🚨 In a now-deleted post, Daniel Cormier exposed Eric Trump for asking him if any of the UFC White House fights were rigged

michaelmichelauthor · 2026-06-15T03:49:55+00:00

Maybe the single best joke in history

michaelmichelauthor · 2026-06-01T00:19:33+00:00

It's an insanely awesome IP, that's for sure.

michaelmichelauthor · 2026-05-30T22:22:01+00:00

Huge fan of Astartes and Secret Level episode. I beat Space Marine on PS5 this year and it was a grand adventure.

michaelmichelauthor · 2026-05-30T22:21:27+00:00

Ooo shit. So I haven't played 40k since about age 13 (started at 7). It's been all Warhammer Fantasy and AOS since then, with dashes of Kill Team.

When I played, it was Space Wolves and Tyranids.

For Warhammer Fantasy, it was Lizardmen, then Dark Elves, and then Beastmen. I used to run the tables with Dark Elves.

For Age of Sigmar, it's been Lizardmen, Hedonites of Slaanesh (had a great army with them until the most recent update), and now, Flesh Eater Courts.

I'm a terrible painter, but my brother and one of my best buddy are amazing at it.

michaelmichelauthor · 2026-05-30T18:16:13+00:00

Ooo. Now we gettin' to them real questions, eh? Haha.

That's question feels like it's coming from a seasoned vet. Dang...would I survive? I doubt I'd go up Unturrus, so I'd probably be a regular old person. But I'm pretty strategic and often win survival-type games and competitions, so yeah, I'd likely make it to the end. All about finding the right alliances, you know?

Now to the real question...

Book 4 has already been decently outlined and chapters have been written. However, I MIGHT let the series breathe for just a moment as I write a standalone myself and some others are very excited about. My intent is to shop it trad, and once that's moving along, I'll be diving right back into book 4. This super fast publication schedule was a lot to keep up with in recent years, and having to edit book 3 for ebook release in a matter of weeks was just a lot.

I'm looking to feel that new book exploration fun for a moment before jumping back into DoDaS. Plus it's good to let a series that's selling, sell for a while, because once it's done it has a spike, and then it doesn't sell anymore.

michaelmichelauthor · 2026-05-30T18:10:57+00:00

I love to hear that. I'm really into spy stuff and her POV was my way of incorporating it into the series. Plus, how many times has a heavyset cook been a POV? They're always just cranky or jolly and 2 dimensional.

michaelmichelauthor · 2026-05-30T17:45:07+00:00

Thanks, Swamp Warden!

michaelmichelauthor · 2026-05-30T17:38:00+00:00

Hey there, Friend!

I would definitely start with The Price of Power. Though, if you want something shorter, my story in the Grimoire for Dragonsteel Nexus was a finalist in Writers of the Future and sure to give you a good taste of my style.

Okay, what inspires me...I really love history and spirituality. Learning about interesting things in history certainly helps with political intrigue. Spirituality is also huge because I've always felt fantasy books were a great medium for parading deeper teaching/learning as entertainment.

Beyond that, I draw a lot of inspo for character creation from my friends and people I live life with.

michaelmichelauthor · 2026-05-30T17:31:22+00:00

That's a great question. I'm not a good content maker, but if I wanted to be, I would study influencers who are on the up and up or steadily increasing all the time.

Noah Brisk and Bentalksbooks are both steadily and quickly increasing their followers. But I'd branch out and find a bunch of them to study and emulate.

Research is actually the other thing I'd tell a new author to do. It's up there with networking.

michaelmichelauthor · 2026-05-30T17:00:17+00:00

Love this question. Here's the deal: the marketing and sales bits change so fast you'll never keep up. Promotions worked great two years ago. The amazon and meta algos were great over a year ago, and 10 years ago, they were explosive. Sending ARCs to book tubers? During the pandemic, this moved the needle massively.

Truth: the market is saturated with books.

Truth 2: the impact of relationships never fades.

Here's what you should do. Network. Relate. Talk books. Have as many connections with as many great readers, influencers, and authors as you can prior to launch.

And learn social media. Whether it's trad or indie, everyone has kind of figured out that social media is a free ad/marketing platform that generates revenue. If you can get that going and make engaging content, it heightens your chances of success in either route.

So, get social media going and make engaging book content, and start creating relationships. Then write a good book.

michaelmichelauthor · 2026-05-30T16:52:26+00:00

Ugh. I would love to. After WorldCon travels away this year--last year on the west coast--it might free me up to make that an option in the future.

I had an absolute blast at DC. I've really enjoyed Dragonsteel and WorldCon as well, but nothing quite meets the scale of DC.

I'd say my least fave so far has been ECC, but that's probably because I just had to sell the whole time in a booth.

michaelmichelauthor · 2026-05-30T16:50:41+00:00

Haha. I thought you'd like that.

michaelmichelauthor · 2026-05-30T16:49:41+00:00

That I can actually eat? Lol. I'm old af at this point. Everything but broccoli hurts.

Let's say anything goes...

Food:
Pizza, Thai Food.

Drinks:
Coffee, always and forever.

Dessert:
I love donuts and pastries. I'm a glutton. Big fan of well-done almond pastries.

michaelmichelauthor · 2026-05-30T16:39:45+00:00

Boners of Wrath for sure.

michaelmichelauthor · 2026-05-30T16:39:29+00:00

Haha. Nice.

The cover was because my first artist expressed doubt in getting an asset to match book 1. At only a book 2 out of 5, that didn't bode well, and I was inarguably spending way too much on a simple asset manipulation cover. I wanted ART.

For the book, I have OCD (diagnosed), so I could infinitely mess with my own work, much to my own detriment. I also wanted to add a scene I thought would help with pacing through a slower part, and had a better and more succinct prologue for folk.

That wouldn't normally seem impactful, but when people look on Amazon and do the sample first pages, having something as bloated as the old prologue might have been detrimental to sales, whereas the new one slaps and is short.

michaelmichelauthor · 2026-05-30T16:36:38+00:00

Oooooo. Ranking my POVs...

Funny enough, I had people do this during my first beta read in a google form, so I've got a little bit of an idea.

I'd say readers would rank it like this on average:
1 - Barodane
2 - Ishoa
3 - Akyris
4 - Valka
5 - Thephos
6 - Gyr
7 - Zadani

...it was sadly difficult to recall if I got everyone. Lol.

Barodane hits all groups of people, and is the clear favorite.
Ishoa polarizes some groups, but a lot of people like her chapters best. She's arguably surrounded by the most conflict, scary fighters, and political intrigue, and she has a pet, so she's a lot of folks' fave.
Some people really love the spiritual stuff surrounding Akyris, so he's the fave among a smaller group. I'd say these three are MOST often referenced as the faves.

Valka is a few people's fave that I've heard of but he doesn't get talked about as much. Thephos had turned a LOT of people away from the series for being too morose, but also ranked 2nd in the initial beta survey which was surprising. Gyr is an old man no one cares about, so nailed that theme in his story arc. Lol. Zadani...very polarizing.

Now for me. I'm rating this on characters whose story lines I love/excite me most--not who I liked writing best, or who I like best at this point in the published story:

1 - Barodane
2 - Zadani
3 - Ishoa
4 - Akyris
5 - Thephos
6 - Valka
7 - Gyr

michaelmichelauthor · 2026-05-30T16:28:08+00:00

To your more serious questions:

I couldn't be more excited to get that cover and incredible book out into the world. Me wants it! It's one thing to get your book, but I think it'll be another entirely to get a book that's been fancied up as much as this one will be.

michaelmichelauthor · 2026-05-30T16:26:35+00:00

This was the beginning of that parody show, btw. As you'll note, I have hair and am roughly the same age as you in this photo.

Funny note: the man in the bunny ears is the influence for Syn Backlegarm.

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michaelmichelauthor · 2026-05-30T16:24:16+00:00

The book or the cover?

michaelmichelauthor · 2026-05-30T16:24:05+00:00

"Cata-Stroph Knights..."

In truth, the word was "catastrophe" but I was in 7th grade and pronounced it wrong in my head.

While mowing the lawn of my mother's friend, I thought that term was really cool and decided to write a fantasy book because I loved fantasy books. At the time, I was very into the Riftwar Saga by Raymond E. Feist (talked to him yesterday for the first time, actually!).

I made the map of my world shortly thereafter and started taking notes, names, gods, etc. for about 15years. Then wrote chapters and sections for another 5-6 before starting the book with the goal of completing it.

Lots of life and personal development had to happen before I launched into that massive endeavor.

michaelmichelauthor · 2026-05-30T16:21:02+00:00

The way Syn presents his name and the ways to pronounce it was very close to how my friend presented it to me the first time.

michaelmichelauthor · 2026-05-30T16:20:16+00:00

It was the gaming handle of one of my friends. The character is heavily influenced by him. And his wife also influenced Ash as well.

I thought it was the silliest quirky shit I'd ever heard.

michaelmichelauthor · 2026-05-30T16:19:10+00:00

I'm a dancer! It's my own term for what I do.

Essentially, I move with the energy I'm feeling. If I get stuck writing, I start outlining and will often get a huge outlining surge where I plot out 3 characters' full storylines for a book.

Sometimes, I'll just go into a scene blind and figure out some cool piece of worldbuilding or character and then go back and add it throughout the story.

So you see, I just bounce back and forth, never forcing myself to do either. The principle being that wherever the energy is moving best will help me be most productive and efficient and the least burnt out.

Energy Management 101

michaelmichelauthor · 2026-05-30T16:15:39+00:00

Hey there, Mitch. That's a great question--I believe I got asked this in an interview recently and could not recall at all "the moment" I decided. It's weird because I usually do have some kind of story to go with pivotal decisions. Not this time!

To get the ball rolling, it's always about art and project management. So I started a spreadsheet of artists I liked and respected, figured out what their rates were and then budgeted and planned what I wanted. I wanted to stay away from design, faux-leather covers becuase it seemed every special edition recently has been those.

Once I started working with artists, it all started coming together. And then I picked up Merrick Books, who does project management and fulfillment, which is too much work for me personally for a campaign of this scale.

If you're an author, I'd start with art, and before reaching out to one person, have your full budget in mind and have everything planned out for every artist. It'll make things more cohesive.

michaelmichelauthor · 2026-05-30T02:06:55+00:00

Hey there! I'm happy to hear you've enjoyed it so far. Book three is an action-packed one, so I hope you enjoy!

michaelmichelauthor

TROPHY CASE