Friday, December 2, 2011

Reboot

So here's the deal. I'm rebooting the Grym Brothers.

This:


Is now this:


I know this might seem a little crazy, but bear with me for a moment.


During one of our walks my wife and I were discussing the Grym brothers and future books in the series when I suddenly had a revelation:

The Grym brothers should have been the Grym sisters.

When we originally came up with the idea of these grim reaping brothers, the plan was to create a more mainstream series that would appeal to an audience beyond that of the Alex Cheradon books, but still allow me to indulge in my favorite parts of writing. It never occurred to me that the mainstream reading audience was female and that the brothers have been sisters.

I don't normally write lead female characters. I tend to write what I know and, this may come as a shock to some of you, I'm not a woman. So my leads tended to be men. With the exception of OUTLAWED LOVE which had US Marshal Kate Sharpe carrying the book on her shapely shoulders.

As a side note, OUTLAWED LOVE is currently rocking a 4 out of 5 star rating on Apple iBooks with over 143 ratings, and that's just in the US.

So, apparently I have a better handle on female characters than I thought.

Anyway, back to the Grym brothers.

During the course of our 30 minute walk my wife and I explored the repercussions of a gender switch. Mort's philandering and (according to some reviewers) misogynistic behaviors, suddenly became a bizarre take on female empowerment. The concept of two brothers talking about their relationships felt slightly awkward and metro, but as females, it takes on a Sex in the City-type quality. Side characters such as Alan Gold and Stanley Morris took on whole new and, frankly, more interesting interpretations.

By the end of the walk we had decided to pull the trigger. TWO AND A HALF DEAD MEN would become ONE STILETTO IN THE GRAVE. Thane would become Avery. Mort transformed into Brooke. I changed their last name to Graves and series name to Reapers in Heels.

ONE STILETTO IN THE GRAVE is not just a rehash of TWO AND A HALF DEAD MEN. I've added new material, I've deleted old material. Some stuff might seem familiar at first, but later will take on a whole new meaning.

Even the Grym brothers themselves aren't really gone.

The book is a little longer, with more of an emphasis being placed on Avery's and Brooke's love lives. It's a little steamier in some places (Well, 'little' is probably underselling it.). The ending's even been changed.

The over-arcing plot has been changed dramatically and toned down even more so. There's still some serialization in the series. I fancy each book similar to an episode of a TV show, building to a season finale, but that doesn't mean that each book won't be able to stand on it's own.

So, that's the big news. As of December 2nd, I'll be pulling the Grym Brothers books from distribution. This shouldn't delete them from your e-reading devices. If it does, send me an email at onestrayword@gmail.com and I'll correct that for you. The Grym Brothers series may resurface later on in another format perhaps.

If you've purchased TWO AND A HALF DEAD MEN I want to give you a copy of ONE STILETTO IN THE GRAVE for free. Just send me an email at onestrayword@gmail.com with a copy of your receipt from whichever e-retailer you purchased it from and I'll send you a copy of ONE STILETTO in whatever format you prefer.

I think you're going to like the Graves sisters. I've grown quite fond of them in short time they've been around and I think you will, too.

So, without further adiu:



When a dead soul goes renegade you call a grim reaper. And when you’re in Century City, you call the Graves sisters.

Avery and Brooke Graves are two of the best reapers in town. For them, hunting down a renegade dead soul is easy, hunting for a good man, however, is a whole ‘nother challenge.

Brooke’s ex-boyfriend is back in her life and the heat between them is quickly turning up.

After what was supposed to be a simple double homicide at the Kirkland Motel the Graves sisters end up with more than they bargained for.

With love on the rocks and souls on the run, it’s just another day for these reapers in heels.


4 comments:

  1. That's too bad, i really liked this series and was very excited for the next book to come out. I definitely did not think that Mort and Thane were women, and now that they are i know that i will no longer be reading these books. Too bad they couldn't have been two separate series, that would have been a much better idea than just getting rid of the grym brothers altogether.

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  2. I've got to agree running these as separate series would be great. I will probably read this new series as well but I really wanted to see where the old series would go

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  3. Miranda, Oddball,

    I’m sorry you guys feel that way. “One Stiletto in the Grave” is still free on Amazon till midnight tonight PST or 3am EST and I encourage you both to download a copy and give it a shot. I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised.

    As for running the series concurrently, it’s an idea my wife and I were strongly considering. In the end, I just went for a straight reboot because both series were going to be covering a lot of same ground story wise and character wise. I didn’t want people to feel cheated or seeing double when they bought Two and a Half Dead Men and then bought One Stiletto in the Grave.

    A lot of the story elements in the Grym brothers are being transferred over to Reapers in Heels, including at least one of the Grym brothers. The mystery of what was on William Grym’s hard drive will carry over as something the Graves sister’s discover in their deceased father’s past. Messor & Decessus is still maintaining a strong presence in the new series and the reboot has given me the opportunity to fine tune some story elements surrounding them. In fact, the macro-story the first three books in the Reapers in Heels series will deal primarily with M&D.

    In the end my wife and I really wanted to reach the largest audience possible and that just wasn’t happening with the Grym Brothers. Our hope is that by rebooting the series, we’ll be mainstreaming it enough to grab the larger audience we need to continue producing all these great books.

    Thanks for being fans and I really appreciate you both taking the time to comment.

    Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

    -Jason K.

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  4. Oh I will certainly give the new series a shot and have downloaded each of the new stories for the reapers in heels but I was really enjoying the way the Grym Brothers novels were going and was looking forward to seeing the where it went in the future.

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