01 April, 2017

#SpecialFeature :: #GuestPost - Why readers want writers to be real by #Author Geoffrey Wells

Under "Special Feature" every month I feature a Special Author. 
During this month I put up 5 posts about the Author/Book, including Interview / Review / Excerpt / Guest Post / Author Bio / Fun Facts or whatever else we can come up with. Also on the first day of the month we will  launch the Giveaway contest along with the first post and will announce the winner on the last day of the month.
So be sure to check out my blog every 1st, 8th, 15th, 22nd and 29th of every month for something new :)

*** Special Feature - April 2017 ***


About the Author:
Impressions on a South African farm, boarding school, a father who read from the classics to his children, and a storytelling mother, sparked Geoffrey Wells with a writer’s imagination. Though the piano and drum kits and Mozambique led to his first thriller, A Fado for the River, his career as Art Director in advertising led him to the American Film Institute, and an awe of digital technology propelled him to VP/CIO at Disney, ABC-TV stations and Fox. Wells wrote an award-winning animated film, has visited elephant reserves, and climbed to the tip of Kilimanjaro. He lives on Long Island where he swims the open water and runs a video and design company. He writes thrillers about imperfect characters who, always with a diverse band of allies, fight villains that devastate our natural and virtual ecosystems.

Atone for the Ivory Cloud is a compelling, fast-paced thriller with an exotic international flavor. Geoffrey Wells takes the reader on an enthralling ride, skillfully entwining cybercrime, music, and the fate of African elephants in a breathtaking tale of danger and romance.”
Pamela Burford, best-selling author of Undertaking Irene.

Contact the Author:
Website * Facebook * Twitter

Why readers want writers to be real.

Readers will commit to reading all an author’s books if they can also “read” the author like a good book. After the introduction to the writer—like an opening paragraph—the reader is led deeper into the writer’s life story that concludes with a satisfying ending about the current book, Readers will review, and make their decision to continue reading the author, or find another who can pass the authenticity test. As a reader myself, I like to know something about the author who is asking me to spend time with their creations. Let me be clear: I don’t look for writers who I would necessarily like if I met them. Or who I would want to befriend. What I look for is how I can learn from this person, and whether the author’s storytelling supports the affirmation of life.

For me, learning through fiction is about finding a truth in the story. Does the author deliver a truth about me that I had not previously understood? I’m not suggesting that I look for an all-embracing, universal truth to jump out of the book, rather, I am fond of unassuming, sometimes even intimate revelations of truth. If that contract is delivered the author’s integrity stays intact. Other toppings such as experience and perspective are the cream on the apple pie. Then, if the author can juggle emotional and intellectual intelligence, I can’t wait to read the book that is a manifestation of who that writer is. Suffice to say, I will not spend time with writers who are nihilistic.

These are also the standards that I also hold myself to. I have made sure that readers have a glimpse into who and what I am through my website and blogging at www.geoffreywellsfiction.com  My full biography is posted on my site, so here is the short version: Impressions on a South African farm, boarding school, a father who read from the classics to his children, and a storytelling mother, sparked Geoffrey Wells with a writer’s imagination. Though the piano and drum kits and Mozambique molded his first thriller, A Fado for the River, his career as Art Director in advertising led him to the American Film Institute, and an awe of digital technology propelled him to VP/CIO at Disney, ABC-TV stations and Fox. Wells wrote an award-winning animated film, has visited elephant reserves, and climbed to the tip of Kilimanjaro. He lives on Long Island where he swims the open water and runs a video and design company.

Between the lines of my biography, and CV and resume, lies the story about me—the writer—who has lived through what seems to me to have been multiple lifetimes. I don’t claim to have seen it all, but I’ve seen a lot. My father’s work as a consulting mining engineer on mines in Africa (mostly South Africa) took our family to new locations every few years. I got used to making new friends at different schools in different towns. After cycling through (and bicycling to) a few schools I learned to assess who I could trust with my emotions when I knew my friendships might be short-lived. Some lasted, most didn’t, but the memories of joy and pain are with me still. And my working life was no different: going from art director in advertising to vice president of Information Technology, as I did. What compounded this diverse range of experience that I had accumulated over the years was the fact that my left and right brain constantly competed for the attention of my mind. I think this is generally true for writers, but it worried me—until I realized that I had a brain that was flexible and could bridge or merge or reconcile the creative and the scientific sides of my mind that was obsessed with solving problems.

I only began to truly exploit my ambidextrous brain when I started writing fiction. After completing my first thriller, A Fado for the River (soon to be re-released in heavily revised form for its 5th anniversary edition), I sweated the tough questions I needed to answer to develop my brand as a writer. I realized—with surprise—that my brand is essentially a romance with ecology, combined with a fascination with technology, reflecting the merging of art and science, resulting in stories that tumble through ecosystems, emotional, virtual and physical.

In retrospect, it was not surprising to me that my eco/technothriller, Atone for the Ivory Cloud weaves a story between the analog tragedy of elephant poaching and the digital machinations of organized crime in the Dark Web. The story is about Allison, a talented New York composer and coder who must go undercover to trap a cybercrime syndicate that has hijacked her website—to traffic African ivory.

In my next three articles, I will discuss the three themes in Atone: African elephant ivory smuggling, cybercrime and its threat to our privacy, and digital music, the catalyst that brings these elements together. In the meantime, I keep my newsletter subscribers up to date on these evolving themes, and welcome you to join; where you can steer me right when I veer from my true authenticity.


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About the Book:
A brilliant composer and coder goes undercover to trap a cybercrime syndicate that has hijacked her website—to traffic blood ivory. She must survive impossible physical, virtual and cultural obstacles and choose between the opposing forces of privacy and responsibility.

Allison is stunned when the CIA leaves her no option but to go undercover to surreptitiously modify the code she wrote to protect her symphony. She is deployed from New York with a savvy street vendor to Tanzania, where he is from—and where the cybercrime trail goes dead. Their guarded love affair is sidelined when they are abducted by a trafficker who poaches elephants on a massive scale. To avoid betraying each other they abandon their CIA handlers and return to New York City. Allison must find a way to bring down the syndicate knowing that she might have to sacrifice her symphony, her loved ones and her privacy—for a greater good.

Goodreads * Amazon



Giveaway
3 eBooks of Atone for the Ivory Clouds
a Rafflecopter giveaway

2 comments:

  1. Thank you for sharing this post..quite interesting!

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  2. Thank you for this special feature! I would love to connect with readers from India! Join my newsletter at www,geoffreywellsfiction.com

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