My writing career began in the early nineties when I published a poem in a local Columbus, Ohio newspaper. I struggled off and on for the better part of two decades to get my work noticed. During this time I was learning the craft, finding my voice, branding myself, learning how to market on social media, and making my fair share of mistakes in the process. I was doing all of this while working a full-time job. Truth be told, I liked the idea of being a writer but I just wasn’t working nearly hard enough.
Around 2012 I began working on my writing like my life depended on it. In a way, it did. I found myself in a very stressful profession that required long hours. I wasn't sleeping, my health started to suffer, and I saw my dreams of becoming a writer were quickly fading away.
Shortly after this came three distinct milestones in my writing career:
MILESTONE #1
In 2013, about eighteen years after I began writing, when I published my debut dystopian novel, Alarm Clock Dawn. I was taking weeks of vacation time off from my day job to complete it. For six months I worked for several hours each night after working a full shift at my job. I couldn't really afford it but I hired a professional editor and an artist to design the cover and paid them with borrowed money. Instead of an expense I viewed it as an investment in my future.
This is when I started making real sacrifices for my writing. As a result I finally found my voice. I also proved to myself that I could actually write a novel. Because of this book I finally believed in myself and my abilities as a writer. No matter what I accomplished from that point forward Alarm Clock Dawn would always be my first and it will always be special to me. The novel was well received and was getting consistent four and five star reviews on Amazon. This kicked me into hyper-drive. I started seeing some sporadic success but my efforts to make a living at writing didn’t yet materialize.
MILESTONE #2
My second milestone was when I read James Altucher’s book, Choose Yourself. Choose Yourself shattered any misconceptions I had left that there was security of any kind to be found working for someone else. In his book James stressed that, in today’s world, no matter how secure you might think your job is you can find yourself unemployed at any time. He stressed there were no longer any gatekeepers that had to say "yes" and give you permission to make your dreams come true. Therefore, the only rational thing you can do is to choose yourself and become an entrepreneur. He taught that you must work to find your passion and pursue it with all you’ve got. The book cracked my slumber in many ways and also gave actionable ideas on how to become an author-prenuer, to achieve independence from the traditional nine-to-five job. I soaked up James’ teachings and they pushed me to come up with my plan.
MILESTONE #3
Fast forward two years and my third milestone arrived. It was a new social media platform called Steemit introduced to me by @stellabelle in mid-June. Her posts were already rocking on the platform but I didn’t really understand how Steemit worked. I had heard about Bitcoin on the news but had no idea what cryptocurrency was and blockchain was a completely foreign term. I was a Noob to the Nth degree. Finally on July 5th I took the plunge and wrote my first post. Two weeks after registered I began getting frustrated, I felt like I was getting nowhere, friends ( @tcmiller and @fairytalelife) told me to be patient and keep writing. Three weeks and thirty or so posts later I started getting some decent upvotes and thoughtful comments. Almost exactly a month later, a few hundred posts into the process, I started getting more traction and then a few days later my posts caught fire. What might seem to some like an overnight success actually was a twenty-two year struggle.
Steemit has been a true miracle. In just over a month it’s given me a taste of what success as a writer feels like and it’s also taught me that I can actually make a living at it. It’s also allowed me to collaborate with some extremely talented creative people. No matter what happens from this point forward I will be forever thankful to Steemit and all of you for giving me a gift that I thought I might never receive.
Now, for my big announcement!
Alarm Clock Dawn will be available to read here on Steemit for free! As a token of thanks to Steemit and for the support you have shown me I’m going to post the entire novel here on Steemit in installments.
A little about Alarm Clock Dawn:
ALARM CLOCK DAWN, author Eric Vance Walton's debut novel, is the chilling story of a world only decades ahead of our own. Adam Harkin is an employee of XenTek, the most powerful corporation the world has ever known. Adam begins to question the purpose of his existence in a world where people are no longer citizens; they are merely consumers. Every aspect of a person's role in society is to be determined by one number-their credit score. The planet is protesting corporate greed and insatiable consumerism through crippling super storms that erupt without warning. In a race against time, thousands of people are waking up from this nightmare, burning their Consumer Identification Cards and doing the only thing they can to strike back-dropping out of this toxic society. One by one they join the camps outside the cities. The fate of humanity itself is at stake and the clock is ticking. Sometimes, when it seems all hope is lost, there's only one solution...to AWAKEN.
I’m so excited to share this with you for a couple of reasons. First, it will be like reliving the book all over again and I feel like the cast of characters are old friends. Secondly, I can’t wait for you to join me on this adventure! I look forward to interacting with you, answering questions, and reading your thoughts and feelings about the story.
The very first installment of Alarm Clock Dawn will appear around this time tomorrow (11AM CST) and we will continue the journey together through approximately 50 and 60 serialized posts over the coming months. Do you know someone else who enjoys dystopian Sci-Fi/Suspense fiction? If so, please share this blog with them.
(Alarm Clock Dawn is the first book of a trilogy. The sequel entitled, Truth Is Stranger will be published on Amazon in the spring of 2017.)
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