Kingmaker book thread (merged 89 times)

[Brag]

Thank you, John for a generous review. It makes me happy to know readers enjoy the book. This makes the effort of writing and re-writing, and re-writing again worthwhile.


Q. Brag, judging from your bio, you have a great deal of life experiences to draw upon when writing; Was there any one event which inspired you the most to write Kingmaker?

A. Yes. When I saw General Colin Powel give his anemic presentation to the UN I could see a man under great pressure. By this time, people were leaving the CIA in droves. I asked myself a question: What would happen to an intelligence officer who refused to tailor reports to fit a political agenda?

Q. Probably one of the more difficult things for a writer to do is create believable, flawed, characters that the reader can honestly relate to. It is also one of the things that you have done well in the creation of Kingmaker. Has this ability always been one of your strong points? Or do you just sit down and decide ‘okay, this is the kind of character this book needs.’?

A. The study of people, their motivations and their weakneses was an integral part of my work while in the intelligence field. This of course helps create a cast of characters with some depth to them.


Q. Speaking of flawed characters, every great writer includes a flaw or weakness within his main character. It gives the sense of humanity that a reader can relate to in that the main character, like the reader, are not always 100% sure of themselves. In Kingmaker, we see John Trager make a few mistakes in the book, but one thing that stands out is his sometimes crippling fear of heights. What made you chose this flaw?

A. Heh. I have to confess, I suffer from a fear of heights. So I plunked this fear on poor Trager.

Q. Your book, im my opinion ranks up there with Tom Clancy and Ian Flemming. I even read a few bits of dialogue which reminded me of Ian Flemming’s work with the James Bond series. One of the lines in Kingmaker when Trager addresses the planted safari driver “No sudden moves, Im a nervous customer” seemed reminiscent of James Bond’s line from the 1962 film Dr. No in which he finds himself in a similar situation with a planted driver and says “Hands on the wheel, im a nervous passenger.” Is Ian Flemming a writer you look up to? What writers have served to inspire you throughout your writing career?

A. I've read only one book by Ian Fleming, but have seen several Bond movies. I'm a great admirer of John Le Carre. Robert Ruark, Evelyn Waugh and Heminghway. I also love the humour ambushes of Nelson DeMille.

Q. Do you have any upcoming titles you want to spread the word about to our subsim.com members?



A. I'm working on another thriller, The Gelwitz Cipher, where events of WWII including the secret voyage of a type XXI U-boat influence present day action.


Alexy, thanks for taking the time to answer these questions, im personally looking forward to reading your next book. Im confident it will be a nail biter as well!


John, I thank you for this opportunity.
---------

[GoldenRivet]

and it was great!

i made a review and some "interview style questions" for Brag and posted them in his old thread, but i think all i managed to do was bring it back from the dead

for anyone who is interested here it is.... i highly recommend this book. not only is it a great read, it will help out one of our brethren if purchased.

furthermore, if purchased through subsim's amazon links, it will benifit subsim

===============

Kingmaker is a masterful tale containing twists and turns which will crush the reader’s wildest perceptions. Alexy Braguine, obviously draws from extensive experience in Africa to skillfully paint a picture of the beautiful yet brutal continent with his words. He also displays his multilingual abilities by showcasing the great number of languages used in the book by many characters. His apparent knowledge and mastery of various subjects shine through well within the pages of Kingmaker.


A brief plot synopsis:


After the mysterious disappearance of two agents in Africa, John Trager, a former CIA agent is blackmailed into conducting one final operation for the CIA. Trager is sent with orders to find out what happened to the two agents, and report on the activities of a suspicious Russian. Reluctantly, Trager is deployed to Zengawal, Africa with very little information, and only a couple of names scrawled on paper as leads for initiating his search. Quickly Trager realizes that there is more to this African nation than meets the eye as a multitude of manipulative organizations, including his own U.S. Government seek to misdirect Trager, and play their own deadly political games in Africa. Eventually teaming up with a beautiful and enigmatic anthropologist, Simone Loriot, John Trager seeks to set the course of events in Zengawal in a direction of peace and discover the truth behind all of the masks of deception … but instead he finds his true purpose in redeeming what could be labeled a misspent life.


Q. Brag, judging from your bio, you have a great deal of life experiences to draw upon when writing; Was there any one event which inspired you the most to write Kingmaker?

A.

Q. Probably one of the more difficult things for a writer to do is create believable, flawed, characters that the reader can honestly relate to. It is also one of the things that you have done well in the creation of Kingmaker. Has this ability always been one of your strong points? Or do you just sit down and decide ‘okay, this is the kind of character this book needs.’?

A.

Q. Speaking of flawed characters, every great writer includes a flaw or weakness within his main character. It gives the sense of humanity that a reader can relate to in that the main character, like the reader, are not always 100% sure of themselves. In Kingmaker, we see John Trager make a few mistakes in the book, but one thing that stands out is his sometimes crippling fear of heights. What made you chose this flaw?

A.

Q. Your book, im my opinion ranks up there with Tom Clancy and Ian Flemming. I even read a few bits of dialogue which reminded me of Ian Flemming’s work with the James Bond series. One of the lines in Kingmaker when Trager addresses the planted safari driver “No sudden moves, Im a nervous customer” seemed reminiscent of James Bond’s line from the 1962 film Dr. No in which he finds himself in a similar situation with a planted driver and says “Hands on the wheel, im a nervous passenger.” Is Ian Flemming a writer you look up to? What writers have served to inspire you throughout your writing career?

A.

Q. Do you have any upcoming titles you want to spread the word about to our subsim.com members?



A.


Alexy, thanks for taking the time to answer these questions, im personally looking forward to reading your next book. Im confident it will be a nail biter as well!


---------


We have seen a number of attempts to increase revenue and awareness of the cost of operation of our subsim.com community with donation programs like the GWX2.0 early download a few months ago, as well as the sponsored links allowing subsim.com to benefit from sales of Kingmaker through the site.


I would encourage any bookworm, member of the forum, or anyone interested in espionage/ action adventure books to purchase kingmaker through subsim. Not only to help out our starving writer friend but also to support subsim.com and the community that has done so much for us and the silent hunter series. (not to mention the wonderful book you receive)


Thank you all for taking the time to read this post!

~ John

__________________

[Brag]

[quote=GoldenRivet]


Thank you, John for a generous review. It makes me happy to know readers enjoy the book. This makes the effort of writing and re-writing, and re-writing again worthwhile.


Q. Brag, judging from your bio, you have a great deal of life experiences to draw upon when writing; Was there any one event which inspired you the most to write Kingmaker?

A. Yes. When I saw General Colin Powel give his anemic presentation to the UN I could see a man under great pressure. By this time, people were leaving the CIA in droves. I asked myself a question: What would happen to an intelligence officer who refused to tailor reports to fit a political agenda?

Q. Probably one of the more difficult things for a writer to do is create believable, flawed, characters that the reader can honestly relate to. It is also one of the things that you have done well in the creation of Kingmaker. Has this ability always been one of your strong points? Or do you just sit down and decide ‘okay, this is the kind of character this book needs.’?

A. The study of people, their motivations and their weakneses was an integral part of my work while in the intelligence field. This of course helps create a cast of characters with some depth to them.


Q. Speaking of flawed characters, every great writer includes a flaw or weakness within his main character. It gives the sense of humanity that a reader can relate to in that the main character, like the reader, are not always 100% sure of themselves. In Kingmaker, we see John Trager make a few mistakes in the book, but one thing that stands out is his sometimes crippling fear of heights. What made you chose this flaw?

A. Heh. I have to confess, I suffer from a fear of heights. So I plunked this fear on poor Trager.

Q. Your book, im my opinion ranks up there with Tom Clancy and Ian Flemming. I even read a few bits of dialogue which reminded me of Ian Flemming’s work with the James Bond series. One of the lines in Kingmaker when Trager addresses the planted safari driver “No sudden moves, Im a nervous customer” seemed reminiscent of James Bond’s line from the 1962 film Dr. No in which he finds himself in a similar situation with a planted driver and says “Hands on the wheel, im a nervous passenger.” Is Ian Flemming a writer you look up to? What writers have served to inspire you throughout your writing career?

A. I've read only one book by Ian Fleming, but have seen several Bond movies. I'm a great admirer of John Le Carre. Robert Ruark, Evelyn Waugh and Heminghway. I also love the humour ambushes of Nelson DeMille.

Q. Do you have any upcoming titles you want to spread the word about to our subsim.com members?



A. I'm working on another thriller, The Gelwitz Cipher, where events of WWII including the secret voyage of a type XXI U-boat influence present day action.


Alexy, thanks for taking the time to answer these questions, im personally looking forward to reading your next book. Im confident it will be a nail biter as well!


John, I thank you for this opportunity.
---------

[GoldenRivet]

thanks for the replies.

funny you mention being your fear of heights, yet you worked for an airline. Im the same way.

of course the feeling is different when your in an airplane for some reason, perhaps it is the fact that you are enclosed.

put me on a nice tall ladder and get me much over 10 feet up and im about worthless

[Brag]

Bumperhoochies.

[StdDev]

Brag!!!
You ARE gunna make the meet in TX . yes?
Onkle Blanky..er Neal and all would really like to meet ya! :p

[Brag]

I certainly want to go to the gathering, meet the Gang and have a few foamy ones. It will all depend on the money the publisher sends me in August. At the moment, sales have not broken out to the public at large. Amazon still keeps the book in the Hot Releases Espionage Stories list. The Espionage News section on my new Amazon blog is bringing some light traffic to my author's webbie. So there is hope.

At the moment, I'm probably making $2 - $3 a day in royalties. Which means I'm getting poorer every day. A bit disappointing when most readers find the book very good. But it takes a while for the word of mouth to turn into a buzz.

The Subsim community was vey supportive when the book was first released and helped to bring it close to instant best seller. Now, most of the sales come from places like Author's Island, which actively promotes the book and has it as the Flagship of the Mystery section.

So I invite the few readers who come to this thread to check out the reviews

[nikimcbee]

$2 to 3 bucks a day in royalties . So in other words, I shouldn't quit my day job to be an author .

[Brag]

Originally Posted by nikimcbee

$2 to 3 bucks a day in royalties . So in other words, I shouldn't quit my day job to be an author .

Yeah, it is like banging your head on a wall. But you can't keep a good book down. Take Ann Patchet who wrote Bel Canto, a book that had a thriller plot but a beautifully written snail pace. Slowly, slowly, the book crawled into the NYT best seller list, and stayed there and kept creeping up and stayed there a looong time.

At least Amazon considers Kingmaker as best seller material.

[Kapitan_Phillips]

You never know Brag, someone might want to turn it into a movie someday :p

[Brag]

The drawing for one free, signed copy of the esionage thriller Kingmaker took place yesterday. All entries were numbered in chronological order of arrival. Then the number was entered into a piece of paper, folded and placed inside a paper bag.

After shaking the bag well a slip of paper was drawn.

Taraaaaa!!!

The lucky winner is: NealT.
Congratulations, your copy will be mailed as soon as we get an addy.

Thanks all of you who have participated. You may get another chance again soon.

Brag

[Brag]

The drawing for one free, signed copy of the esionage thriller Kingmaker took place yesterday. All entries were numbered in chronological order of arrival. Then the number was entered into a piece of paper, folded and placed inside a paper bag.

After shaking the bag well a slip of paper was drawn.

Taraaaaa!!!

The lucky winner is: NealT.
Congratulations, your copy will be mailed as soon as we get an addy.

Thanks all of you who have participated. You may get another chance again soon.

Brag

[Hanomag]

Fixxxxed!!

Just Kidding ... Grats Neal

[d@rk51d3]

There was a competition?

[NealT]

Whoopiee!

Now it's off to do the Hoochie Woochie Dance...

Where is that darned Tea Cozie that I picked up at the antique store.....