Sales and Charity

This is not going to be a long post. I just wanted to give a quick status update.
It's been two months since my friend Daniel took his own life. It's been a rough two months. Daniel was, and will always be, my nerd friend. He was the guy I relied on to get excited with me anytime something surfaced for me to be excited about. You have no idea how hard it was not being able to text or call him when that The Last Jedi trailer was released.
I know that might sound shallow, but it's those little things everyday that drive home the fact that he's not around anymore.
A few days ago another friend of mine received word that a good friend of his had made the same decision and ended his life. Even separated from that situation, it hurt.
The news motivated me to expedite my plans to donate to a local suicide prevention charity. I'd been planning on waiting until next month so I could include my March royalty payments in the donation, but I decided that I would instead just use February's. Sales that month were better anyway.
In the end, I decided to go with Hope4Utah. You can follow that link if you want to learn more about them. I decided to go with them, because I thought, maybe if they'd been around when Daniel was in high school, if there wasn't such a stigma around talking about it, he might have been willing to share with us how he was feeling. Maybe he would have been more inclined to look for help.
Maybe is a painful word, but if my small donation can only maybe help someone, I'm okay with it.

Announcement

There are phone calls that can change everything. There are moments that make every other moment of the day, or year, or however you want to measure time, seem unimportant and banal.
I got that call recently. That moment doesn't seem to want to end.

My good friend Daniel committed suicide a little over a week ago.

Anyone that's lost someone this way knows how it feels. The surreal haze that just settles over everything. And every time someone asks how you're holding up, the wall cracks a little more, and nothing feels like it will ever be the same again.

Every night when I sit down to write, I find that I just can't. It doesn't help that both of my current projects feature characters based on him. If you've read Son of Thunder, the character of Dan is basically just Daniel in a Fantasy setting. The thought of working on scenes featuring him is a little terrifying. What if it's wrong? What if the words don't honor him the way they should?

The thought of writing like I normally do doesn't sit right. I know that'll go away, but right now? Right now it's impossible for me to work. Last night I started writing a comic book script because it was different enough that it felt safe. It's probably horrible, but at least I was able to work on something.

Anyway, that's not what this post is about. It's more of an announcement than anything, I just wanted to share that news to help explain this next part.

As you may or may not know, I have a table at Salt Lake FanX, March 17-18. I'll be selling copies of both Fixer and Son of Thunder. And, in memory of Daniel, I will be donating a portion of the sales to a charity that benefits suicide prevention. I don't know which one yet, but research is being done, and phone calls/emails are being made. And it won't just be sales made at the convention. Any online sales for the duration of the show and at least the following week(likely longer) will be factored into that donation. This applies to ebook, paperback, and audio format.

And it's not just me. Another good friend, Joshua Mayne, has a short story that will be available on Kindle in the next week or so, and he's generously offered to include a portion of his sales for that time as well. In fact, for the duration of the show, Josh is planning on donating 100% of his sales. So, please, tell your friends. You get an awesome story, and you get to help with a worthy cause.

Stay tuned for more news as we get closer to show, including a link for Joshua's story when it goes live.

And even if you feel like you can't purchase anything at this time, you can still help. How? By being good to each other. Tell your friends how much you appreciate them. Let everyone in your life know that they would be missed if they weren't there anymore. Try your damnedest to brighten someone's day. And if you find yourself in a dark place without any sign of light, reach out. You don't have to be alone. There is always, always, someone willing to listen. I promise.

Be Good

There was some excitement around the office today. It was one of those things that are almost impossible to actually accept as real. The street our company calls home was shutdown by the police.

We had swat, snipers, the whole shebang. A man had been fired from a company in the area and had locked himself in his car in a parking lot down the street. He had a gun. His aim was suicide.