Thursday, January 28, 2016

Virtual Book Tour & #Giveaway for Average Joe and the Extraordinaires by Belart Wright

Welcome to my stop on the Virtual Book Tour, presented by Goddess Fish Promotions, for Average Joe and the Extraordinaires by Belart Wright.  Please leave a comment or question for Belart to let him know you stopped by. You may enter his tour wide giveaway, where one (1) randomly chosen commenter will be awarded a $10 Amazon/BN GC, by filling out the Rafflecopter form below.  You may follow all of the stops on the tour by clicking on the banner above, the more stops you visit, the better your odds of winning.

Guest Post by Belart Wright

Hello glorious readers!  My name is Belart Wright, author of Average Joe and the Extraordinaires.  AJE is proudly self-published and is my very first published novel.  I have been self-publishing for a year now and it has been a wondrous yet arduous journey.  Today I’ll be talking about the biggest influences to my writing as well as what I wish to accomplish in 2016.

The biggest influences to my writing is the same as most others.  I have been fortunate enough to devour some really good and horribly bad T.V. shows, books, videogames, comics, manga, and movies.  I have grasped what is good and what is bad in all these forms of art and entertainment and it has given me certain tastes that permeate into my writing.  I now know what I like and what I don’t like when it comes to storytelling. 
My list of favorite authors fall heavily on the “like” side of my tastes.  J.K. Rowling and her Harry Potter series has been a huge influence growing up.  George R.R. Martin and A Song of Ice and Fire has been a huge influence these last seven or so years.  Amy Hennig has been influencing me with her dark vampiric fantasy Legacy of Kain series of videogames since I got into them in the early 2000s.  Then we have Bruce Timm with his Batman: The Animated Series and Justice League Unlimited.  And last but not least, Yoshihiro Togashi with his superb Yu Yu Hakusho shonen manga and most recently his Hunter x Hunter series which was adapted into a near flawless anime by Madhouse Inc.  Each of these creators has created stories with clever narratives filled with imagination and well written characters.  Beyond even that, these creators have created worlds for their characters to reside in that feel very real and complex.  That well rounded approach to storytelling is something I strive for in each of my projects.

I have some pretty lofty plans for 2016.  I want to write more books, starting this year.  I’ve freed up some more time for myself by quitting my weekend job.  The extra cash was helpful, but only having one day to myself that usually got interrupted anyway was really slowing me down.  Now having the weekend to myself will give me ample opportunity to write at a much quicker pace.  Besides that, I have plans to release two Average Joe books this year.  One is a prequel to Average Joe and the Extraordinaires called Liandra and the Dream Reader.  That should be a fun read for everyone and a slight change of pace from Average Joe.  The other book, Average Joe and the Beauty, is the direct sequel to Average Joe and the Extraordinaires.  Liandra and the Dream Reader should be out before summer as a free web serial should things proceed as planned.  Average Joe and the Beauty should be out in eBook and paperback form at the end of 2016.  Besides that I am working on a new LitRPG series called Hell’s Glitch: An Escape From Adventure.  That series is a darker adventure than AJE and is available on Wattpad in rough form with new chapters every week.  My hopes for the year are to spark more interest in these projects and get more feedback from more readers.

I’d like to thank Queen of All She Reads for hosting me and having such interesting topics for me to delve into.  I’d also like to thank the Queen’s most gracious readers.  Such support is vastly appreciated.

Average Joe and the Extraordinaires
By Belart Wright
Average Joe, Book 1

Publisher:  BWright Publishing
Release Date: December 14, 2014
Genre: YA Action & Adventure
Format: eBook/Print
Length: 347 Pages
ISBN-13: 978-0986367519
ASIN:  B00R7EMRXA

Buy Link:  Amazon
*Book is $.99 during Tour



About the book:


On a dark and balmy Floridian night, a strange and mysterious dark haired woman stalks the shadows of the local college football stadium, on the prowl for secrets buried deep beneath the Earth. These secrets, she knows, may change everything including this small town.

While knocking back illegal drinks with his friends at the hallowed Orangetown Pickers' college football stadium, average kid Joe Black finds himself desperately trying to save the life of a beautiful dark haired woman after a deadly explosion violently interrupts his fun and games. While trying to fathom why he would even do something so reckless he soon finds himself entangled in a dangerous game of terrorist plots, mistaken identities, hard boiled detectives, the criminal underworld, and of all things magic as he tries to escape with his life and make sense of it all.

Joe faces many challenges from all new enemies, assassins, and even his own friends. Can Joe navigate all this danger, escape with his life, and handle his biggest challenge to date, finding something about himself that is truly extraordinary? Find out within the pages of Average Joe and the Extraordinaires.


EXCERPT

She rode off, down the street on her motorbike that was now a sky blue color to match the highlights in her hair, her ponytail, and her full face helmet.  As she drove, she thought of her next move.  She had a long list of places she wanted to visit, mostly associated with Grabas and the secrets he held beneath the stadium.  But now her focus was on getting Joe out of trouble.  She needed to figure out who has gunning for him...or better yet, she had to convince the man who hired this assassin to call off his killer.  That man was definitely Robert Grabas.

 AUTHOR Bio and Link:

Belart Wright was born and raised in Detroit Michigan with a short but adventurous stint in St. Ignace during his childhood. Always poor, Belart had to learn to use his imagination to fuel the fun he had. Whether it was drawing cool and dangerous looking heroes to creating fully fledged storylines with his action figures to writing stories about kids similar to himself with fantastic abilities and destinies, Belart was always an expert in delving into other worlds that were not his own.

Always naturally talented at writing, it took the advice of his brother, and a little creative boost from his high school creative writing teacher to get him to realize that writing was something he could do really well and pursue as a career. To this day he revels in building worlds and characters from the ground up such as the worlds of Hell Warriors, Story of K, Cyborgs and Deadmen, and Pannam which are all working titles.

In his spare time Belart tries to update his two blogs whenever he can, but mostly just ends up writing or editing. As a huge gamer he plays a lot of games online and off with his favorites at the time being Borderlands 2, Phantasy Star Online, X-Men Legends, and Dark Souls. He just wishes he had more time to whittle his impossibly long gaming list down which goes all the way back to PS1 and Sega Genesis classics. He and his buddies at FlubberKnuckle Studios are also working on several new game IPs. He is also patiently waiting for the next installment of the superb Legacy of Kain series.

Author Website:




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20 comments:

  1. I really enjoyed reading about the influences in your life. I think it sounds like a great read.

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    1. Thanks again Ree Dee! You've helped make this a really enjoyable tour!

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  2. Is there a book you love that nobody else seems to?

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    1. That's a good question Mai! I read this book a long time ago, called "The Barbed Coil." It was a dark fantasy novel that was very well written but it doesn't seem to be all that popular.

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  3. Thank you for the chance to win :)

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  4. I can't wait to read this. Thanks for the intro to Belart and his work.

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  5. Wow! This book sounds awesome and I enjoyed the post.

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    1. Thank you Amy! I am giving out review copies for honest reviews if you're interested.

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  6. Do you have an author that you can't miss there books or influenced your writing?

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    1. I have several! Whatever G.R.R. Martin, J.K. Rowling, Bruce Timm, Amy Hennig, or Yoshihiro Togashi are working on, I'm reading/playing/watching.

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  7. I have enjoyed learning about the book. Thanks for sharing it.

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  8. Growing up did you know you wanted to be a writer?

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    1. I always wanted to write comics. I can't remember wanting to ever write books until maybe middle school.

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  9. Thanks for the intro to Belart and his work. I just know that he will go far with his talent. I mean that.

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    1. Thank you so very much, Misty! Your words are so very kind.

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  10. I really enjoyed the excerpt! I have enjoyed the book tour, too!

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