Book Tour – OBSIDIAN WORLDS

Obsidian Worlds

by Jason Werbeloff

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GENRE:  Sci-Fi

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BLURB:

Jason Werbeloff’s short stories have been downloaded over 20,000 times. Obsidian Worlds brings together his 11 best-selling sci-fi shorts into a mind-bending philosophical anthology.

In Your Averaged Joe, a man’s headache is large enough to hold the multiverse. Q46F is an obsessive-compulsive android who finds love in a zombie-embroiled apocalypse. The end of the world isn’t all that bad – The Experience Machine will fulfil your every desire (and some you hadn’t considered). A sex bot dares to dream of freedom in Dinner with Flexi. But mind what you eat, because The Photons in the Cheese Are Lost. Don’t fret though: The Cryo Killer guarantees that your death will be painless, or your money back when you’re thawed. Unless, that is, you’re The Man with Two Legs.

Plug into Obsidian Worlds for these and other immersive stories, including the hilarious Time-Traveling Chicken Sexer. Your brain will never be the same again.

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Book Excerpt:

(from Your Averaged Joe):

“Sorry, this is a bit overwhelming. Let me introduce myself.” Then all three men spoke in unison, extending their hands, “I’m Thursday.” They each chewed a piece of gum, their masticating movements simultaneous.

Joe eyed the identical hands. Long, frosty fingers. Whitest skin. He shook hands with each. Their grips were firm. All three.

Thursday continued, “This is the Chamber.” He waved his arm around the room proudly. Joe considered the space. The rows of beds seemed to stretch forever. He couldn’t see the end of the room. And no pillars. Nothing to support the pink ceiling that extended in all directions. Joe scrunched his feet at the enormity of the Chamber, and the floor squeezed between his toes. But the floor wasn’t smooth – it was … hairy? He glanced down, and yup, fine dark hairs covered its surface. It was like standing on a forearm. Goose bumps erupted along his arms, down his legs, Joe shifted his weight to his heels, trying to avoid the hairs from scratching between his toes. And as the goose bumps spread across his back, down his chest, the ground beneath his feet changed. Between the silky black hairs, the fleshy floor lumped in places. Lumps the size of fists. Bumps, goose bumps. On the ground. He shivered.

Trying not to think about it, and resisting the urge to jump, to get his feet anywhere but on the fleshy floor, he stared at the beds. Each held a single occupant, each with brown hair, each wearing the same pale blue nightgown he was wearing. Joe looked to the bed beside his, and his heart stopped.

The man in the bed was him.

 

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AUTHOR Bio and Links:

Jason Werbeloff is a novelist and philosopher. He loves chocolate and his Labrador, Sunny.

He’s interested in the nature of social groups, personal identity, freedom, and the nature of the mind. His passion is translating philosophical debate around these topics into works of science fiction, while gorging himself on chocolate.

Amazon Author Page – download all of Werbeloff’s fiction from Amazon.

http://smarturl.it/AuthWerbeloff

Newsletter – subscribe to get ‘The Solace Pill’ free, as well as VIP access to Werbeloff’s latest fiction.

http://smarturl.it/werbeloff

Goodreads – read reviews of Werbeloff’s fiction.

http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/7340789

Facebook and Twitter – follow Werbeloff for release date information on upcoming shorts and novels.

http://www.facebook.com/solaceseries

https://twitter.com/JasonWerbeloff

Website – read about the author, and the philosophy behind his fiction.

http://www.jasonwerbeloff.com/

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GIVEAWAY

Jason will be awarding a $15 Amazon or B/N GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour. 

Enter to win a $15 Amazon/BN GC – a Rafflecopter giveaway

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Author Interview

Jason, thanks for being here. Tell us about you
Human, male, 31. From an obscure planet in the Milky Way Galaxy. Likes chocolates, Labradors, and zombies (not necessarily in that order). I’m a philosopher by training, a programmer in a previous life, and a novelist by profession. I’ve written two novels, ‘Hedon’ and ‘The Solace Pill’, and the short story anthology, ‘Obsidian Worlds’.

What inspires you to get out of bed each day?
Guilt. And the occasional stray positive thought. I do get excited occasionally. On a full moon.

Really, I love my lifestyle. I get to write every day about bizarre, previously untapped worlds. What could possibly be better than living this way?

If you could hang out with one famous person for one day, who would it be and why?
Probably Oscar Wilde. Love his acerbic wit and effortless paradoxes. My favorite (partly misattributed) quote of his … On his deathbed, he remarked: “Either this wallpaper goes or I do.”

There’s something about a personality that runs against the grain … people like Wilde make the world a more dynamic place. Without them – well, we’d all be sheep.

What’s the story behind your latest book?
‘Obsidian Worlds’ is a collection of eleven short stories. Underlying them all is this idea: insert protagonist (and reader) into bizarre, harrowing world; see how protagonist (and reader) flail about to survive; and then resolve, usually through a further disaster, but sometimes through a wonderful surprise.

I named the collection ‘Obsidian’, because it’s a glassy, multi-layered, pitch-black, phenomenally sharp volcanic glass. It’s so sharp that it separates cells, rather than tears them as a conventional blade would. The stories in the book are meant to do the same: slice between your concepts and ideas, bifurcating them into dark configurations you couldn’t have imagined beforehand.

Tell us your writing process
Step 1: Eureka moment! Idea forms in brain.

Step 2: Reject idea. Couldn’t possibly work.

Step 3: Play with idea guiltily. This can’t possibly result in anything useful.

Step 4: There might just be a story here.

Step 5: Begin writing.

Step 6: Assume the story will never be finished.

Step 7: Shock and panic as middle of the story approaches.

Step 8: Eureka moment for next story.

Step 9: Finish story.

Step 10: Return to step 2.

Do you have any tips for other writers who want to spread the word about their book?
I’ve heard this said elsewhere, but I’ll reiterate it here. There are two sure-fire ways to build your author platform: write more, and grow your email newsletter. (Shamelessly, here’s the link to mine: http://smarturl.it/werbeloff).

The more you write, the more products you’ll have in your store, the better your writing becomes, and the more cross-advertising you’ll have at your disposal. The more your email list grows, the more reviews you’ll get for your work. The more reviews you have, the better your advertising potential is – sites like Bookbub will only look at authors with lots of reviews.

When did you realize you wanted to be a writer?
Quite late, actually. I was 28, and disillusioned with my job as a software developer and management consultant. I’d studied philosophy to PhD level, but didn’t really want to pursue it as a career. So I played with the idea of writing a short story, which turned into a novel (The Solace Pill). What convinced me to continue with it was the enormous release I felt each time I finished a story. It felt, and still feels, like something new has been birthed into the world. Something that breathes and converses and taunts without any further input from me. I love being an author.

Tell us about your main character:
Each of the 11 stories has a different protagonist, in a distinct world. They range from androids, to a smelly goat farmer, to a killer for hire, to a bottle of silicone lube. All of them took their stories in directions I hadn’t initially planned. All of them are strong-willed, vibrant, and unique.

My favorite is Barker, a killer for hire in a peculiar world. Barker is hired by his victims, because they want to appear to have died of natural causes, so they can be cryogenically frozen – cryogenic freezing only happens to those who die of natural causes in this world. Barker is level-headed, old-fashioned and reliable. But everything changes when a young client with a smile he can’t refuse, walks into his life.

What are you working on next?
I’m about half-way through a sci-fi biopunk gore novel. I’ve pulled out all the checks on violence and explicit gore on this one. It’s going to hurt your teeth to read it. More than that I can’t say, other than it’s scheduled for release mid-2016.

Do you have any special/extraordinary talents?
I love plumbing. There’s nothing quite like sealing a leaking pipe. It doesn’t talk back. Doesn’t complain or request revisions. It either works or it doesn’t.

Plumbing goes along with a love of renovation more generally. Tiling, painting, knocking through walls – all of it makes me genuinely happy, in a way I just can’t reproduce any other way.

Who are your favorite authors?
I love the sci-fi greats, especially Philip K. Dick, Kurt Vonnegut, and Margaret Atwood. Anything dystopian, space-based, cyberpunk or mind-bending gets my vote.
What do you like to do with your free time?
I try (and fail) to gym. Love yoga. Listening to podcasts. Binge-watching ‘The Walking Dead’, and eating out.

Tell us about your plans for upcoming books.
The biopunk novel is set for release mid-2016. Between now and then, I’ll probably release a bunch of sci-fi short stories. Really interested at the moment in gory sci-fi. Been watching too much David Cronenberg. Have you seen ‘The Fly’? Woah. If you haven’t, do yourself a favor. And Stuart Gordon’s  ‘Re-Animator’ is insanely good. I challenge you to watch them, and see if you can ever sit through another romantic comedy without wishing the characters significant bodily harm.

Needless to say, my upcoming work will have plenty of body horror.

 

Any final thoughts?
Thank you so much for the opportunity to appear on your blog! I enjoyed answering the questions, and hope to engage further with your readers. Comment below! I’m always happy to respond. And don’t forget … join my newsletter for a free novel, and a lifetime of free and discounted stories: http://smarturl.it/werbeloff