A fresh start for anyone
How my "first act" impression of people unlocks their potential
(Hey, first things first… I apologize for sending two copies of the June 26th newsletter. Substack didn’t send a copy to my inbox, so I was concerned it hadn’t sent out at all. Next time, I’ll wait to check the stats before sending again!)
In this newsletter…
🎭 Seeing people as first-act protagonists!
🐶 Your last chance to grab DAUGMENT for just $0.99!
🤖 Tons of fantastic freebies!
(Art from Pixabay.)
Here’s something I realized about myself recently.
When I meet someone, my brain encodes them as a story’s protagonist in their first act.
(I’m gonna blame this on the sheer number of books I read as a kid. There’s a stack of reasons, but that’s certainly a main one.)
I’m an optimistic person (though I skew realist rather than “blue sky”). So, I assume everyone is part of a hopeful story. Thus, even though they may experience some dark moments, their arc can only (ultimately) go upward.
Woah. Absolutely wild.
(And, explains a lot about the people I’ve let manipulate me along the way…!)
This won’t be true of everyone I meet, of course. It often turns out that some people are in their second act, or even their third. Or, that they’re in a tragedy, and not a hopeful story. (Or, uh… both.)
But it does help me give everybody I meet—or re-acquaint myself with—a chance to start over. If they were someone they didn’t want to be, they don’t have to be that person with me. They can be the fresh start they’d like to create for themselves.
Though of course not everyone responds the same way, this creates a very interesting effect in people who have agency: even if they don’t agree with my assessments of them, they realize that they have potential. And they seize it.
Powerful. Maybe even a little dangerous. Certainly transformative.
A lot of people just need someone to believe in them, and then they discover the courage to write their own story (or stories, as the case may be)—in life, or on the page. (Sometimes both.)
How do you see the people that you meet? Are they protagonists? Antagonists? Your ensemble cast? Hit reply and let me know!
I’ve got a question for y’all—would you be interested in audio posts? 🗣️ I can’t go in for a full-blown podcast, but maybe every other week, I could record a thought and share with my list… if that would be something you’d enjoy. Reply and share your thoughts!
When I was perusing bundles on StoryOrigin that would fit my books, I couldn’t help but pounce on the SAVAGE SIDEKICK sale bundle. DAUGMENT and SEEKER seemed like perfect fits.
Look at that magnificent crow on Curse of the Furies! 🐦⬛ And I’m curious about the shifter virus in The Shifter Plague… 🦠
👉 And don’t forget, DAUGMENT is still on sale! This is the last week to get a copy of my debut novel for just $0.99. 👈 Don’t disappoint Pit! Just look at his goofy face.
(Adorable art of Pit by M. Manning.)
Pit begs you to buy a copy of DAUGMENT. No, wait… he absolutely DOES NOT. He’s far too prideful to beg.
Woof.
🚀💵 If you’re looking for other cheap reads, you’ve still got time to grab the books in the 99 CENTS SCIFI AND FANTASY SALE bundle and the SPECTACULAR SUMMER SCI-FI, FANTASY, AND WESTERNS! bundle. 💸📚
Have you tried Ream yet? (I mentioned it in my last newsletter.) Regardless, I highly recommend Perry Constantine and his collection of stories featuring “action with character.” He and I recently collaborated on a longform project, and co-writing with him was delightful. I’m not kidding when I tell you I looked forward to Friday night manuscript drops and got very sad when they were over (because our draft was complete)…
Anyway! Because he and I are pals, Perry gave me a promo code to share with y’all for the subscription page he just launched on the first of this month!
If you sign up using the code NEWBIE, you’ll get a month of Perry’s content for free. Sign up now on Ream!
Then you can check out his brand new serial, Omega Knights. I’ve been following along with the first few installments and it’s badass.
Or visit his website if you’d like to snag Perry’s other books as stand-alone purchases! 🦹🦸♀️⚡
The Free-zer
It’s another installment of THE FREE-ZER—the section where you’ll find something that will cost you zero monies. (That’s no dollars, cents, pounds, pesos, Republic credits, Monopoly money, latinum, or dubloons.)
👉 It’s that time of year!! The Smashwords sale is up and that means you can get all my writing help books for free for a limited time, only on the Smashwords platform! (My fiction is all on deep sale/free as well.)
👉 Have you summoned your copy of SPELLBREAKERS yet? If not, you can find it among the other short titles in the SHORT STORY SMORGASBORD giveaway! Don’t miss this chance to add some quick reads to your library so you can disappear into a story at every chance this summer (or winter!).
👉 Or, if you haven’t fetched SEEKER for your summer/winter reads pile, it’s right here in the EPIC SCI-FI & FANTASY giveaway. (Or you can still snag it from the GET THESE PAGE TURNERS BEFORE THEY’RE GONE! bundle.)
👉 Discover Charles Bastille’s new novel MagicLand, about a forbidden affair between an actor and a priestess-in-waiting that’s steeped in “magic, evolution, and romance.” The rave reviews mention AI, which has my attention… 👁️🤖
👉 Dark fantasy author A.P. Mobley offers up Wrath of Persephone, an exclusive story from her “War on the Gods” series. Blissful young goddess Kore is kidnapped by Hades, King of the Underworld, and must become the vengeful goddess she was destined to be… ⚡🗻
👉 Snag a copy of Legacy, a short story in author Ingrid Moon’s “Saxen Saga,” and follow a young adventurer as he outsmarts his client’s enemies. 🤔🚀
So say we all!
August