ZOMBIE NOVEL: 6th Draft Done!

Huzzah! After two solid weeks of agonizing but rewarding work going through the book line by line, I've just completed the 6th Draft of Deathbreed: A Zombie Novel. It clocks in at 376 typeset pages (157,000 words). What a great feeling of relief and accomplishment!

Work progresses on the book's website and I'm confident we'll meet the January 2007 release date.

ZOMBIE NOVEL: 6th Draft Climax!

Took Sunday off and spent Monday in recovery... I was up until 7am, got up at 3:30 pm, and couldn't shake a massive migraine so I took some aspirin and went back to bed around 8pm. Woke up at midnight--headache still present--and slogged through Chapter 26 of Deathbreed. Was able to insert a quick little scene I hadn't considered in earlier drafts. The extra scene not only made perfect sense but it could be seamlessly inserted.

Goddamn migraine messed me up most of the night but I managed to get over it and now Chapter 27--one of the nastiest in the entire novel--is done. Only 38 pages left to go...

ZOMBIE NOVEL: 6th Draft Almost Done!

Some more website and film production issues popped up Saturday but I managed to deal with them and get four more chapters of Deathbreed revised.

I'm very near the end of the book! Just completed Chapter 25, which wraps up on page 313, a nice barricade scene. So far, I've managed to trim eight pages out of the book even after adding the revisions in. Only five chapters and an epilogue left to go--another 67 pages and the 6th (and hopefully final) draft is done!

ZOMBIE NOVEL: 6th Draft Nearing Completion

Spent Thanksgiving eating frozen eggrolls and working on my zombie novel. Today I took the afternoon off to discuss some issues regarding the redesign of the new ZombieNovel.com site with my web designer.

Chapters 1-21 of the 6th draft of Deathbreed are now finished. Chapter 21 is a personal favorite of mine. It's also a bit of an homage to the infamous "Trash the Nude Zombie" scene in Return of the Living Dead.

Chapter 21 closes the first two-thirds of the book, paving the way for the rip-roaring final 110 pages as things go from bad to crazy to impossible for our merry band of survivors. This is where we really get some dynamite zombie action and human drama, not that there hasn't been enough already! LOL

ZOMBIE NOVEL: 6th Draft Update

As promised, here's an update on my zombie novel, Deathbreed.
I pulled an all-nighter the past two days and really kicked ass on it. Chapter 15 is done so I'm over halfway through the 6th draft (a little over 200 pages in). I'm striving to get it all done by this weekend but the arrival of my Alias: Season 5 DVDs may upset those plans...

ZOMBIE NOVEL: 6th Draft Begins

Well it looks like I spoke too soon and there will be a 6th draft of my novel after all. I began it Monday and am 85 pages in. I spent 10 hours on it Monday and 6 more Tuesday. I expect to conclude it by next Monday. Also, my editor's back onboard--hopefully that works out. She's going to pick up her edit on the 5th draft from where she left off in the 3rd (Chapter 28), then start over from the beginning on the 6th draft... So there may be a 7th draft depending on what she finds.

I don't anticipate any of this causing a delay in the book's release but it might push it into January 2007. I'm still trying to get the trailer and website done as well so those are major contributing factors to any possible delay. Believe me, if I could snap my fingers and have everything ready, I would. I want Deathbreed to be the best possible book it can be and so I'm really pushing hard to make that happen. More news later in the week as the 6th draft continues. Hang in there!

ZOMBIE NOVEL: 5th Draft Complete!

The 5th Draft of my zombie novel, Deathbreed, is done! It clocks in at 388 typeset pages (156,000 words). I'm really happy with it! Barring any last minute changes, I think the 5th Draft will be the final one. This brings the grueling, seven month process of writing my first novel to a close.

Would I change anything? Not really as far as the actual story goes--that's solid gold as far as I'm concerned. I know I could have written it faster (despite taking time off to write and produce a bunch of films and do a TV show!) but I don't think I could have written it any better. I poured everything I had into this novel and it's hard letting go. It's kind of like when I'm making a film and riding that production high. I want to stay in production forever because it feels so good to be making shit happen, to be surrounded by my cast and crew--CREATING! It makes me feel alive! Coming down from that production high is always a bummer. Writing is the same way. I've spent seven months inside the heads of these characters, watching them, guiding them. We've shared a lot of good times together but now it's time to release them into the world and let them sink or swim on their own. Hopefully, the reviews are kind, LOL, but you know what? I wrote this book for ME. If other people like it, great--if they don't then screw 'em. Based on reviews of everything else I've ever done, pepole either love or hate my work. They either "get it" or they don't. I'm sure Deathbreed will be no exception! Let me just say that if you loved my offbeat, politically incorrect films The Necro Files and Faces of Gore, you will love this novel. There's nothing else like it!

As for my next novel, I've got some extremely innovative ideas for a sequel to Deathbreed kicking around but I have a dark fantasy novel I'm dying to do as well. A buddy of mine is trying to get me to (ghost)write for a long-running men's adventure series so that's something I might take on just for the fun of it. I think I'm going to take a little time off before I write any more novels--just to catch my breath and reflect on everything I've accomplished this past year: 13 screenplays, 12 feature films, a major television show, and completing my first novel. This is probably my busiest, most creative year so far! If 2006 is any indication, I can't wait to see what wonders 2007 has in store for my career!

ZOMBIE NOVEL: 5th Draft Nearly Done!

I'm up to Chapter 25, page 314, of the DEATHBREED 5th draft now. I've significantly beefed up the zombie action in the preceding chapters because you can never have too much of that! LOL

Only 5 chapters and the epilogue left to revise (about 70 pages) and then this draft is done!

Woohoo! Rock on bitches!

ZOMBIE NOVEL: 5th Draft Update

Just a quick update to let you know where I'm at with the book. I'm on Chapter 19, page 244, of the 5th Draft of DEATHBREED. That's over halfway through!

Had to divert my attention Sunday night to write the upcoming new website for the novel. I also designed a free 13 page PDF preview for my book which I plan to release shortly...

Zombie Novel Update: 5th Draft

DEATHBREED: A Zombie Novel is currently undergoing its Fifth Draft. The editor got grossed out and quit on me, leaving me hanging for a month--didn't even bother to tell me she quit, LOL. I was so busy with production of my zombie anthology, TRUE NECROMANCE, that I didn't really notice anything was wrong until this past week. That really sucks because she was only 40 pages away from finishing her edit of the Fourth Draft...

I'm engaging a new editor and just plowing ahead with the book's Fifth Draft, which is nearly done after going full tilt on it this past week. I'm trying to add in some extra zombie action where appropriate--can't have too much of that, eh?