discussion with someone about doing short serials for Kindle, kind of as a get your feet wet sort of thing. Mostly to help me build up my base while I tried to get my novel published. So, I had all this backstory that was just waiting to be written. So I did. Wrote then published each part one at a time. It was almost like doing performance art once I did the first one, because it just kind of wrote itself, and each within a 2-3 month time frame.
How much of your time does writing take?
Not enough. I wish I could write more, but have decided its best for my children and myself both, if I have a little balance in my life. I write something most every day/ Sometimes it’s only a few words, some days a few pages. I quit making excuses a while ago when I realized as a single dad with 3 boys, I’ll never just have a whole day to write any time soon.
Do you edit yourself?
I do as much as I can myself. But I always have somebody else edit as well.
My style is much more direct than yours. When reading Veil of the Dragon, I almost imagined each line as a brush stroke on a canvas… Tell me about your processes.
I write in layers. First pass is almost like a screen play because that is how I see them, like a movie. Then I go back and fill it in by layers. An agent I worked with gave me the best phrase for it, for me it’s like painting between the buildings. Sometimes I don’t like it, and I wish I could be more direct, but it’s just how I write.
How important are reviews? For sales? For marketing?
They’re both incredibly important and incredibly dangerous. See below.
How do you feel when you get a good review?
Encouraged. Confident. Somewhat vindicated, and that’s when it can go wrong. When I start taking credit for what I really believe is so much bigger than me. But without good reviews you don’t sell books, so I just have to learn to take them all with a grain of salt. And be grateful that I get good reviews for what I write.
Does it hurt your feelings when you receive criticism through reviews?
Yes, sometimes more so than others. After 4 years of Art School and 5 years of Graduate Architecture School I’ve learned to take criticism. But writing is a little more personal for me, even than my paintings. So as with life, you take what you like and leave the rest. Fortunately most of my criticism has tended to be from people repulsed by even the most oblique reference to a spiritual life, and frankly, people like that just won’t like what I write, and guess I have to be ok with that.
How do you feel you are doing as far as connecting with, and gaining an audience?
Depends on what day you ask me. The truth is I’m doing amazingly well. Particularly considering from where, and how long ago, I started, and how much time I actually have to put into it. As of this date I’ve self- published 9 short stories and one novel, and traditionally published 5 short stories. My second novel, Mouth of the Dragon, should be sent off to the publisher hopefully by Christmas. I’m really excited about my first audiobook, for Veil of the Dragon being scheduled for release in a month. The narrator, Neil Hellegers is amazing. And the only way from here is up. And every day I get a little bit better, and little bit closer to my Muse.
Thank you so much for the opportunity to share.
Tom Barczak
Links:
Veil of the Dragon
Awakening Evarun
Wolfbane
Novels & Links
The Bitter Ends
Somewhere in the Bible Belt Gateway has gone insane. Who knew what would come? Thrust into the end of times, Gateway’s citizens attempt to outrun the zombie outbreak…
Discover 12 unique stories, and see how Gateway’s main cast fares against the deadheads. See how they live. Watch lives expire and people become heroes or villains. The Bitter Ends is more than just a book about zombies. It is about the characters, like Anna. It is seeing what ordinary people might do in a zombie apocalypse and unordinary ones too.
Will any of them survive? Or Will They All Meet Their Bitter Ends?
Ways of the Stygia- Cult of Morgod (Book 1) Releases September 19th 2014
Destruction. To see something destroyed, gone. None can deny its appeal. To the abyss, nothing is forever. To the World-Eater creation is flawed… Flesh is weak. Souls are fodder- fuel. Power is endless. The Stygia grants unlimited strength to the daring… Slavery and death are a means to an end… For Morgod , everything must burn. Ruination must reign immaculate.
Heroes come in many forms. For who is truly evil? There are shades of light and dark. Left with two choices, survival or total annihilation, the cosmos displays signs of harmony.
They face a common foe.
Ways of the Stygia- Fallen Song (Book 2)
Thomas Van Pelt lived a normal life. On one dreary raining evening that all changed. His work as a CSI investigator had led him to yet another crime scene, and there, prompted by his primal senses he discovered the ancient artifact that would that day forward alter his own life and the fate of the universe itself
. The ancient weapon Fallen Song summons Thomas, and reawakens his forgotten past. He embarks on his new calling- bringing justice to the guilty, the ones who would otherwise remain free to perpetrate their vile acts on the unsuspecting.
Thomas is reunited with past allies and embarks on an epic adventure involving demons, necromancers, deities, vampires, sorcerers and the terrorists of Purgatory itself, the night stalker. Get pulled away to new lands, terrible enough to cost you sleep and see what ends Thomas will go to in his quest to bring a new era of light to an ailing universe.
Ways of the Stygia- Fallen Song is intended for mature audiences.
Ways of the Stygia- Banner (Character Novella 1)
In Purgatory, there is one law. It is damnation.
The abyss plots as the gods use its powers to suit themselves. Born of the void, to the hostile landscapes of Purgatory, not as a child, and not as a man, Banner must overcome his roots. The realm of Purgatory does not forgive so easily, suffering is ceaseless. It is a realm where death grants rebirth so suffering can begin anew. Those of his race are bred killers, evil, and cold to their marrows.
Banner, a night stalker set apart from his peers in extremity faces an uncertain future as he attempts to leave Purgatory and the nightmares behind.
He cannot do it alone...
Anthologies:
Free on Smashwords across all e-reader platforms.
The Indie Collaboration Presents
Snips, Snails, & Puppy Dog Tales
(The Wacky Adventures of Bob & Dill, Case of the Missing Ghost & Barracuda Blast by D. Swords)
Summer Shorts
(Boots by Donny Swords)
Spectacular Tales
(Sparks by Donny Swords)
Tales from Darker Places
Releases October 25th, 2013
3 stories by Donny Swords
Coming Soon:
The Bitter Ends_ Other Side of Town- Tentative street date Oct 25th, 2014
7 Slices - November 2014
.jpg)
