The Newsletter
Newsletters disgust me. Multi-media marketing as a whole is something I desperately wish we could live without. Such as it is, I need a way to keep a meaningful connection with those of you who have found yourselves to enjoy my stories.
So what are you getting from a newsletter here? Not stories about family vacation and the weather and how "I've been working on the next book" every couple of weeks for a year, that's for sure. Here's my promise to you all up front: at a minimum, every time you receive an email from me, there will be a reason.
First and foremost, this newsletter is going to act as a notification service for new releases of the Incursions series. The Song, the Wolf, and the Watcher is almost a quarter-million words. It took me eighteen months to write. While I mean to be quicker about releasing the next volume in The Hymn of Humanity, I also have every intention of-… Well, spoon-feeding you all flash fiction for the low, low cost of free until I have another hard product available for purchase.
Sign up for the newsletter and you'll get advance notice on book releases and in-person events like you might expect. But you'll also get a single short, pointed email with a download link every time a new free episode of Incursions drops. Let's be honest, nothing I ever write would pass the sniff test in modern Hollywood, so this is as close as I'm going to get to producing a TV show and I plan to treat it accordingly. If stories are the products I sell, consider each episode of Incursions a gift to you all, given in order to show my gratitude for staying with me. After all, I wouldn't be here telling stories in the first place if it weren't for you. From the bottom of my heart, thank you for being here.
Respectfully,
-Alex
What's the latest?
10/21/2026
Well, friends… Here we are.
I’ve been working on this project in some fashion for almost ten years, though I finally sat down with a blank word document and began typing the first draft of a story about a year and a half ago. By that metric, time really flew.
The English program I was part of in college really humbled me. And frankly, I had two professors (one of whom I hated and one of whom I loved) that put me off the idea of writing for a very long time. Besides, the amount of undisguised disdain I have for people who call themselves “writers” or worse – talk about a book they want to write one day can’t be overstated. I lump myself into that category, which is why I kept quiet about this project for so long. I don’t like hearing people talk about things they haven’t done yet and I didn’t want to be that guy.
Some of the best advice writers are often given is “write what you know.” Unfortunately, those of you who know what I do for a living must understand I have no wish to write about work. If I get anything out of this, it’s going to be the escapism. For that reason, I was forced to default to the second-best “write what you love” approach. Thanks to my father I grew up as an avowed nerd, so here we are. At fantasy.
Many of you will roll your eyes at this, and you’re right to do so. As a life-long lover of the fantasy genre, I’m here to tell you I can’t stand most of the content that exists in this sphere. From the beginning I had the goal of building a story that was approachable to outsiders. I wanted it to land in the same way the Dune films hit for people who aren’t normally into sci-fi. Good enough to be forgivable for being nerdy.
If you read this book, you’re going to meet characters you will be able to understand and empathize with. You’re going to recognize the same human behavior in the far-flung future of this world (spoiler alert) that you see every day in the streets and on the news. You’re going to shiver at the reminder that evil people will always find ways to do evil things if they’re left unchecked, and – I hope – be satisfied with the response of the righteous, who are bold as lions.
Alright. Enough gassing myself up. Here are the technical details: This book is pricey for a paperback because it’s nearly a quarter-million words. This isn’t a Kickstarter and you aren’t taking a gamble on anything. The book is 100% complete and the first edition is being printed now. I have opted to use a US based printing company and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future. I have no interest in slinging a Chinese product. While I’m confident I’ll have them in hand sooner than projected, I’m leaving some wiggle room to allow for shipping and pre-existing travel arrangements. I’ll be at Author Nation and Reader Nation in Las Vegas in a couple of weeks. That being said if you’re reading this, first edition copies of The Song, the Wolf, and the Watcher are available for purchase and will ship on or before December 1, 2026. Buy one. Buy a signed copy. Buy copies for your friends who read and absolutely buy copies for your friends who don’t because they’re wrong.
What else is coming down the pipe? For one thing, it’s worth clicking on the section of the website labeled “Incursions.” If I’m going to ask you to sign up for a newsletter (and I absolutely am) I want to make sure you get something out of it. Incursions is exactly that.
Rounding back to the discussion about “writing what you know,” I have ignored the advice of my peers who have told me to pick a genre and stick with it. Screw that. I wrote a thriller, too. If soldiers, spies, cops, and cultists are your jam then Complications is the volume you’ll want to pick up. That one may lag behind S.W.W. a couple of weeks but I’m working frantically to get it all buttoned up and available as quickly as possible. I’ve enjoyed writing just as much, and I’m eager to talk about it more when the time comes. For now, I’m going to restrain myself from overloading you all with too much of my nonsense at once.
Sign up for the newsletter. It makes a world of difference to me. Like everything else I do, I’ve chosen to build my brand the hard way. The truest way to marshal a following is organically, through word-of-mouth and honest recommendations between friends. Buy it. Read it. Talk about it. Enjoy it. And if you can find it in your heart to recommend a humble independent author to a friend, it would mean more to me than you all could ever know.
Respectfully,
-Alex