The Burning World TOUR!

Well friends, it's really happening. THE BURNING WORLD, my second novel and the biggest creative undertaking of my life, hits shelves in 25 days. And after 5 years of popping up all around the country for random and contextless appearances that leave you wondering "What the hell is he doing with his life?" I am finally acting like an adult and going ON TOUR.

I will be doing an eclectic mix of events, from the standard Q&A/signing to hosting a theater screening of Warm Bodies. I won't be doing any readings, because apparently no one wants those anymore, so don't worry, you won't have to listen to a nervous anti-social weirdo trying to be a virtuoso actor. What I'll be doing is talking a little about my personal story as a writer, "how I got here" etc, then opening it up to your questions. And of course, signing your books with weird jokes and cool doodles.

Sometimes there will be snacks!

Sadly, it's a pretty limited tour at the moment, mostly the west coast with one surprise jag out to Kentucky. I'm hoping to do a more expansive second leg after the urgency of opening week settles down, but no guarantees! So if you're anywhere near any of these locations and you want to give me a high five and spill wine on my shirt, I suggest you make it happen!

See you soon!

TOUR SCHEDULE

 

R's Rmy takes a holiday

Did you know Warm Bodies has a street team? To my amazement, dozens of people have volunteered to hand out cards and put up posters for THE BURNING WORLD. I never expected that kind of hands-on enthusiasm from you guys, so...wow. Thank you.

I have been printing stuff and addressing envelopes for the last couple days, and if you filled out the form, you're on the team, but I wanted to let you all know I decided to wait until January to actually send the packages.

December is such a noisy mess, everyone is harried and overstimulated, and if anyone does actually get around to spreading these materials, no one is going to notice them in all the holiday chaos.

So I'm going to pause the campaign and let December run its course. When we clear this final hurdle and wake up January 2nd, healed of our hangovers and purged of all 2016's poison, that will be the time to move.

Until then, enjoy your holidays! And thank you all so much for your support. You have no idea how much it means to me right now.

-Isaac

 

 

Your stupid stories at a time like this?

It's awkward being an artist when the world is falling apart. It feels clueless and crass to hawk fiction while everyone's out fighting for real and urgent causes. Whatever your political leanings, these are scary times. Stakes and passions are high, there are dozens of global crises that demand our attention, and luxuries like art can seem remote and unimportant.

I have been struggling with that feeling throughout this year. What is my role in the world's problems? Is it my duty as a conscientious American to drop whatever I'm doing and go join the political process? Is it wrong to sit here tinkering with fictions instead of feeding refugees and protesting atrocities? Or are my energies better spent in my own field of expertise, where they can have a quieter but potentially deeper influence?

I've spent the last four years writing a story that's very much a response to these times. It's not a “political" novel; you won't find cheap jabs at public figures or snarky satires of current events, but I pumped it up from an aquifer that's been bubbling beneath our surface for a while now, and I've never written anything that turned out to be so timely. Watching 2016 unfold has been like watching a bad dream come true. But I want to believe the good parts of that dream are as prophetic as the bad ones. Maybe the resistance in this story could be some inspiration for the one in real life, a little gleam of hope as we stumble toward the apocalypse.

So rather than abandon my work to go out and take action, I've decided to make this book my action. My 500-page protest sign. This isn't an excuse to sit out the struggle; I'll keep doing whatever I can in the real world, but I'm not going to feel guilty for being an artist instead of a soldier. I'm going to keep pouring my heart into my writing and do whatever I can to get it into people's brains, because for whatever it's worth, fiction is my clearest language and my most effective tool. Some people are orators, organizers, journalists, activists. I write stories.

If you'd like to help spread the word about this story, you can join the Warm Bodies street team.

Thank you, everyone. Stay alive.

-Isaac

Flammarion Immersion

Writing has been my priority for may years now, but there was a time when I split my energies equally between writing and music. I've been in many bands, and recorded a few albums, but I've been on a long hiatus from the world of sound.

I have started a new project—my first in ten years. It's called Flammarion. It will eventually become an actual band with songs and vocals and records and all that, but for now, it's the foundation for a musical experiment I'm calling Flammarion Immersion.

Flammarion Immersion is a different kind of show. It's not a band inserted onto a stage to pump music through the house PA while the audience drinks and talks. It's a focused immersive experience.

You sit or lie down on blankets in the middle of the room.

There are 5 amps placed in a circle around you.

 

Each amp plays a different signal, singing to you from distinct positions in the room, creating a spatial, three-dimensional sound that envelops you.

The sound is a soft, lush swirl like sinking into a warm ocean or floating through vast spaces. I play a vintage electric piano (Fender Rhodes) and a unique analog synthesizer (Theravox) run through many effects and loops to create rich organic tones with more grit and character than typical ambient music. The emotions are gentle and warm, with moments of yearning and occasional soaring peaks.

 

It does not go dark. There is enough darkness in the world right now. It nods to pain but continues to lift upward.

Everyone is quiet—the lights are low, your phone is off—and you just backfloat in this sound for 30 minutes. Maybe you close your eyes and dream for a while. Maybe you meditate. Maybe you let yourself cry in the safety of this melodic cloud, where no one can see you, no one is looking at anyone, but you can feel their comforting presence around you.  

 

All of this is very new and still developing, but I'm really excited about the concept.

I'm performing Flammarion Immersion for the first time at the Fremont Abbey in Seattle, tomorrow (11/13) at 8:30. It's FREE.

Just show up, lie down, let the chaos of this week wash away, and wake up Monday ready to fight.

 

Burning World slow burn

Remember book trailers? They were a cool idea that was almost never executed well, with most publishers apparently passing them off to their teenage interns to slap together in Powerpoint rather than hiring any kind of actual filmmaker with a vision—let alone a budget!

I haven't seen a book trailer in a long time. They probably still exist, but they seem to have fallen out of fashion. Nevertheless, I wanted to make one for THE BURNING WORLD. I made one all by myself for WARM BODIES and I thought it was pretty cool. But when I asked my publisher if they wanted to fund a REAL trailer, something with style and flair and genuine cinematic artistry, they looked at me like I was asking them to put on a vaudeville tap-dance show.

"We don't really do those anymore. They don't sell books."

So I gave up that dream, because it's been 5 years since I released a novel and my pocketbook is steadily shrinking I can no longer afford to self-fund my campaign. But I've been doing something else that's...kind of similar? But not quite as cool? But still kinda cool?

It's like...a very slow trailer...that moves at one frame per week...it's pictures and text. It's quotes from THE BURNING WORLD over photos that I took on my various travels. Slowly, one week at a time, it reveals a glimpse of what's going on in this story.

You can follow this slow show (and eventually other Warm Bodies content) on Twitter
Instagram and Tumblr.

3 months to go...
 

Van Fulla Books Tour

You know where I am right now? Sitting in my 1989 VW Vanagon Westfalia in a rocky field on the edge of a suburban construction site somewhere in northern California.

Why??

I am driving down the west coast on something I'm calling the Van Fulla Books Tour (#VanFullaBooksTour !) Because, see, my van is fulla books. Galley copies of THE BURNING WORLD, which I'm delivering to bookstores in order to make some kind of human connection to the people who will (hopefully) be selling my new book. Here's me with one of them!

TREASURE!

Hey friends. As you may have noticed, I'm doing a thing. I'm trying to sell The Burning World on my own little author store widget, for exactly 4 reasons:

  1. I get more of the money! It cuts out the evil empire that starts with A and ends with mazon.
  2.  You get more of your money, because I can set my own price and I've set it as low as it can go.
  3. (here's where it gets fun) I can give you things! Every preorder comes with a download of a very special and magical item that I will talk more about later.
  4. It allows me to do this referral game where you spread a link around and get a point for everyone who orders via your link. (and also for every copy you order.) When you reach certain scores, I send you increasingly rare stuff to say thanks.

THE BURNING WORLD is finished

Last weekend I read a book that I've read dozens of times already. Usually when I read this book, I get angry and dismayed and I want to change things about it, but yesterday I had a strange experience. I finished the book, and I didn't want to change anything. I read the last page and I thought, “You know what? It works. That was a damn good book." And then I sent that book to my publisher and said, “Publish this!"

THE BURNING WORLD update

Publishing is one of the slowest art industries because books are one of the slowest artforms. While films--even massive, globe-spanning blockbusters--can be shot in a few months, novels typically take several years to write, and while a film can be experienced in two hours and passed from person to person to reach hundreds of viewers in a matter of days, a book moves slowly. A book requires weeks or months between each link in the chain. It requires deep investments of time and attention. It doesn't travel virally on a surge of impulse clicks. A book demands a committed relationship. It's laughably ill-suited to the modern age.

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