Back of the Cereal Box is a pod cast that discusses all things related to pop culture. The host John Pyka is a man of many talents: Magician, Author, Cosplayer, Storyteller, Comic Character and Podcast Producer.
I first met him when he was running the cosplay circuit, and I mean running it. He was the Host with the Most covering all Middle America.
A place where everything you don’t believe… is real.
With those lines you enter “Hit World.” A new universe where one day you are given a contract take out a terrorist, but on the way there you get attacked by a demon. You call in reinforcements, but they’re fighting space alien’s in Paris.
In a world where murder is privatized, as long as you are licensed. What could go wrong?
The Trashman – By William Alan Webb – Follows the story of LifeEnders Incorporated shooter Duncan Steed. Steed was a superstar at LEI, but everything came to a sudden stop when he fell for the wrong woman. After that moment nothing made sense again.
A Bullet for the Shooter – By William Alan Web and Larry Hoy – This story introduces us to Luther Sweetwater, a Marine Sniper who is trying to earn his LEI badge. Unfortunately for Sweetwater the mission becomes more than what he envisioned.
Back when I was teaching Karate, I dedicated the month of January to set goals.
Years back, I read a news article that discussed NOT setting New Year resolutions because you’re just going to fail, and failing is even worse than not even trying.
I encouraged my karate students to plan BFHGs – Big Fat Harry Goals. A BFHG is a goal that is so ginormous that the shear site if it can strike fear in the heart of a lesser man.
Over the year, my students and I would challenge and encourage each other to accomplish those BFHGs. Each time a BFHG was beaten, the entire class celebrated our shared victory.
January 2020, my BFHG was to start a series of short stories. The goal was over a year to self-publish half a dozen of these pulp stories. It was going to be called Hit World. A place of assassins, monsters, daemons, and dreams.
In February, I got a call from Bill Webb, my writing mentor. It seems my BFGH wasn’t big enough. Bill met with Chris Kennedy. Chris runs a publishing house that releases books by the fistful. Chris loved the sound of our Hit World, and he wanted to help us remove it world wide. There was just one little change. Chris wanted novels, not short stories.
I’m good at short stories, but a full novel was outside my skill set. I talked about it will Bill, and he explained the difference to me. Don’t’ stop banging on the keyboard. Just keep typing.
With that bit of help and the assurance that Bill would help me push through to the end. I watered my BFHG nad it grew. It grew until I didn’t see a chance of success. Then I started typing.
Months passed, Bill and I passed the novel back and forth. I kept typing.
Now, as we draw close to the end of 2020, I can share the results. My first novel is DONE. It’s being trimmed as we speak. I’ve also started my second novel. Started means I’m pounding through it.
Last week. Chris reached out to us with the new logo for our Hit World Universe. That’s it at the top SEXY, right? Chris will be releasing our books starting in January 2021. Watch for Hit World Press releases here. (about once a month)
Thank you for reading this long and sharing the celebration ad I mark my BFHG 2020 – beaten!
Hit Wolrd release schedule (that has been announced)
Jan 15, 2021 – The Trashman – by Willam Alan Webb – The first novel from HWP, Hit World Press.
Feb 22, 2021 – A Bullet for the Shooter – This is the novel Bill, and I completed together.
There are more coming, but this is all you get for now.
Have an excellent finish to the year and start thinking about your BFHG for 2021
You know the feeling you get when you’re watching the mega-Lotto and the numbers on the screen start matching the numbers on the ticket your holding?
Yeah, me neither, BUT something pretty cool did happen this morning.
I was reading my email this morning and saw a message from Bill Webb. Bill has been kind enough to share the “Hit World” universe with me.
We have BOTH been banging out stories in a world filled with assassins.
Think John Wick without the crazy hair cuts.
ANYWAY….
Bill was mentioning our world to Chris Kennedy. Chris is one of the people who work at Chris Kennedy Publishing. Catchy name, right?
It seems that Chris and the gang would like to take over the management of the “Hit World” universe.
What does that mean? No Idea. But, I’m going to pretend it relates to sharing our stories with the world. Chris, be sure to send a copy of Shoot First to Netflix for us. K?
Anyway Chris, Bill, please join me in a toast. For a long, fruitful trip together as we drop the crosshairs on our next target.
The winter months really put me down in the dumps. The cold and wet of Memphis just sucks the motivation out of me.
So I started a new diet a couple weeks ago. It’s the 1k diet. Each day I encourage myself to write 1,000 words in my story. This diet has been a LIFE CHANGER. In the past two weeks, I have finished Rough drafts on TWO new Hit World Stories.
SECOND CHANCE has been cleaned up and is currently being reviewed by my Critique Group. I get their feedback this weekend.
THREE STRIKES just finished the – Rough Draft phase. I plan to slap some polish on it this weekend and get it to the crew for their insite.
The best part of this diet. I get to keep everything I write. Don’t’ worry You’ll see it soon.
I just finished my FIRST Draft and sent it off to my Critique Group. (Pray for them)
Yea, just a week ago I said I finished my ROUGH draft so what’s the difference?
In my world, a ROUGH is purely a dump of consciousness. This is where I don’t look at the screen, I simply type as fast as I can. Miss-spellings and grammar mean NOTHING – I don’t even slow down for them. If any of you have seen how I type you’ll know just how chaotic that draft can be. I have more mistakes than I have content.
A FIRST draft is after I run the work through a spellchecker & Grammer checker. I also read through the document, to make sure IN GENERAL the words make some form of sense. This is where I am today.
This is the point where I look to my CRITIQUE group to give a general look and feel. Can you follow the story? Do you care about the characters? Did you LIKE the story?
I collect their opinions and go back to work. They have the PAINFUL job of reading that first draft. So PRAY for them.
I hope they give me a SECOND CHANCE (See what I did there? Clever huh?)
FINALLY!! Last week I was having lunch with a writer friend of mine.
Larry, I’m envious of you. I wish I was as young as you when I started taking this career seriously, but you are at that age were you need to decide if you are going to take it seriously.
Bill is good man who shoots straight from the hip, and sometimes the truth hurts.
I had been sitting on my hands for weeks. This time last year I was pumping out a thousand words a day. I finished a rough draft of a novel, I was finishing a screenplay, and I was banging out flash pieces left and right.
Something happened and I was in a slump. Every time I opened my word processor, I’d get discouraged in myself and walk away without even touching the keyboard. I knew that if I ever started typing the words would flow, but I just couldn’t seem to type that first word.
Lunch with Bill changed that. Somehow the words got threw. The only thing stopping me was me. That night I banged out 750 words. The next day another 750, then 500. I was afraid that I was going to fail again. The next day, I had a day off from work and I slammed down 1,120 words while I was waiting at the mechanic. The next day I slammed out 1,350 words and finished my current piece.
It’s NEVER top late to start again, but the thing that makes the word move is DAILY exercise. Put the words on paper. Get in that rhythm and make steps every day.
Now I’m happy to say I have finished my rough draft of “Second Chance” it is the sequel to shoot first. Both my main character and I got lucky, in the first story. We both succeeded him in his career and me in publishing a short novel.
We both were struggling under first-time success, knowing just how unworthy we both were. This time we both found ourselves in a slump hiding from what we should be doing. We were both ignoring that little voice inside of us telling us to get busy.
We both found that little nugget of advice and got back to work.
Wait am I writing an autobiography? I hope not, Luther, my main character, is an assassin.
The convention season has started with a fan favorite – Shadowcon. I’m a little late posting this the Conventions was the first weekend of the year.
It was a curious time. I met a fan, a little green kid with big ears. He wanted a copy of Deathlehem. He said he heard there was a lasagna recipe in it, and he wanted some num nums.
I tried to tell him it was too scary for him, but he was just so darn cute.
A crazy couple of months. Too much to detail everything, but let me tell you what I’ve been doing for the last few weeks.
A couple weeks ago, I read a short story by William Allen Webb. “I’ll kill you when I can” The story was about a world of assassins. Think John Wick, but not as perfect. Bill’s characters had problems, lots of problems. I loved the story, it was right up my alley.
I stopped by to tell Bill how much I enjoyed his story. That is where things went sideways.
“Bill, I read your new story; it was a blast. There are so many possibilities that could fit in there.”
“You want to write one?”
“Heck Ya!”
Bill, not only let me put a story in his world, but he co-authored the story. Together we wrote history and brought this young world to life.
Thank-you Bill, for sharing your vision with me. I can’t wait to see how far this goes. Look for the worldwide release on Amazon later this week.
It is about a young man who joined USMC to be a sniper.
But there is a problem, and he is struggling.
He is smaller then everyone else (5’6″ – ish).
He is trying hard to keep up, but he’s just not at the level of the others in his group.
He also has a problem none of the other guys have.
He doesn’t have a name. (That’s BAD for the main character)
So to compete in this please just reply to this post (preferably on my blog not facebook) – with your suggestion for this guys name.
PLEASE do not suggest real names – If I use your name – You win BRAGGING RITES – over all your friends. – You got to name the MAIN CHARACTER in a book. How cool is that?
Please drop as many times as you can – I am planning to release this story to the world next month. So hurry, what should we name this guy?
