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John Van Stry
Hi, I write books. Or to be a bit more precise I'm an author writing novels in the genres of Science Fiction, Fantasy, or Urban Fantasy. I write under my own name: John Van Stry, and the pen name: Jan Stryvant.
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Subscribers at this level will get to see what I'm currently working on. Once a week (typically on Friday - though sometimes I'm late) I'll post the current story that I'm writing. Complete with editorial notes and other markup. So you get to see the inner workings of my writing process and see the story as it develops. (occasionally I will miss a post, if I'm not working on anything).
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- Once I have this page set up properly, there will be two tiers offered for subscribers, a $1 level for those who just want to help support me and a $5 level for those who want to see the inner workings of my writing process.
Recent posts
Public post
Another Kickstarter
I just launched a kickstarter for the audiobook for Dan's Inferno, Book III - Heritage. If you're interested or want to see the details, it's here:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/johnvanstry/dans-inferno-book-iii-audiobook
I just launched a kickstarter for the audiobook for Dan's Inferno, Book III - Heritage. If you're interested or want to see the details, it's here:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/johnvanstry/dans-inferno-book-iii-audiobook
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Just a follow upI don't think I'm going to stop with the occasional sex scene, you pretty much ha...
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Blog post 6/18So it's time for our least favorite game show: Uncomfortable Truths. Doing the book...
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EDIH Chapt 10AI realized I had a few things happening out of order, so I had to move some stuff a...
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No chapter today, but try this instead?Okay, I had a bunch of stuff I had to do around the proper...
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EDIH chapt 10I changed the name for Chapt 9 and moved it here. I think after chapt 11 there's goi...
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EDIH Chapt 9Wanted to get this out earlier, but as I was at the half way point I did the first re...
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What would make my SubscribeStar better?I often get the feeling that I'm not doing a good enough ...
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Public post
A Little Something About Lost Souls
So, now that a bunch of you have read it and yes, provided some valuable feedback, I thought I'd mention a few things about the story.
So, now that a bunch of you have read it and yes, provided some valuable feedback, I thought I'd mention a few things about the story.
First, it was written before any of the Portals of Infinity books were written. By several years. The idea came from part of a graphic novel I saw, that was still in it's infancy, when helping a friend bind magazines (he ran a small press). There was a story (that I suspect never got finished) about two characters who'd grown up as friends and were now at odds (though one of them was completely clueless and didn't know it).
I found the idea interesting, though I had a different take on it. I also had no idea where that story was going to go (and never found out, I sincerely doubt it went more than another few pages past what I saw - a lot of artists in small press never finish their stories). So it got written, and re-written a few times, then I decided to publish it back in 2015. I had another story in the same world (I think it's at about 30K words?) that I was going to finish and follow up with.
But Lost Souls completely bombed. So I shelved that other (unrelated) story in the same world and more or less gave up on it. Maybe I'll put it up on my patreon / subscribestar one of these days, we'll see. I may still have some of the notes on the world / story floating around, but back then I kept a lot of plot ideas in my head, so I don't remember what the resolution was on the second story. Or a fair deal of what was to take place in the second part of the book.
As for why I wrote it? Well I wanted to 'diversify' I wanted to have a broader appeal, and back then I was thinking of being a more 'mainstream' kind of fantasy author. This is why when I wrote Shadow and then Valens, I created a pen name. Part of what killed Lost Souls was that it wasn't what people wanted to see from me back then (I got several emails about that). Though now looking back at the cover, yeah, it was too romancey. I'm gonna throw something simpler on it — that or I may just pull the book completely from the shelf and unpublish it.
One of the things I was told the most about it, back then, was that people didn't like a hero who was so loyal, that he followed orders from his leaders and never disobeyed them. That he'd ride off to exile, even though he knew it was just politics and that he was being 'thrown under the bus' for political gain.
The thing is, that's life in the military. You can be 'thrown away for political gain' and you're expect to suck it up and accept it. It's called 'falling on your sword' and it's a part of life in those worlds and this hero was so loyal, that when he got blindsided, he never saw it coming and didn't know how to react. The thought that people had lied and were engaged in far more nefarious plots never occurred to him. His enemies played off of his loyalty and so he accepted his banishment at face value.
Now he's coming back, older and wiser, and a lot more knowledgeable about corruption, greed, backstabbing, conspiracies, and other such things. Now his loyalty is flavored with not just doing his duty, but doing it in ways that don't leave him holding the bag. Not just blindly running off and doing as he's ordered in the heroic and self-sacrificing way. He's not just a pawn on the chessboard. Sure, he'll take out the 'king' and win the game, but he's not going to play by anyone's rules but his own. Because the truth is, he's playing for himself now.
So that was the story I was trying to tell. How well I did *shrugs* you can be the judge on that. For my first real fantasy novel that I wrote, I guess I didn't do too badly, and I've learned a lot since then. Like I said, it was written before I wrote the first POI books, I think I wrote it in 2003? But in either case, it's done now, and I doubt I'll ever revisit that story again.
So, just a little background, in case anyone was interested. Thanks again to all of you who read it and gave me feedback, I did learn a few things.
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Blog stuff, 04 JunWell it hasn't rained here in like two days, which is nice. The creek is almost...
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EDIH Chapt 3I should have got this up earlier. :-P I'm about a quarter into chapt 4. I do need to...
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The rest of Chapt two. . . Sean was up near the front of the column as they drove south as fast a...
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Public post
Free Book
In the search for answers I'm putting one of my books up for free from tomorrow for five days. This is probably my worst selling book ever and someone told me yesterday that the story was good, they just felt the cover was giving people the wrong idea? So take a look (if you want) and feel free to tell me: Does it suck? Or does it need a better cover? Or is it something else?
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01489KXRS
In the search for answers I'm putting one of my books up for free from tomorrow for five days. This is probably my worst selling book ever and someone told me yesterday that the story was good, they just felt the cover was giving people the wrong idea? So take a look (if you want) and feel free to tell me: Does it suck? Or does it need a better cover? Or is it something else?
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01489KXRS
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Public post
Book Ten in Portals of Infinity is now live
For those on the higher tier, I'm sorry I didn't post anything yesterday, but I got the manuscript back from my editor and spent the day reconciling edits. Actually didn't get finished and put the book up until 2AM.
For those on the higher tier, I'm sorry I didn't post anything yesterday, but I got the manuscript back from my editor and spent the day reconciling edits. Actually didn't get finished and put the book up until 2AM.
For those who wish to buy a copy:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0963GRN52
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EDIH Chapter 2This is most of chapter 2, wasn't able to finish it tonight as I have to go QA the ...
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EDIHOkay, so after a lot of thought I've decided that I'm going to write the follow on series to ...
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Friday Blog PostFirst off, I'm not looking for any sympathy here, but I did want to clear up a fe...
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WH Chapt 5I should have put this up yesterday, but I spent way too much time trying to write the ...
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