Hey you guys, Hell Night is live on the Kindle store! Pick up a copy! Read it! Enjoy it! Post a review! You’re awesome!
Buy Hell Night
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ebook
UPDATE: HELL NIGHT. 3/21/2017
Okay, it’s time. Mark those calendars, tell your friends, tell your enemies, call the newspapers. I just got the physical proof of HELL NIGHT, the second Alex Rains adventure, and me and my cat agree that it’s pretty awesome. So, let’s do this thing. And if you haven’t already, this would be a great time to check out the first Alex Rains Novel, The Devil’s Mouth
Thanks so much to all of you who have been waiting patiently.
-Matt
Update: Did I say January?
Hi, folks.
Okay, I know I said that the book would be out in January. As it turns out, that was a filthy lie. But don’t despair, it’s coming soon! We had some minor production hiccups, and the manuscript went back to Santa’s workshop for a few weeks. Things are back on track now, but I’m still not entirely sure about the release date. I’d like to thank everyone for their enthusiasm and their patience.
Story time. As those of you who read The Devil’s Mouth early on know, that book had a fair amount of typos. Those were all my fault, and due largely to my own impatience, not to mention my vast overestimation of my own proofreading skills. The result was a final product that was less than it could have been. Those mistakes cost me with reviewers, and, I’m sure, with a fair number of readers. It wound up being an embarrassment to me, and to everyone else involved in the book.
Your enthusiasm has been contagious. I’ve been working my butt off to try and get the new book out as soon as possible, but I have to force myself to take a deep breath. And then let it out, because otherwise I wouldn’t be breathing anymore and I’d die. Seriously though, I hate to push the release date back, but I want to take as much time as is needed to make sure this one is as good as I can make it. If people hate it, I’d at least like them to hate it for subjective reasons.
Thanks for your patience,
Matt
HELL NIGHT: Alex Rains, Book Two
Hey folks, just a quick update. Hell Night is coming. Pretty soon. Like really pretty soon. I’ve been quite busy getting all my ducks in a row, and, you know, life stuff. I’ve also been slightly more active at my weird side project, The Mud Lake Proboscis, so if you’re into ill-conceived liberal propaganda, check that out. More updates to follow.
HELL NIGHT
ALEX RAINS knows all about hunting vampires—after all, that’s his job, and he’s the best at what he does. But when he follows a lead to the tiny desert town of Prosperity, Nevada, Alex quickly learns that vampires aren’t the only things that go bump in the night. He’s just as surprised as the town’s residents when the dead start walking the streets of Prosperity . . . and they’ve got a bit of an appetite.
Together with a ragtag group of survivors, Alex will have to dodge undead horrors and small-town drama as he digs into Prosperity’s darkest secrets and macabre Wild West heritage to figure out why the dead aren’t staying dead, discover what–or who–is responsible, and put a stop to it . . . before the whole mess gets out of hand.
After dealing with the undead in Prosperity, Alex Rains is going to have to update his resume.
It’s sunny with a chance of apocalypse in HELL NIGHT, Matt Kincade’s eagerly anticipated follow-up to THE DEVIL’S MOUTH. With HELL NIGHT, Kincade once again delivers fast-paced, gritty pulp action, engaging characters, and delightfully grim humor.
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Alex Rains Book Two
What the heck is a Bearalope? Where the heck is Prosperity?
That’s why we call it a teaser.
Alex Rains knows all about killing vampires. Too bad it’s not vampires this time. If Alex survives his trip to Prosperity, he’s going to need to update his resume.
HELL NIGHT: Alex Rains, Book Two. January, 2017.
My Debut Month Recap-A Whole Mess of Gratitude
Once upon a time, there was a crazy kid with a crazy dream. A dream to write a book about a one-liner quipping, fast-car-driving, katana-wielding, cowboy-hat-wearing, rockabilly vampire hunter. If that isn’t a crazy dream, I don’t know what is.
And then that crazy kid, he went and wrote that book.
And then he had another crazy dream. He dreamed that someday somebody other than his two best friends might read it.
He thought for a while about traditional publishing. He made some inquiries. It went like this:
Author: I have this book…
Publisher: Does it have an orphaned child wizard?
Author: No, but it…
Publisher: Is there a female teenage protagonist, forced to fight to the death for entertainment in a future dystopia?
Author: Not exactly.
Publisher: Are there dragons?
Author: No. But there are vampires.
Publisher: Okay, now we’re talking! Are they broody, sparkly, harmless good vampires that romance teenage girls?
Author: No. They just kill people.
Publisher: Get the hell out of my office.
Okay, my lawyer wants me to mention that this conversation only took place in my imagination, but it was extremely vivid.
So, after that, the crazy kid looked into online self-publishing, the craziest dream of all.
So, he found a crazy little website called Reedsy.com where he found an editor and a cover designer, and spent a kind of a crazy frightening amount of money getting this crazy manuscript polished up. Then he spent more crazy amounts of money on formatting and advertising, and he released his crazy rockabilly vampire hunter novel out into the world.
And to his utter shock and amazement, it didn’t do half bad.
Plot twist. I’m that crazy writer. The Devil’s Mouth has been out on the Kindle store for a little more than a month. I’ve sold significantly more copies than I have sympathetic friends and relatives, and I’m actually getting mostly good reviews. People seem to enjoy the book, and it’s the most rewarding, encouraging, validating thing I can possibly imagine.
I am overwhelmed with joy and gratitude.
I would like to extend a big giant heartfelt thank you to everyone involved.
First and foremost, my readers. I know that buying a book on the kindle store from an unknown author is a risk, to say the least. So thank you, thank you, thank you from the bottom of my heart for taking a chance on me. I cannot thank you enough. I am so completely serious that I am literally tearing up as I write this. And a double thank you for those of you who went to the trouble to leave a review. Self published authors live and die by those reviews, so I cannot express my gratitude enough. Even those of you who left meh reviews, I truly appreciate the feedback, and again, I appreciate you taking the chance on me. Except that one guy who left a one-star review. You obviously didn’t even read the book, and you can eat a bag of dicks.
Thank you to the reviewers who also took a chance on my book. Invested Ivana, Patrick Dorn, Derek Edgington, Barb Taub, Jess Haines, Bob Williams, and anyone else who I forgot, or whose review escaped my notice. Those early, positive reviews from professional readers and writers who had no vested interest in sparing my feelings meant more to me than you’ll ever know. Thanks.
Thank yous go next to my friends and family, you know who you are. All those of you who read my early drafts and gave me feedback, or listened to me as I talked out some plot issue or another, or just refrained from rolling your eyes when I mentioned the book I was writing, thank you. Thank you. You guys, you are the wind beneath my wings.
Next up, thank you to the professionals who helped me make the book everything it could be.
J. Caleb Design, you saw my vision, and you brought it to life. Thanks for putting up with my nit picking, and thank you for that awesome cover. Everyone loves it. Except that guy that left the one star review, but fuck him.
Angela Brown, thank you for cleaning up my atrocious grammar, hammering the dents out of my story, and bringing my manuscript up to a professional standard. I’m sure it was a Augean task, but you got it done with style. I’m afraid I added in a few more typos after you got done with it, but I want everyone to know that those were all my fault, so blame me, and not this wonderful editor.
Polgarus Studios, You guys just rock. Thank you for making my book look like a book. If anyone reading this is considering self publishing, talk to these guys. They’ll format your ebook better and faster than you could do it yourself. It’s a bargain. It’s worth it. Believe me.
Reedsy.com Thank you for your website, which allowed me to browse dozens and dozens of vetted industry professionals, and receive quotes from those same professionals. Without you guys I’d still be browsing fiverr and craigslist for an editor. There’s no getting around the fact that real professionals cost real money, but reedsy.com absolutely made the whole process easier and far less risky for both parties.
Again, thank you everyone. I’m aglow. This is the beginning of an amazing adventure.
-Matt Kincade
The Joy of Being Done
“Art is never finished, only abandoned.” -Leonardo da Vinci
Those of you who’ve been following my blog, or those of you who got here by following the link in my ebook, will know that I’ve recently published a book that I’ve been working on for quite a while. It’s called The Devil’s Mouth, and it’s on the the Kindle store.
Having begun this post with a quote about art, I have to stipulate that I think it’s a stretch to call a book about a katana-wielding rockabilly cowboy vampire hunter “art.” But the sentiment still applies. Is anybody ever really finished with anything creative? Or do you just get sick of it, or run out of time? If Leonardo da Vinci were here today and he took a look at the Mona Lisa, he’d probably have to go get his paint brushes and touch up her eyebrows or something. Fun fact, da Vinci worked on the Mona Lisa for over ten years. Because it’s never perfect. And if (like me) you’re working on your own schedule, the only deadlines you have are the ones you impose on yourself. So it’s almost impossible to draw a line and say that something is done. But eventually you have to.
And damn does it feel good when you finally do.
It’s been a long road. From a rough outline, a crazy idea and a few scribbles in a notebook, to a finished, polished final product, something I can look at and say, “I did that.”
After reams of paper, printer cartridges, notebooks, pens, drafts and drafts and drafts, revisions, proofreading, beta reads, feedback, revisions. . . it’s done. It’s done.
While it’s incredibly validating to see the finished product, to hold your book in your hand and see people enjoying it, a large part of the satisfaction is just having the damned thing finished. To know that the product has shipped. The bird has flown. I can’t change it now it I wanted to, thank God. Even though I can’t read a sentence of it without wanting to shuffle words around, I can’t anymore. It’s out of my hands. It’s done.
Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy the process, or I wouldn’t be doing it. I love creating. I love watching these characters developing, seemingly of their own accord, the plot twists that surprise even me. I love the lightbulb moment while I’m washing dishes or taking a shower. I love getting dialed into an editing trance and realizing that it got dark while I wasn’t paying attention.
For me, there’s always a part of my brain chewing on stories. I’ve probably got five or six going now. They come and go as they please, plot elements bouncing around in my head like bingo balls, searching for the right configuration, waiting for the tumblers to line up. They were there even before I started writing. Hell, that’s probably why I started writing. Because the only way to get rid of them is to write them down and finish them.
Still, The Devil’s Mouth has taken up the majority of my imagination RAM for quite a while. There’s a peculiar feeling of lostness, like my brain doesn’t quite know what to do now. My imagination is like that old guy in The Shawshank Redemption who got out of prison and didn’t know what the hell to do with himself.
It’s not a bad thing. It’s a good thing. But it’s a strange feeling all the same. It’s done.
Welp, time to get to work on the next one.
Another Great Review!
Check out this great review from author Patrick Dorn!
Matt Kincade’s breakout novel doesn’t just kick butt in the action scenes—all writers in this genre had better know their way around describing exciting murder and mayhem—the story goes DEEP and BROAD in creating a believable world where society’s outcasts and outlaws have formed a community to defend the world from equally established criminal organizations of fanged, undead predators.
I’ve gotta say, after living for quite some time with this bizarre fantasy world churning around in my brain, it feels pretty darned good to get it out in the world and have normal people not think that I’m completely insane. Thanks for the great review, Patrick! Check out out Patrick’s website, and of course pick up a copy of The Devil’s Mouth!
THE DEVIL’S MOUTH is Now Available on The Kindle Store!
Aw, heck yes. After a whole lot of time and effort, I am kicking this little baby bird out of the nest. The Devil’s Mouth is available on the Kindle store, and for a limited time it’s only .99 cents.
I’d just like to give a great big thank you to all of you out there in blog land, you’ve all been so supportive and just all around awesome.
Buy THE DEVIL’S MOUTH Today
The Blurbs-Blurbs For Books That Don’t (and Shouldn’t) Exist
Writing a book description is nerve-wracking. You’ve only got three or four sentences to convince someone to read your book. First, it needs a hook. Then it needs to be an accurate description, but not give too much away. It has to go into detail, but still leave something to the imagination. It has to introduce the reader to the characters and the world and the story, but still not be too long. And the punctuation? You can get away with a missed quotation mark on page two hundred of your self-published work, but on the blurb? That’s gotta be perfect. Stressful.
So, like always, my brain responds to stressful situations with humor.
Me: Okay brain, we’ve got to get serious here and figure this out.
Brain: Haha what if the book was about like a zombie apocalypse but with ducks. A duckpocalypse.
Me: Shut up, brain. That’s a terrible idea.
Brain: No, but seriously. Duckpocalypse.
And so without further comment, a few blurbs I thought of while trying to think of a blurb.
***
One man. One canoe. One creek…of shit.
And no paddles.
1845. William Fudge was a warrior. A poet. A gentleman. A family man. Until the tragic accident that changed everything. Now, a broken loner, he accepts a job that only he is qualified for. To journey, alone, up the wild and dangerous Shit River, into Deep Shit territory, all the way to Shit Creek. His mission is to map the Deep Shit territory for the fledgling United States Government, to find the source of the Shit River, and the mythical city of Porcelaina.
It was all going great until he lost his paddles. Now William Fudge is up to his neck in shit, fighting against the current, and trying to figure all this shit out.
Book one of the Up Shit Creek series, Up Shit Creek: Without a Paddle.
Available wherever shit is sold.
***
He’s a badass vampire hunter. A lover. A fighter. He’s also a talking golden retriever.
She’s just a cute, quirky girl, living life to the fullest, trying to learn how to love again while she tries to make her artisanal cupcake shop a success.
After a series of dog-gone implausible events brings them together, they team up to hunt for the vampires that took his puppies and gave her cupcake shop a terrible Yelp review. Together, they’re going to teach those vampires that their bite…is worse than their bark.
Woof at the Devil is available on the Kindle store, and soon to be a major motion picture starring Jennifer Anniston and Rob Scheider.
***
London, 1585.
Up-and-coming playwright William Shakespeare has just written a work that will live on in history. But when rival playwright Richard Greene steals the only copy of Richard III, Shakespeare pulls out all the stops to get his play back…and get his payback.
The race is on as Richard begins production with his stolen play, and Shakespeare fights his way through London’s literary scene with his rapier wit, and also an actual rapier. Even though it’s the renaissance, the Bard is about to get medieval.
Together with a ragtag gang of misfit actors, William Shakespeare is about to prove that the pen is mightier than the sword. Except he still has a sword, because a pen is only mightier in a figurative sense, and he’s going to murder all of his enemies in an extremely literal sense, in which case a sword is still far mightier than a pen.
Coming this summer: Bard Hard.
***
Melanie Strudel is just a normal girl, except for one extraordinary power: She can understand the language of birds.
She can’t talk to them, but she can understand them.
This superpower doesn’t change her life in any meaningful way, because birds don’t say anything worth listening to. As it turns out, they mostly just complain about the weather, talk shit about each other, and discuss the things they ate.
Melanie goes on living a perfectly normal life, except that birds annoy the crap out of her, because they’re a bunch of boring, loudmouthed, gossipy little shits.
Pick up The Language of Birds, wherever boring, uneventful books are sold.
***
#URDEAD
Until she found that hashtag, Rebecca Doodler was just another social media queen, instagramming duckface selfies and food pics to her hundreds of thousands of followers, spitting out pithy 140 character witticisms, basking in her odd quasi-fame.
But then the message showed up. “retweet this in thirty seconds or you will die in one week. #URDEAD”
She thought it was just a joke. Until her followers started dropping like MySpace users.
Now, Rebecca has to use every ounce of her social media prowess, racing from the fetid swamps of facebook to the ghettos of instagram, to the ghost city of MySpace, fighting against time as she tracks down the source of the mysterious hashtag. If she doesn’t figure this out soon, she won’t have any followers left. And then who’ll like her bikini selfies?
Coming when you least expect it: #DeathByTwitter.
Matt Kincade 