The Vase - a novel of suspense in Nazareth

This blog is named after my second novel. The Vase. It has nothing to do with my first novel. Killer of Killers. My third novel, Killer Eyes, is the sequel to Killer of Killers. But The Vase is the novel I expect to hit the big time. And for many reasons. Like all five of my novels, it's excellently written. Even more so since I've revised it time and again even after it's original publication. The same is true for all the five novels I've written. But The Vase has a topical premise. Which is the conflict that is happening right now in Israel. I wrote the book way before the current conflict. That doesn't matter. The conflict in Israel has been ongoing since 1948. And it seems to be a conflict that will never be resolved. I wrote the story because the premise of ancient recordings being viewed in modern times was a premise that had never been done before. Only in my book, The Vase, has this premise been explored. Still, it takes more that an original premise to make a great novel. It takes great writing, and great characters, and a great storyline. Well, forgive me for saying so, but The Vase checks all of those elements. The story is great. The characters are great. And the writing, espcecially after all the revising, is outstanding. I still believe in this book. As soon as it gets published again, it should be marketed correctly this time, because I'm shooting for mainstream publishers. And then...it will make a splash. And once it does, then back to my music. Can't wait to resume the writing of Volume 15. (Yet to be named.) I've written four songs on it so far, but right now I'm focused on republishing The Vase. Hopefully an agent will see in it what I see. We'll see.

The Beekeeper puts John Wick to Shame

Just saw the latest Jason Statham movie. The Beekeeper. My reaction? Move over John Wick. Adam Clay takes over. And move over Keanu Reeves. Jason Statham isn't just an actor like you. Jason Statham is the real deal. Look, I had already posted about how disappointed I was with the last two John Wick movies. Sure the first two had me buying in. But the last two, well, the last two plain sucked. John Wick became a pussy. Anyone could be a John Wick. But only Jason Statham can be an Adam Clay. The movie even had a female Beekeeper, hired to kill the original Beekeeper. And like in real life, the man prevailed, and it was no contest. And hey, I am not a sexist or a misogynist. I am a realist. Sure there are some women out there who can beat up some men out there. But when it comes to the BEST male fighters versus the BEST female fighters, it's not going to be a contest. And in this movie, that's the way it was. Adam Clay had no problem taking out the female Beekeeper. So, like in the John Wick movies, it's a world-building premise. In the John Wick movies, you had the fictional assassins in their fictional world with their codes of conduct and the markers and the Continental, et al. Beekeepers are a fictional society above the law, used when the law doesn't work. And that means these guys are the top of the top of the top in regards to fighting ability. And that's my cup of tea. Like my own character from Killer of Killers and Killer Eyes. The top fighter in the world is Trent Smith. In The Beekeeper, the Beekeepers are the best. The one flaw in this movie was that the female Beekeeper seemed to be a loose cannon type of character. Firing a minigun at anything moving in her effort to kill the other Beekeeper (which included responding policemen) was over the top. Nevertheless, Adam Clay took her out, and in great fashion. Now I don't want to give the wrong impression. To avoid any misunderstands, I have said it over and over again, there is such a thing as STRONG female characters. But to prove you are a strong character doesn't mean you have to go around beating people up, or killing dozens of people, whether they deserve it or not. As a matter of indisputable fact, there is no woman in the world who can win a fight against Mike Tyson. All right? There is no woman in the world who can win a fight against Brock Lesnar, all right? All right. Bottom line? The Beekeeper is the best movie I've seen in a long time. Thank you Jason Statham.

The Vase - Revising to keep up with the times

I had originally written The Vase almost twenty years ago. I had used the electronic devices in the story that I was most familiar with at the time. Like iPods, earbuds, phonographs, and cameras that took traditional photos. But the years have passed and now I have a familiarity with the devices of today. Intead of iPods, it's all about iPhones. Instead of earbuds, it's all about AirPods. Instead of phonographs, it all about online listening platforms. (SoundCloud, Spotify, Pandora, etc...) Instead of traditional photos, it's all about apps on your laptop computer. So... I had a lot of revisions to do. I have to keep up with the times. But the story still holds. It's a great story.

Revising The Vase (Again)

With the horrid events of the current times, I believe The Vase is a more apt story than ever before. I seek no fortune and no fame, but it's a story that has everything to do with what is happening in Israel at the moment. For those of you who do not know, the story in The Vase, as it explains above is about the conflict between the Israelis and the Palestinians. I may not be an Israeli, and I may not be a Palestinian, but that doesn't mean I can't write. I can. And I can come up with a very interesting story, which I have. The Vase. I will finish revising it, to make it a better-written book, and maybe, just maybe, I can get another agent. Years ago, when I had an agent, she was unwilling to work with a story that involved terrorists. Hopefully that's not the mindset of all agents. Let's see.

John Wick Gets a Flat Tire and Runs Out of Gas

So I finally saw John Wick Chapter Four. I was very happy that Halle Berry had no part in it, but that didn't save it. Not for me. Because it was really just the same ol', same ol' all over again. And again. And again. And again. I mean how many fight scenes and over-the-top killings from start to finish can a person tolerate? I mean, talk about overkill. Literally AND figuratively. Killing, killing, and more killing. It was too much. And this is coming from a guy who wrote a book called Killer of Killers along with a sequel called Killer Eyes. (That would be me.)

So someone might ask, "Hey dude. Since you wrote a book called Killer of Killers, and it's about a dude who kills, how come you're criticizing a movie that features another dude who kills. Well, I might answer, "Because in my book, Killer of Killers, and in its sequel, Killer Eyes, there was a lot more than just non-stop scenes with non-stop killing going on. My books had plots, and a message, and morals, and love interests, which means romance, and strong friendships, and back-stories that tied everything together to forge a strong story-line, with several strong three dimensional characters.

Look. I really liked the first two John Wick movies. I was even a fan. But then, starting with Chapter 3, which they called John Wick Parabellum, and included the aforementioned Halle Berry, it was getting to be too much. Another word for it is gratuitous. Yes. Gratuitous violence, and gratuitous killing. It was just too much. It glutted the senses. It was as if it made killing to be ho hum and even boring. I already wrote that Halle Berry playing the part of a female John Wick reduced the significance of the John Wick character. He was no longer special. It was as if anyone, even a five foot two inch 110 pound, middle-aged woman could be a John Wick, which meant that ANYONE could be a John Wick. And that meant the John Wick Character was just another person that anyone could be.

In my books Killer of Killers and Killer Eyes, it was cleary demonstrated that the main character, Trent Smith, was the greatest martial artist in the world. And only one person can be the greatest something in the world. Plain and simple. And he only killed people who had already proven themselves to be murderers. In John Wick, the dude killed for "markers" and that meant he killed innocent people.

Nevertheless, I liked the first two movies. It should have ended with the third installment, without a Halle Berry role, and it should have been written in a way that satisfied the story, the premice and the characters. But they got a flat tire in the 3rd movie, and then in the 4th movie they plain ran out of gas. Oh well. It was fun, like I said, at first. But then, it wasn't anymore.

Revised Volume 10 - Rockin' the Dark Side

Now that I have a distributor to place my music on the online platforms, I decided to redo my least favorite album. Volume 10 - Rockin' the Dark Side. It was my least favorite only because I felt that my singing on that album sucked more than any other album of mine. So I decided to go ahead and try to re-sing the songs. Every single one. I had done that before for Volume 3 - Rockin' the Hard Road. It had always been one of my favorites, but I just felt I could sing it better and I did. I had also revised some of the songs, as I had noted earlier on this blog. But with Volume 10 - Rockin' the Dark Side, it was only the singing that needed redoing. And while I was at it, I also revised some of the lyrics. But once I was in front of the mic, I had to sing some of those songs up to fifty times before I got a take that sounded right. Can you imagine that? As many as fifty times before I got a take that met my satisfaction. That's a lot of singing. The same song over and over again. And ten total songs. I wouldn't quit, though, because I really believe those songs are fantastic.

And with the success of Volume 10, I can proceed to put more albums onto TuneCore for distribution. I had noted earlier that I only have Volumes 1 - 4 on there. Pretty soon I'll put up 5 - 10. I may want to re-sing Volumes 11 - 13. But it might not be possible because on some of those songs I hit notes that I can no longer hit. It's a shame. It takes a lot of effort for me to be able to sing some of my own songs. Sometimes I can do it and sometimes I can't. It remains to be seen. As for now, however, I can be content with Volume 10. It's on SounCloud and sounds great. Check it out.

My Music to be Distributed

I have noted the last couple years, that I have put my creative writing on the back burner in favor of creating original music. In fact, I had been a song writer long before I wrote novels. It's true I had written a few stories in my younger days, but not to the degree that I had been writing music. Ultimately, it was all about technology for me. When I was a young teen, I was writing music on my parents' upright piano. I had no means to record those songs, so the songs that I kept playing into adulthood were the ones I remembered. And when the technology caught up to me, I recorded some of them on a cassette tape. But then when the technology continued to catch up to me, e.g. computers and word processors, I was inspired to write novels, and I did. Five of them, with two more on hold. After that had played out, I decided to go back to writing music, because, yes, the technology continued to catch up with me. I bought more pianos, the electronic kind, which were great for writing music. And I did. I wrote 145 songs, or the equivalent of 14 albums, and they are all listed on the right margin of this blog. Those links will take you to SoundCloud where all of my music can be found. But there are so many more platforms, I've learned, other than SoundCloud. There's Spotify, and other more common ones, like You Tube, and more. But I learned you have to have a distributor to get your songs on many of those and there are plenty of distributors. I opted for TuneCore, and my first four albums are distributed now.

I've also learned that for ditribution, some of the platforms do not want volume numbers listed as part of the text on the cover artwork. SoundCloud didn't care, but since I am getting my albums on all platforms now, I went ahead and deleted the volume numbers from the titles of the albums as you can see on these images.

If anyone has any inkling to hear my music, (which is great music if you like Alternative Rock,) then you no longer will be limited to SoundCloud to hear it. You can go to any other music platform, now, and my music will be there. Within the next couple of weeks, I plan on having all fourteen of my albums live on all of the online music platforms. I hope you can enjoy the music as much as I have.