I'll Be Glad to Toss Your Book in the Trash

So sayeth a brand new fan I've received. Along with all the emails I received from my website contact link today was a gem of an email about my novel Blood Ocean, which was part of the Afterblight Chronicles published by Abaddon Books (UK).

Here's the email:

"After reading your contribution to the Afterblight Chronicles, I can say that I will never read another one of your books again. I have issues with it since I started it. But being someone who doesn't give up on a series and who enjoys SciFi, I am going through them. If this is any indication of your work, well lets just say, your no where as good a (sic) your complementaries. So, unless you have a another book in the Series, I will be glad to toss this junk in the trash where it belongs." - name withheld by me

Here was my reply:

"Thank you! Can I ask what your issue was?"

I'm waiting on a response.

His response will sort of indicate what sort of person he is. You see, this is my most brutal book. I mean, hell, it's post apocalyptic. It's supposed to be brutal, right? But it also has transgender characters, cannibalism, anti-Caucasian sentiment, and I heap a ton of fictional baggage on the Japanese.

Is he Japanese?

Did he take umbrage at me making white people evil?

Is he a vegan?

Maybe he doesn't like LGBTs.

This book is still available. It was published in 2012. This is not an advertisement, but here's what the book is about if you've never heard of it.

Waterworld meets Point Break as Kavika, an under-sized boy living in the floating Sargasso City - jigsawed together with ships, submarines, barges and oil tankers off the coast of what was once known as California, must strive to overcome his lowly status and the condemnation of his peers in order to save his city from an enemy living within.

Survivors of the Cull, a Plague that wiped out people without the blood type O-neg, struggle in the floating Sargasso City jigsawed together with ships, submarines, barges and oil tankers off the coast of what was once known as California.

Separated by demarcations of turf, ethnicity and fear, it’s not so much living as existing. High above it all swing the Pali Boys: descendants of Hawaiian warriors, they desire to lift themselves and the spirits of the residents below by performing an increasingly impossible series of extreme stunts, designed to test their manhood, and demonstrate the vibrancy humanity once had.

But as a conspiracy of murder unfolds and blood attacks increase, Kavika a single under-sized Pali Boy must strive to overcome his lowly status and the condemnation of his peers in order to save them all from an enemy living within.

The book received mixed reviews when it came out. Some consider it the favorite of my 20+ published books. Others don't like it for the brutality. And some think I spent too much time in scene setting. But everyone had at least something good to say about it. 

Update: I've waited 24 hours for a reply, but didn't receive on. But I did put my detective skills to work, you know, those I got from watching television. His name is in his email, which I can see. I Facebooked his name and there is one person out there with a mutual friend of that same name. If that's the same person, then he's white, southern, and middle aged. So being Japanese is out. Maybe he's a white vegan?

So there you have it. You can't please everyone, but at least this fine upstanding gentleman gave me a laugh.

Zombies Attack Barnes and Nobles - Authors Survive... barely

Metropocalypse 2012

It was meant to be a fun day of book signing, zombie walking, costume contesting, and general undead frollicking. No one anticipated it would turn out the way it did. No one thought it would be so devastating to the community. As of current count, 177 Barnes and Nobles customers were turned into zombies this past Saturday. On one hand, the undead population of Phoenix rose by a fraction, allowing the undead to join  the new minority of the un-taxable, but on the other hand, 177 Barnes and Nobles customers stopped reading. They exchanged their voracious hunger for books for a voracious hunger for the other white meat-- People!

 Shown here is a man who once read Hardy Boys, loved books on the Civil War, and had a subscription to Cat Fancier.

No More.

He can now be found downtown, feeding on the homeless.

And these young zombies. They meant well. They'd planned to come for the scavenger hunt and maybe check out some new Adam Nevill or David Moody books. Then they were infected, and all they wanted to do was a cha cha out the door to flavortown.


Probably the saddest of all is this young wanna be Barnes and Nobles customer turned into a zombie before she even knew what the letter Z was.

Okay. He's waayy to cute for me to continue this lie. In truth, no one really died or became undead or whatever.

It was all part of Metropocapylse 2012. Put together by Sarah and Dallas at the Metro Barnes and Nobles, it was everything zombies and apocalypse. I was asked to come because they love me to death, and I was asked to bring some other partners in zombie and apocalyptic crime.

Joe McKinney, Joe Nassise, and myself were on hand to sign a ton of books. (ashamedly I forget the other gentleman's name)

At one point there were more than 150 people in the store for the event. It went over tremendously well. I know a bunch of my fans came. They already owned my books, but left with other swag.

It was a terrific day all around.

They want to do it again next year... this time, bigger and better and more undead.

I plan on being there.

What about you?

Books and Kids of All Ages - Signing Story

Yesterday's book signing at Barnes and Nobles (Westside) in Tucson went terrifically. Mary, the publicity manager, had pre-positioned my table for several days. She'd also had a sign announcing the event since the first of the month. Add to that they were having a Teacher Appreciation Day and there was a load of traffic.

I posted the event on Facebook, which drew out a bunch of my confederates, including Joe Palmer (and wife), Scott Glenner (and wife), Jason Reinhardt and his brother and sister-in-law (Joe and Jennifer I think), Rebecca (and sometimes Klingon husband), etc. My parents, who live in Tucson, took me and Yvonne out to lunch, along with Nephew Tynan and GF Maria.

But I also had some folks show up based on their love of Empire of Salt. A young family traveled from Casa Grande to see me, have me sign a copy of Blood Ocean and chat about the Salton Sea (setting for Empire of Salt).

Some additional folks showed up because they were fans of Abaddon's Afterblight series.

 On a funny note, I was positioned beside the customer service desk and the escalator. A pair of kids was driving the staff absolutely mad running up and down the escalator. There were moments where I absolutely believed that if the staff had been allowed to kill just one person, it would have been a certain kid driving them absolutely batty.

On a more serious note, Mary and I talked about the state of bookstores, and especially as it relates to signings. With the closure of Borders, Barnes and Nobles is the only big chain store left in America. Mary, like her counterparts in all the other stores, gets inundated with requests for signings. She turns most of them down, because she checks sales records and such. This directly affects self-published and small press authors, especially those who have books price pointed above $15.

I was glad she asked me to come back to the store. But then again, in her eyes, I earned that right. I don't sit behind the table. I stand and greet everyone who comes by. I engage people. I sometimes ambush them. In the end, I sell a lot of books for the bookstore. I remember one signing when I sold out all the books they had of mine. I still had an hour left, so I went and found some books my friends had written, like Joe McKinney, and sold them. I even signed two of Joe's books as the 'Fake Joe McKinney.'

Bookstores, whether they be a big chain or an independent, expect authors to help sell books. Doing a signing in a bookstore is less of an honor than it is a job.

They had two rare copies of Empire of Salt which sold immediately.
They also had four copies of Scarecrow Gods which sold as well.

Caleb came back five times and finally convinced his dad to buy a
copy of Blood Ocean. Check out the look in his eyes. Man was he
excited.

Daniel is a fan of Afterblight and was psyched that I was coming  for a signing.

It was a terrific book signing. I sold most of the books you saw on that table. Mary invited me back. I'll probably do it in June or July, so if you live in Tucson and you missed me, you'll get another chance.

Thanks Barnes and Nobles!  Thanks Mary! And thanks everyone for coming out to my signing.

Shoveling Coal into the Action Furnace

Original Limited Edition

My fiction was at one time called thoughtful and profound. Scarecrow Gods was compared to the best of Stephen King, Peter Straub and Robert McCammon, especially such tales as Boy's Life and The Talisman. I think I might have wept over those comparisons when they came out. But I realized of course that they weren't real comparisons, but reviewers' struggles to compare me to like literary professionals in order to enable readers to better understand what sort of prose I had to offer.

I've been working on my action since that first novel. I felt it wasn't as good as it could have been. I think with each of my seven previous novels, I've gained a better grasp on action and the sense of pace I need to balance it out. In fact, I think Blood Ocean is about as action-packed and violent as anything I've ever-written, and an achievement in my own right.

I read from Chapter 10 (I think) at Salt Lake City during the World Horror Convention. The audience was left breathless and breathing heavily after 30 minutes of reading, the action was so profound. (Here is that reading courtesy of Lincoln Crisler - sorry for the quality of my voice. It's the only one I have)



So I think I got that action thing down now.  I think I've figured out how to translate the complex martial movements taking place in my mind to the page.

But I have to be careful that I don't forget the depth of character I and plot I desire to write.

In a recent review of Blood Ocean, Matthew Fryer said--

"Fans of China Mieville may also notice similarities with his sprawling and gorgeous “The Scar” with its floating city, cultural diversity and grotesque body modification, but those heavy sociopolitical depths aren’t attempted here. In fact, ignoring the horror content, this almost feels like a book for younger audiences. That’s not because this is euphemistic or lightweight storytelling. I think it’s partly due to a sense of optimism despite the odds, but mainly because it’s a wild ride driven by a fresh-faced youth that doesn’t contrive to be disturbing or profound, but concentrates on shoveling coal into its furnace." Read the entire review here.

Matt's point is just. Blood Ocean is intended to be a 'wild ride' and optimistic. Although I do get into characterization, as he points out elsewhere in the review, I don't think I plumb as deeply as I usually do. Of course I did it for a reason with Blood Ocean. As part of a series of books under the Afterblight umbrella, they were all fast-paced, violent pieces of fiction. To write the book any other way would be a disservice to those who had come before and the readers who expected thus.

But like I said. I have to be careful. Just the other day, I began work on a new novel. Ten pages in and it felt a little juvenile and lacked depth. I wasn't sure what was wrong, until I read Matt's review of Blood Ocean. You see, my mind was still locked on Blood Ocean. If Blood Ocean is to the far right of the scale and Scarecrow Gods is on the far left, I want to find somewhere in the middle to write this next novel I'm tentatively titling Aftermath.

Once aware of this, I sat down last night and wrote a few pages. It felt good. I could feel myself getting to know my new characters and the world within which they live. I could feel the tight spring of action, controlled by the impetus of character and thought. This is good. This is how I want to write.

Not that Blood Ocean is bad... not at all.

It is what it is meant to be.

But now I am writing something else.

Something different.

Something set in my world.

Count Gore Gives Me Two Fangs to the Gut

For those of you who don't know who Count Gore de Vol is:

Count Gore De Vol is a television horror host who originally appeared on Washington, DC's WDCA from 1973 to 1987.[1] Originally named M. T. Graves and played by announcer Dick Dyszel, the character first appeared on the WDCA version of the Bozo the Clown program. When the character got a positive reaction, he was given his own program called Creature Feature. The choice of Gore De Vol as the character's name was either a pun involving the name of acerbic author Gore Vidal or the name of a prominent Washington D.C. funeral home, "De Vol." Gore De Vol became the Washington/Baltimore area's longest running horror host, broadcast every Saturday night on WDCA from March 1973 to May 1987.[2] He returned to the DC airwaves for a one-time special, Countdown with the Count, on New Year's Eve 1999/2000 (Cite). 

I first met Count Gore at Horrorfind, I think. What a personality! You definitely know when he's in the room.
(Check out that coffin. Is that Vampirella on the roof? No wonder he likes to sleep in one of those.)

Well, as it turns out, he finally leveled his fiery gaze on me and reviewed Blood Ocean and Multiplex Fandango. When I found out, I was terribly worried. I mean, Count Gore reviews are as coveted as rare gem.

MULTIPLEX FANDANGO: "Stoker winner and Pushcart nominee, Mr. Ochse hits the horror fan's sweet spot dead-bang with MULTIPLEX FANDANGO, which is currently a most worthy contender for the 2011 Bram Stoker award for best single-author collection... an enormous depth of heart and craft truly holds this collection together." Click Here for the Review.

BLOOD OCEAN: "Here's a terrific heart-thumper of a novel, a science fiction action-thriller set in the times following a horrific plague... filled with fascinating Hawaiian history, lore and cultural touchstones, Mr. Ochse has constructed a streamlined thrill machine for discerning readers with a penchant for rip-roaring adventure." Click Here for the Review.

Thank you Count Gore and your minions.

Best in the Series - Science Fiction Review

Don Damassa's review of Blood Ocean can be found here.

"There's a fair amount of quasi-martial arts violence and a moderately puzzling mystery, but the real merit of this particular novel is the fine writing and the evocation of the protagonist's subculture. The best in this series that I've read so far."

To put that in perspective, this is the eleventh book set in the Afterblight Universe. Here's what I said in my last primer where I described trying to be a part of it early on:

As promised, here is your third and final primer for Blood Ocean. If you haven't read the first one, which discusses the Pali Boys, you can find it here. And if you haven't read the second one, which discusses character and setting, you can find that here. 

So why did I write this? I mean besides the fact that I'm getting paid a fine sum of English pounds with worldwide distribution of a beautiful-looking paperback book. I can't include that in my reasons, because I never knew any of that when I first pitched Abaddon when they first started out way back when.

I don't know where I was at the time, but I do remember that I heard about a new publishing house called Abaddon Books and asked for their bible about Afterblight. I sent a quick pitch, and I mean quick, and I got back an email from Jon Oliver, then Editor-in-Chief of Abaddon, now Editor-in-Chief of both Abaddon and Solaris, that he was intrigued about the idea and would I send him a full pitch, which has a sample chapter as well as a chapter by chapter outline. So I found myself working on this for about a month. In fact, I finished the pitch while I was in a hotel room in Alexandria, Virginia, working on my laptop while the Steelers beat the Colts in the Superbowl.

My pitch at that time was about Native Americans in the Southwest, who must team up with an L.A. gang of biker samurai to fight off the Radiant Dawn - the white folks who want their blood. It was a damn good pitch. I sooo wanted to write that book. But the problem was that every Tom, Dick and English Harry submitted a pitch about Native Americans too.

Needless to say they didn't need me.

So I did what every other writer would do in my shoes... I sulked and wrote something else.

Blood Ocean Bracketology (Road to the Final Four)

I'm a big fan of March Madness. I love college basketball. Well, really I love watching Tennessee Vols college basketball. But with the NCAA looking into possible violations last year and the loss of their top ten coach and two best players, this year was a tough year to be a fan. Still I watched my team and had Tennessee won one more game, they might have been in the Big Dance (what us fans call the NCAA College Basketball Tournament). Instead, they are in the Little Dance, a regional Number 1 seed in the National Invitational Tournament (NIT or the also rans).

But Irony of Ironies, where my basketball team didn't make the bracket for the Big Dance, Blood Ocean did.

Fantastic Reviews did this. I guess what happened is they receive so many books that they can't review them all, so they created the Battle of Books. Here are the official rules:

Every 16 review copies we get will be placed in a bracket.

For the first round, the Fantastic Reviews judge (usually me, Aaron Hughes) will read the opening 25 pages of both books. The winner will be the book I most want to continue reading (not necessarily the better book -- how would I even know that after only 25 pages?). The winners advance to the second round.

For the second round, I will read through page 50. The winners advance to the semifinals.

For the semifinals, I will read through page 100.

For the finals, I will read through page 200.

The winner of each bracket will be read completely and reviewed at Fantastic Reviews.

At the end of 2012, the judges' favorite book out of all the winners will be named Fantastic Reviews Battle of the Books Champion.

This is an odd but somewhat cool sort of review. I'm looking forward to it. I'm crossing my fingers. I hope Blood Ocean does better than the Vols.

BLOOD OCEAN Review Roundup: Or where I reinvent reading with my merciless skill

Reviews have been pouring in from sources such as the Financial Times of London to a young man who started reading again because of Blood Ocean (I'm not kidding).  Here's a short rundown--

1. Financial Times of London: I have 'Merciless Skill' says the Financial Times of London re BLOOD OCEAN:

"The plot, in which a young Hawaiian, Kavika, seeks revenge for the murder of a friend, almost takes a back seat to the multilayered, often ironic and sometimes sickeningly degenerate seaborne society depicted here with such vivid, merciless skill."

I like it that I have merciless skill! There's more at this link.


2. Abaddon Books: This is the publisher, so it's not really a review, but they did ask me a whole bunch of questions about the process of writing the book. Questions like:

Abbadon: Tell us a bit about Blood Ocean and why people should buy it. 

Weston: If it was a movie, I’d call it Road Warrior meets Battle Royale. To compare books its like if The Horseclans Books and Lord of the Flies had a Hawaiian baby and this was the result. Honestly, this is as original as they come.

The rest of the Q & A can be found here.


3.  Fantasy Nibbles: The folks over at Fantasy Nibbles gave Blood Ocean a great review. They also have a scoring system, which I'm not familiar with. Looks like algebra to me. All I know is I scored higher tha Paolini's Eldest, and equaled his first novel Eragon and it thrills me to no end that I can write better than a sixteen year old. 

This was a brilliant read, fast paced & exciting with undertones of sheer terror. Really well written. I enjoyed it immensely. I’ve not read any of the other books in The Afterblight Chronicles, but they’re now being added to my list. This works wonderfully as a standalone though.

The rest of the terrific review can be found here.  


4. Falcata Times: Another solid review. The folks over at Falcata Times are good people.


One of the things about the wonderfully inventive Afterblight series is that you can never be sure of what you’re going to get, this release being a prime example of that. Here, within this title by Weston Ochse is a story of betrayal, a tale of redemption all blended with a coming of age element set in an apocalyptic future.


The best part of the review (which can be found in its entirety here) is that the reviewer said that he/she was glad they read it. I figure with the job of reviewing books, reading can become onerous sometimes. Glad to not be that book that they HAVE to read. 


5. The Big Thrill. This is the monthly online magazine of the International Thriller Writers. They did a little piece on Blood Ocean too. It can be found here. 


6. And finally, there's Kevin Stewart: Here's the story. There's a new local restaurant that Yvonne and I adore called Pizzeria Mimosa. The owner had previously reached out to us because she's a horror fan. So on one occasion Yvonne brought her a copy of her first novel AfterAge and more recently I brought a copy of Empire of Salt. The owner thanked me publicly on Facebook, which was read by Kevin, who then went to Amazon, where he read the first chapter for free, then he was hooked.  Well, as it turns out, Kevin is a hard-working mechanic and doesn't have a lot of time to read fiction. In fact, he hasn't ready any fiction since 2001 - Battlefield Earth (that book is SOOO much better than the movie). But he read Blood Ocean. And now he's back in the world of reading fiction.

Blood Ocean is an incredible, and fast paced imaginative story, that will keep you reading long past your bedtime.

Kevin blogged about it and posted a review on his site and at amazon. It's a lovely story.

Blood Ocean Primer (3 of 3): Why I Wrote This

As promised, here is your third and final primer for Blood Ocean. If you haven't read the first one, which discusses the Pali Boys, you can find it here. And if you haven't read the second one, which discusses character and setting, you can find that here. 

So why did I write this? I mean besides the fact that I'm getting paid a fine sum of English pounds with worldwide distribution of a beautiful-looking paperback book. I can't include that in my reasons, because I never knew any of that when I first pitched Abaddon when they first started out way back when.

I don't know where I was at the time, but I do remember that I heard about a new publishing house called Abaddon Books and asked for their bible about Afterblight. I sent a quick pitch, and I mean quick, and I got back an email from Jon Oliver, then Editor-in-Chief of Abaddon, now Editor-in-Chief of both Abaddon and Solaris, that he was intrigued about the idea and would I send him a full pitch, which has a sample chapter as well as a chapter by chapter outline. So I found myself working on this for about a month. In fact, I finished the pitch while I was in a hotel room in Alexandria, Virginia, working on my laptop while the Steelers beat the Colts in the Superbowl.

My pitch at that time was about Native Americans in the Southwest, who must team up with an L.A. gang of biker samurai to fight off the Radiant Dawn - the white folks who want their blood. It was a damn good pitch. I sooo wanted to write that book. But the problem was that every Tom, Dick and English Harry submitted a pitch about Native Americans too.

Needless to say they didn't need me.

So I did what every other writer would do in my shoes... I sulked and wrote something else.

Then about a year later, I was at the Book Expo of American in Los Angeles. My agent and I went around and had some table-side chats with a few of the editors, one being Jon. This was our first face to face. Being an outgoing person - those of you who know me will agree with this - I enjoy face to face conversations. I thrive on them. Jon and I got to talking. He mentioned that he liked my pitch and was sorry to have to pass on it, but why not send him a pitch for a zombie novel.

Sweet Nadine who was too scared to go past Chapter 3

A zombie novel? It had never occurred to me to write a zombie novel.

But I did. I sent him a pitch and it became Empire of Salt which sold out everywhere and was a smash hit! (still available as a used book and on kindle)

But I still wanted to to write an Afterblight novel. There'd been a burning inside of me that had not gone away. So even as Empire of Salt was premiering in Brighton, England at the World Horror Convention, I was verbally pitching Jon a sprinkle of an idea. He told me to put it on paper when I returned to America and send it to him. I think he saw how eager I was, plus, I think I was keeping him from the pub. So whether or not he meant it or not, I took that as a YES, mentally pumped one arm, and began to work on an idea which revolved around an idea of a monkey being surgically attached to a person's back.

And when I returned to America, I wrote the pitch. Took me about a month as everything came together. And to be totally honest, at first he wasn't sure and didn't accept it right away. But like a dog with a dead rabbit, I shook that idea and shook it, and tweaked the pitch until finally he liked it enough to say those magical five magic words - I'll send you a contract.

And in a few days everyone can read Blood Ocean.

I'm extremely excited about this book. There's some violence. I've done some horrendous things to some nice people and made a nice race do something terrible. As I was writing this, I tried not to pull any punches. I wanted this to be as graphic a novel as anything I've ever written, but with my usual characterization. A few reviewers have socked me for doing some of these things, but I didn't write this for them. I wrote this for me. And I wrote this for you. And I wrote this for all of you who grew up on Post-Apocalyptic novels and movies. Fans of The Horseclans and Road Warrior will dig the hell out of this, because they know that when society crumbles, so do the niceties. Our behaviour is traded in for survival and we'll do whatever it takes to do that, whether it is to kill, maim, lie, cheat, or eat our neighbor.

Please drop me a line when read Blood Ocean.

Until then.

Shaka!

Weston Ochse
Enroute to Australia
Somewhere over the Pacific

Blood Ocean Primer (2 of 3): Setting and Characters

As promised, here is your second primer for Blood Ocean. If you haven't read the first one, which discusses the Pali Boys, you can find it here.  

Why set this in the Pacific Ocean? Why not the Atlantic or Mediterranean? The answer to that lies with the plague. The very nature of the plague is that only people with O Neg blood survive. It just so happens that more Asians have Oneg blood than most other races, so it seemed a good choice to place the setting aboard a floating city in the Pacific Ocean. Also, since I've traveled extensively throughout Asia, I could write about many of the peoples and their microcosmic cultures with a sense of understanding.

Link to Book

Here's what I used in my initial pitch:

SETTING: Nami No Toshi.

Definition. City on the Waves (Japanese). Created by survivors of the Oneg plague off the coast of California. At the core of NNT is the Freedom Ship. Initially idealized by American President Richard Nixon, this ten story floating city, four times the size of the Queen Mary, was created by the Mitsubishi Corporation to support natural disasters. NNT was quickly overrun by those attempting to escape the violence and the gangs operating in the aftermath of the plague. Little is left to identify it as it once was. Now, more than a thousand ships, submarines and barges have been attached to NNT. The original ship is governed like a Japanese corporation (called Corpers), but all other areas and places aboard the other vessels have set their own governments and ways to survive. Other places are usually aligned by economics, and or ethnicity. They include, but are not limited to:

• Corpers – The remnants of the Mitsubishi Corporation who live in the Freedom Ship. They have a dirigible that can travel from the city to shore. They also have computers and other sophisticated machinery, powered by nuclear reactor.
• Saru No Kyuden (Japanese) – Monkey House (run by the Corpers).
• Boxers (Chinese) – Fists of Righteous Harmony, or Boxers (from the Rebellion of 1898).
• Taeyang-ui Sallam (Korean) – People of the Sun.
• Sky Winkers – Satellite Worshippers. Scientists from all walks of life who are actually recording information blinked from a pair of satellites.
• Water Dogs - Those who choose to live beneath the city. They control the water, and everything outside the Corpers fish bins. If you fall in, you are ransomed. If your family can’t pay, you are bait for the bigger fish. They trade in trash, fuel, and anything of value. If it floats or sinks, they eventually get it.
• Mga Taos (Filipino) – The People are monkey worshipers. Most of the time they just follow monkey-backs around.
• He-Shes - Multi-ethnic group of cross-dressers
• Vitamin-Vs -The crew of a disabled Russian sub who spend their days distilling vodka
• Los Tiburones (Spanish) – The Sharks. The drug dealers of the city.
• The Real People – Multi-ethnic (non-Asian) group of North Americans.
• Pali Boys (Hawaiian) - Young men who live on the edge, and do the most dangerous things as homage to their warrior ancestors and King Kamehameha’s defeat of the enemy armies at Pali Point, Hawaii.

One of the things I love about books like these are the various and myriad characters. Anyone who has read Velvet Dogma will know this, especially with the Day Eaters and the Ack Acks. Maybe it comes from Watching and loving Warriors as a kid. Or maybe it's all the other books I grew up reading, such as Robert Adams' Horseclans books or any of the Conan books (Yes, I said Conan), or any number of Fantasy books filled with interesting groups and characters. These sorts of creations provide depth to the world building.

http://www.amazon.com/Velvet-Dogma-ebook/dp/B005KT0MJK

I have links to brick and mortar and online stores in Estonia, Czech Republic, Romania, India, Belgium, Finland, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, Japan, Fiji, New Zealand, Australia, Canada, Ireland, France, Germany, England, United States, United Kingdom and many more. I have world wide links with free shipping. I have links to book clubs. I have links to your favorite store.

Note that I've left the links in the event you might want to cut and past this list or a portion of it and share it with your friends (hint hint).

Also, if you have a link I don't have or know of a place that's carrying it, please shoot me the information.

As on Pali Boy to another - Shaka Shaka!

Book Groups

Shelfari Link - http://www.shelfari.com/books/24218226/Blood-Ocean-%28Afterblight-Chronicles%29

Library Thing Link – http://www.librarything.com/work/11806825

Goodreads Link - http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/12318005-blood-ocean

Brick and Mortar Bookstores (Note that all of these stores have online ordering options)

Australia – Angus & Roberston - http://www.angusrobertson.com.au/by/weston-ochse/format/Paperback/

Australia – Abbey’s - http://www.abbeys.com.au/book/blood-ocean-book-9781907992865.do

Belgium, Europe, Ireland, Netherlands, and U.K. – Waterstones - http://www.waterstones.com/waterstonesweb/products/weston+ochse/blood+ocean/8689794/

Canada – Indigo – Chapters – Coles - http://www.chapters.indigo.ca/books/Blood-Ocean-Weston-Ochse/9781907992872-item.html

England – Blackwells - http://tinyurl.com/88fb2n9

England – Foyles - http://tinyurl.com/7uyet7k

England – WH Smith - http://www.whsmith.co.uk/CatalogAndSearch/ProductDetails.aspx?productID=9781907992865

England – The Guardian Bookshop (Free Shipping within UK) http://www.guardianbookshop.co.uk/BerteShopWeb/viewProduct.do?ISBN=9781907992865

Estonia – Krisostomus - http://www.kriso.ee/cgi-bin/shop/searchbooks.html?author=Weston+Ochse

Ireland – Easons - http://www.easons.com/display.asp?K=9781907992865

Ireland – O’Mahoney’s - http://www.omahonys.ie/catalog/blood-ocean-p-320316.html

Romania – Okian – http://www.okian.ro/autor-813902-weston-ochse.html

United States - Mysterious Galaxy - http://www.mystgalaxy.com/book/%5Bmodel%5D-17

United States – Powell’s Books - http://www.powells.com/biblio/62-9781907992872-0

 Online Bookstores

Australia – Boomerang Books - http://www.boomerangbooks.com.au/Blood-Ocean/Weston-Ochse/book_9781907992872.htm

Australia – Borders Online - http://www.borders.com.au/by/weston-ochse/815804/

Australia – Booktopia - http://www.booktopia.com.au/blood-ocean/prod9781907992865.html

Canada – Archambault - http://www.archambault.ca/blood-ocean-ACH003039384-en-pr

Czech Republic – Book Fayre - http://www.bookfayre.cz/books/item/9781907992865.html.cs

Finland – Book Plus - http://www.bookplus.fi/kirjat/ochse,_weston/

Germany – Sound Media - http://www.soundmedia.ch/de/a/1uv/112694099/weston-ochse/blood-ocean

Germany – Beck Shop - http://www.beck-shop.de/Ochse-Blood-Ocean/productview.aspx?product=9712549

India - http://www.nbcindia.com/books/1-blood-ocean-weston-ochse/1907992871

New Zealand and South Pacific – Wheelers Books - http://www.wheelers.co.nz/books/9781907992865-blood-ocean/

New Zealand – Fishpond - http://www.fishpond.co.nz/c/Books/a/Weston+Ochse

Norway – Akademika - http://www.nbcindia.com/books/1-blood-ocean-weston-ochse/1907992871

Sweden –Price Minister -  http://www.priceminister.es/offer/buy/116381620/blood-ocean-de-weston-ochse.html

Switzerland – Buch - http://www.buch.ch/shop/home/artikeldetails/blood_ocean/weston_ochse/ISBN1-907992-86-3/ID30407855.html

United Kingdom – Sainsbury Entertainment - http://www.sainsburysentertainment.co.uk/en/Books/Paperback/Weston-Ochse/Blood-Ocean/product.html?product=E11023514

United Kingdom – My Hypermart - http://www.myhypermart.com/uk/Books-1025612-1907992863-Blood_Ocean_Afterblight_Chronicles.html

Simon and Schuster

Canada - http://books.simonandschuster.ca/Blood-Ocean/Weston-Ochse/Afterblight-Chronicles/9781907992872

United States - http://books.simonandschuster.com/Blood-Ocean/Weston-Ochse/Afterblight-Chronicles/9781907992872

Amazon Links

U.S. - http://www.amazon.com/Blood-Ocean-Afterblight-Chronicles-Weston/dp/1907992871

Canada - http://www.amazon.ca/Blood-Ocean-Weston-Ochse/dp/1907992863

France - http://www.amazon.fr/Blood-Ocean-Weston-Ochse/dp/1907992871/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1328116462&sr=8-1

Germany - http://www.amazon.de/Blood-Ocean-Afterblight-Chronicles-Weston/dp/1907992871/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1328115991&sr=8-1

Japan - http://www.amazon.co.jp/Weston-Ochse/e/B002BM38Z4

United Kingdom - http://www.amazon.co.uk/Blood-Ocean-Afterblight-Chronicles-Weston/dp/1907992871

Barnes and Nobles

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/blood-ocean-weston-ochse/1104277495

Alibris Link

http://www.alibris.com/search/books/isbn/9781907992865

Worldwide (Free Shipping)

Book Depository - http://www.bookdepository.com/Blood-Ocean-Weston-Ochse/9781907992872

Europe Online

DEAStore - http://www.deastore.com/book/blood-ocean-weston-ochse-rebellion/9781907992865.html

For Librarians – Library Search

WorldCat - http://www.worldcat.org/title/blood-ocean/oclc/741542502

Interview at This Is Horror

On the eve of Blood Ocean coming out from Abaddon Books, I've been interviewed by This Is Horror (UK). They asked me some pretty fabulous questions. I was as honest as I could be.



http://www.thisishorror.co.uk/read-horror/meet-the-writer/weston-ochse/

Blood Ocean Primer (1 of 3): Who are the Pali Boys?

One of the major groups I populated the floating city with in my new post-apocalyptic novel Blood Ocean are the Pali Boys. When constructing the Pali Boys it wasn't hard to use both Peter Pan's Lost Boys and William Golding's Choir Boys from Lord of the Flies as a jumping off point. Both had groups of boys who threw caution to the wind and reveled in their own freedom. But this was just the beginning. To know the Pali Boys, you also have to know where the name derived and how their culture dictates their actions.

Cliffs of Pali

Pali Pass is rich in history. It 'was here where King Kamehameha I fought his last battle in his war to unite all the Hawaiian Islands with an army of 10,000 soldiers. In 1795, a few hundred warriors were driven off the cliff to their death 1,000 feet below by Kamehameha’s men. Legend has it that on certain nights, one can still hear the screams of the warriors. According to reports, workers unearthed 80 skulls believed to have belonged to the warriors during a road construction in 1848.(Cite)'

A Hawaiian friend of mine, Kimo Kalanui, once told me a story about how the trade winds were so fierce that many a young wanna-be Hawaiian warrior would leap out from Pali Pass into the tradewinds, leaving their fate to Pele. Having stood at the edge of the pass, it was a place I could lean at a forty-five degree angle and not fall over; and that was on a normal day, so it was easy to imagine how on a windy day someone could jump out and be hurled back by the strength of the winds.

So I took the idea of the young warriors leaping out and turned it into a rite of passage aboard the floating city; a rite of passage for my Pali Boys.

Blood Ocean takes place sometime between 20 and 100 years into the future. It really doesn't matter, because everything has gone to shit. Here's the premise of the novel:

Survivors of the Cull, a Plague that wiped out people without the blood type O-neg, struggle in the floating Sargasso City jigsawed together with ships, submarines, barges and oil tankers off the coast of what was once known as California.

Separated by demarcations of turf, ethnicity and fear, it’s not so much living as existing. High above it all swing the Pali Boys: descendants of Hawaiian warriors, they desire to lift themselves and the spirits of the residents below by performing an increasingly impossible series of extreme stunts, designed to test their manhood, and demonstrate the vibrancy humanity once had.

But as a conspiracy of murder unfolds and blood attacks increase, Kavika a single under-sized Pali Boy must strive to overcome his lowly status and the condemnation of his peers in order to save them all from an enemy living within.

The floating city is filled with many groups. These groups are separated first by ethnicity, then by social strata. There are groups of transsexuals, drug dealers, scavengers-- The Boxers, He-Shes, Water Dogs, etc (More on those in the next primer.) Then there are regular folk. Because the O Neg plague spared more Asians than Caucasians, the ship is populated with many of the ethnicities found along the Pacific Rim.

The Pali Boys comprise the male youth of Hawaiian contingent. To become a full-time Pali Boy one must be without fear and leap into the face of a typhoon to allow the goddess Pele to hurl you back. They raise hell with pretty much everyone, flying through the rigging like wanna-be Tarzans, playing games of follow the leader all across the length and breadth of the city. They deliver messages, steal fish, perform petty crimes, and do good deeds. They work on their stick fighting and Kuai Lua martial arts. They seem to be out of control... BUT!

There is a method to the Pali Madness. How do you keep a host of young men ready to be warriors at the end of the world when there's really no one to fight? How do you keep them from getting board? How do you keep their skills sharp and ready as a honed blade in the event they are needed?

Yep. You know the answer. The Pali Boys.

And they will be needed.

Stay tuned for the next Primer where I will talk about all the other groups. Then the last primer, to be published later next week will talk about the process of writing the novel.

For links to bookstores in virtually every country around the world, go here.

And remember. Blood Ocean premiers 14 February in the U.S. and 16 February everywhere else.

Ciao.

Weston Ochse
Tarantula Grotto
Sonoran Desert