A catch up on various projects I’m working on:
I Have A New Website!
You can check it out at michaelbarronauthor.com, where you can also sign up for my monthly newsletter. The newsletter will (more or less) take the place of my blog, but I still plan on using this space every once in a while for big news.
I’m also on Blue Sky @barronauthor.bsky.social.
“Patches Rebellion”
My comic PATCHES REBELLION will appear in the “Blood Coven Moon Magic Anthology” later this year. The story follows a teddy bear who decides it’s time he rise up and lead the other toys in a rebellion against their “sadistic” four-year-old owner. This story was a lot of fun to write. After I got the initial idea it more or less wrote itself.
The comic (and the image below) was illustrated by Jack Van Thomme.
“The Year Skyler Richards Ruined Christmas”
This pseudo horror short story (I’ve described it as being like horror the way a hot dog is like a sandwich) will appear in the Rebllion LIT anthology “Three X The Fun” later this spring. I will definitely share the link when it’s available.
This was another story that was lots of fun to write. It starts off with a very minor/petty family conflict that leads to a bigger conflict and then to a BIGGER conflict until a family holiday goes about as wrong as any holiday can go. It’s one of the funnier stories I’ve written and one of the very few in which nothing supernatural takes place.
“The Secret Lives Of Demon Hunters”
This 24-page one-shot horror comic follows a pair of professional demon hunters who must not only must face a supernatural force that means to destroy them but must also face the demons of their own marriage as they try to save their relationship.
The script has been written, edited, read by a lot of beta readers, and edited some more. The ending was a tough nut to crack and I went through a lot of versions, but I’m very happy with where I ended up. I’m currently searching for an illustrator who has experience in sequential art.
“Edge Country”
My novel follows a woman who much journey back to a magical world she visited as a child to rescue her little sister who has been trapped there for over twenty years.
This past month I started submitting my query letter to agents. I’ve already had some positive results, but I don’t want to jinx anything so I’ll leave it at that.
New Project
May has been light on creative writing. I’ve mostly been working on my new website, searching for illustrators, focusing on Edge Country’s query letters and (honestly) been trying to catch on rest and reading. However in early June I’m planning to continue a new novel that’s been brewing around inside my head for quite a while. I’m very excited about this one. While what I’ve written is very much in the rough draft stages I already love the characters and I can see this becoming something I’ll be very proud of.
Writing Advice
So I recently got some pretty harsh feedback regarding one of my projects. What made it worse was it came from someone I respected and what it made it even worse than that was I knew they were absolutely right. At first following their advice seemed like it would involve completely reworking the project and starting over from scratch. However I (fortunately) stopped myself from working on it for the next couple of days, let myself take a very deep breath and when I returned to the project I read over their advice again, and took the spirit of the comments rather than the actual words. I made a very brief outline that helped me determine a way to follow the feedback while changing as little of the rest of the project as possible. When I gave the beta reader my next draft, they absolutely loved it.
So in short: when you get overwhelming feedback just take a deep breath, maybe use an outline and try to accomplish what the feedback is saying without changing too much of the rest of your project.
Life Stuff
2025 hasn’t been the easiest of years so far. First of all there’s: *Motions to the world as a whole* but also my wife has been facing multiple health issues. Fortunately none of them are super serious and with luck they won’t affect her in the long-run. At the same, she’s had a rough time of it these past few months. Please send healthy vibes in her direction.
And finally…
…for absolutely no reason, here’s a photo of my cat watching Star Trek: Lower Decks:
