Blog Archives
His Intense Loyalty
Michael J Bowler Author Interview
Spinner is a genre-crossing novel with elements of a horror, supernatural, and urban fantasy as well. Did you start writing with this in mind, or did this happen organically as you were writing?
I never plan to genre-cross when I write, but it happens organically. My mind doesn’t see niches or genres because I don’t like labels (which publishers do like because they feel niches are easier to market to.) I usually start with an idea or a character and build from there. For Spinner, the idea was a boy in a wheelchair who could heal everyone but himself. From there I populated the story with characters I hope readers will care about, and considered the possible threats to such a uniquely gifted boy from those seeking to exploit him. I love horror stories, so adding in an element of the supernatural came easily. I tried to send my characters on a journey that crosses genres and can be enjoyed even by those who don’t like horror. The disabilities of the characters are based on real kids I taught as a special educator, and I wanted to celebrate the reality that for all of us, our abilities outweigh our disabilities.
Alex is a spinner, capable of taking on others emotions, physical ailments, and pains. What was the inspiration for Alex’s abilities?
I have always been very emphatic, and knew early on I could never be a doctor or someone who deals with suffering on a daily basis because I’d feel the pain of the other person way too much. However, all walks of life have suffering, and I’ve experienced it in many people, especially kids I’ve taught or worked with as a juvenile hall volunteer. I so badly wanted to take their pain away that the character of Alex was born in my mind – someone who could not just listen empathetically, but actually remove the pain from the other person and then expel it from himself. It took many years to bring the character, and his story, to fruition, and the result is Spinner.
The supporting characters in this novel, I felt, were intriguing and well developed. Who was your favorite character to write for?
I think Roy was my favorite because he has other struggles besides his learning disability, and because of his intense loyalty to Alex. Friendship is a major theme in all of my books because I believe it is the purest form of love, and the friendship Roy, Alex, and the other characters have for each other is more powerful than all the forces pitted against them. I’ve known far too many kids like Roy who think they’re losers because society says they have little or no worth, and I wanted to bring that kind of character to life so readers can see, with clarity, that society is wrong.
What is the next book that you are working on and when will it be published?
I have written three novels aimed at the teen+ market and one for middle grade, all different in plot, genre, tone, and even narrative point of view, but thus far none of them have generated interest from publishers or agents. In my mind, I have outlined the two sequels to Spinner that will tie up all the plot threads, but I’ll see how Spinner sells first. If there is enough interest, I’ll write them. At this point, I can’t say when I will have a new book out, but I keep working hard to make that happen.
Author Links: Website | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | Tumblr | Pinterest | Goodreads | Amazon | YouTube
![Spinner by [Bowler, Michael J.]](https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/51D8DIXsJtL.jpg)
Fifteen-year-old Alex is a “spinner.” His friends are “dummies.” Two clandestine groups of humans want his power. And an ancient evil is stalking him. If people weren’t being murdered, Alex might laugh at how his life turned into a horror movie overnight.
In a wheelchair since birth, his freakish ability has gotten him kicked out of ten foster homes since the age of four. Now saddled with a sadistic housemother who uses his spinning to “fix” the kids she injures, Alex and his misfit group of learning disabled classmates are the only ones who can solve the mystery of his birth before more people meet a gruesome end.
They want to know who murdered their beloved teacher, and why the hot young substitute acts like she’s flirting with them. Then there’s the mysterious medallion that seems to have unleashed something evil, and an ancient prophecy suggesting Alex has the power to destroy the world.
The boys break into homes, dig up graves, fight for their lives against feral cats, and ultimately confront a malevolence as old as humanity. Friendships are tested, secrets uncovered, love spoken, and destiny revealed. The kid who’s always been a loner will finally learn the value of friends, family, and loyalty.
If he survives…
Walking the Plank
Just One More Step and . . . Splash, You’re in Love… For hapless writer Michael Thorn, falling in love is like walking the plank—where passion moves you to the edge or anxiety freezes you where you stand. He pens a best-selling romance novel intended to win back the love of his sweetheart. While at an uneventful book signing, he disrupts the attempted kidnapping of Lacy Wells, a feisty playwright whose family holds the missing portion of a treasure map drawn on the back of an ancient Chinese scroll. A rollicking race to claim the lost map finds Michael and Lacy teaming up with freedom fighter Xaing Sun, while matching wits with a blood relative of Blackbeard, the pirate, who is conspiring with the merciless Ministry of State Security. Wild events unfolding for Michael and Lacy are dismissed as publicity stunts by the local police; the national news and FBI have them tangled up with international theft; and the tabloid paparazzi can’t get enough of the celebrity couple of the summer. A beautiful assassin, tough rodeo cowboys, and a posse of old ladies add to the fun and excitement that help push Michael and Lacy closer to the map…and closer to each other; despite images from his past that are preventing Michael from taking that fateful step off the plank. As the pieces of the map come together, Lacy has one chance to prove that she read the book, took notes along the way, and learned from the man who wrote the ultimate book on love. With romance, hilarious hijinks, and utter mayhem, Walking the Plank delivers an entertaining yet deeply satisfying journey through the mysteries and loyalties of the human heart.
The Story Grew Darker
Zachary Brock Author Interview
I really enjoyed the bond that Ace and Zeke had in your book A Dangerous Discovery. What was the inspiration for their relationship?
Actually, it is the banter and relationship I have with my father. That is what really inspired me to make these two characters more than just friends.
There are some thrilling twists in this novel. Did these happen organically while writing or were they mapped out?
I outline each chapter with how I want it to proceed and set up a story board with notes, but so many times the story takes on a life of its own and that is what happened here. I had the concept and the secret, but as I investigated and researched a lot of the incidents that occurred in South America, the story grew darker and darker. I actually let some things out because I thought it may be too dark.
What is the next story that you are working on and when will it be available?
I am working on Book 2 of this series, as well as another fiction novel. Book 2 is tentatively set to be on the shelves in August of 2018. Book 2 is another Vatican conspiracy that I discovered when I was researching Book 1 and I think people will enjoy it.
Author Links: GoodReads | Facebook
Can Ace and Zeke survive the discovery of a lifetime: a secret the Vatican will stop at nothing to protect?
Marion (Ace) Acevedo grew up on the streets as a Latin American. The things he had to do to survive as a child, no one should have to do, but a chance encounter changed his life.
Now he is the face of an international corporation. Wealth, social standing and travel is what his life is all about. He loves what he does, and with the guiding hand of Ezekiel (Zeke) Smith, his mentor and friend, his life cannot get much better.
Unbeknownst to Ace and Zeke, the acquisition of a new company in Peru holds a secret the Vatican does not want discovered. Special agents from the Holy See will do anything to stop this secret from being released.
As Ace gets closer to uncovering this dangerous secret, he must use every skill he was taught from the streets and from his mentor. But, even with an unknown stranger looking out for him, Ace may lose it all, including his life.
Tempting Faith Book Trailer
“Where shadows of past sins are revealed in the Light”
Abandonment. Dark Amish secrets. And an unforgettable romance between the daughter of an American minister and a famous British music producer tormented by tragedy.
When magazine editor Faith Edwards must take an assignment away from her tightly controlled life to travel to London—or else—she is not prepared for the series of unfortunate events that follow, or her intense attraction to David Ashton, a man who condemns all in life that she holds dear.
Set against the haunting backdrop of Cotswold, an English medieval monastery nestled high against the raging sea cliffs, and spanning an ocean’s width of unrequited love, Faith and David are forced to battle their greatest fears—unwittingly setting themselves on a course to bind their fragmented hearts together.
But will the dark chains of bitterness, not so easily broken, threaten the light of their future?
SAM: A Girl Undercover
Deception was never part of her plan. Neither was falling in love. Changing her tomboy appearance & makeup is just another disguise to conceal the birthmark on her face, and her view of stranger’s stares. SAM. Now sixteen and still hiding under baseball caps and sunglasses. Dressing like a tomboy started years ago. She was perfectly happy with her looks until one day she meets a young man named Jock at a baseball field. She excepts a fill-in spot on the team letting him presume she was a boy. Unsure of her attraction toward him; her hormones take part in her desire to conceal her birthmark and dress like a girl with the aspiration of revealing her true identity. However, this turns out to be harder than she had imagined. Her deceitful-pretension, causing her chaos and sends her on a roller coaster ride of lies and confessions. Unaware that this would be the origin of a triangle of gentleman callers that she will have to sort out the difference between love-friendship or just infatuation. Will Samantha retreat to her disguises afraid of falling in love, or will she marry the man of her dreams?
GROND: The Raven High
In the year 2086, Earth is exhausted. The seas have been emptied, the bedrock and soil stripped of their resources, and the superheated atmosphere churns with terrible storms. Those who can afford to do so live in the limbo of virtual reality, and the billions who suffer in poverty have no work, no clean water, and no security from the chaos.
The only hope for those trapped on a dying Earth are the Changed—the seven bioengineered post-humans who work in their separate manufacturing facilities orbiting high above the planet. Raised from birth for their work and fully matured at ten years old, their genius provides the nanomaterials that have begun to cleanse Earth of the pollutants that have wiped out almost the entire ecosphere.
But for Olga Voronov, youngest of the Changed, the isolation and endless toil are not the greatest of her challenges. Down on Earth there are those who resent and fear her talents—and would prefer that humanity not be given the second chance that only she could make possible…
LITERARY TITAN 