Army veteran writes novel to break out of military action-adventure genre

Vanity, no linking to personal sites or Amazon or Goodreads | August 26, 2015 | St Ant Knee

[StAntKnee]

The novel is Prison of the Soul about a teacher who gets fired from the public school system for manhandling a rape suspect on the campus, a kid he caught in the act. (Sound contemporary?) The only job he can get is teaching in a one-room school behind bars in the state's supermax for violent juvenile delinquents. More than the obvious hook, it's an exploration of that aspect of the human condition wherein we build our own prisons by self-imposed limitations and fears.

[StAntKnee]

Writing the military stories like the two-book series, Delta Force (as John Harriman), helped me purge the Vietnam War demons, but when I wanted to move on to mainstream fiction, I found myself locked into the genre, a prison, if you will. So I wrote this.

[Anitius Severinus Boethius]

Love the cover.

[knittnmom]

Looks interesting. Just got the Kindle version and will start reading on my lunch break.

[StAntKnee]

Thanks. Like you, I went to a professional. Sure wish I could design like that.

[StAntKnee]

Bless you. I hope you’ll find it review-worthy. You know the price is right.

[knittnmom]

Just finished Michelle Malkin’s “Who Built That...” book. That was excellent! I was wondering what could follow that! :-)

[Trumpinator]

Is this self published via Amazon’s kindle? I am thinking of putting up some horrible works of mine for free on Amazon’s kindle.

[StAntKnee]

Thanks for the recommendation. Michelle M. rocks.

[StAntKnee]

Yeah, self-published. I sold a lot of military fiction to name publishers and several how-to books for writers at Writer's Digest. Marketing Prison is a personal mission. I had a ton of agent interest in the legacy publishing world. Over time, two separate agents represented it, but no publishers bit. I did a major rework, but since I'd already burned through the legacy publishing world, had no place to go.

My strategy now is to self-market and if interest grows, go back to legacy publishers. Or not. At this point, it's not a decision I have to make until souls like you (readers) feel moved by the story.

As far as "free" goes, my impression is you can run free promotions, but with a lot of conditions, including only briefly. Go visit the KDP pages at amazon to bone up on author info. It's a great service with helpful human beings behind the curtain.

If I'm wrong about that free thingie, let me know.

[StAntKnee]

Forgot to mention. If you’re a member of Amazon Prime, you can read the book for free.

[Trumpinator]

I wish you the best of luck!

[StAntKnee]

Welp, thanks. Marketing is a whole other country.