Seriphyn Knight Chronicles is Now

I will finish what I started by 2020.  I created this series back in 2006, lingering in and out of cache servers for many years. No more will it remain a shadow or figment of imagination. I'm making this series a real deal. Here is how.

~ ★ Zaldizko★  ~

The first book of the series, which I released on the 15th of February this year.

Paid Channels
It has been gaining slow, but steady momentum in paid channels.  Kobo and iTunes continue to be my high revenue channels, whilst Amazon barely kicks off.  Google Play was a surprise new player, which saw to some nice purchases.  I'll continue to only use Amazon for hardback sales and skip their kindle avenue in the coming book campaigns.

Free Read Channels
Webnovel, has surprised me the most with the high support from readers over there.  The Quest-a-Views campaign I have running continues to boost viewing interest.  The almost contract signing was a nice form of reassurance that this story has high potential in the Asian markets.

Wattpad performance is a striking contrast to Webnovel, and not for readership potential. Its experimental read, discovery and ranking system impacted on this story's performance. If it wasn't for recent user group competition campaigns, this story would not be discoverable at all at this site.  I will continue to monitor this site's potential.

It did receive 3rd/4th placing in a community user group awards for the Action/Adventure category this year, saving the story from being dead fish in Wattpad waters.

~ ★ Reborn Legacy★  ~

The story that started it all.  It's only available to read at Webnovel, whilst it's in an in progress state.  I aim to release this story by the end of the year via Kobo, iTunes and Google Play, continuing to use Amazon only for hardback sales.

Its performing slow with little pickup, which makes me think that strong female protagonists aren't as popular as effeminate gay male leads with sass and show of respect towards others.

~ ★ The Fourth Zaldizko★  ~

Cover courtesy of Chryiss.  I wanted something different and more suited to the readership market of Webnovel.  Aside from the title being a tad dark,  I love it.  It really matches the mood of the book with Famine coming out of the darkness.  Brilliant.

This one is also only available to read at Webnovel whilst it's being written at the same time as Reborn.  

The reception for this book is picking up pace with some supportive comments and interest from readers over there. 

Webnovel has been a fantastic story sharing site in general.

Reborn and Fourth are due for paperback releases at the end of this year.  Fourth I had earmarked for earlier towards August/September.

After These?

After these three are four more stories: one between 4th Zaldizko and Reborn, then two following Reborn.  This will complete the Seriphyn Knight Chronicles series and a decade long "must do" saga.

I will have finally finished what I had started.

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Quests for Views - Zaldizko

The Quest for Views is going on for Zaldizko @wattpad and @webnovel

★ --- Webnovel Version --- ★

https://tinyurl.com/webnovzaldi 

♥ - Help me reach 200K views. I throw in Prologue, and Epilogue Special from Leinard's perspective.

♥ - Help me reach 400K view. I post smexy short BL moment between Famine x Leinard.  Kyaa!!

♥ - Help me reach 600K views. I post oneshot of the characters in story you choose for me to write about and what prompt you want me to write on.  Note: Let's keep it clean for general masses.  I'm not keen to end up in court, alright?

♥ - Help me reach 800K views.  I'll provide some more world facts.

♥ - Help me reach 1M views. - I'll get you to pitch me a prompt for the Gat Shiem brothers. Their time before Zaldizko.   What would you like those cheeky four brothers to do. I'll write it.   Note: Again, let's keep it clean. I pretty much like my squeaky clean record. Thank you.

★ --- Wattpad Version --- ★

https://tinyurl.com/wattpadzaldi 

♥ - Help me reach 6K reads. I throw in Epilogue Special from Leinard's perspective. 

♥ - Help me reach 8K reads. I post smexy short BL moment between Famine x Leinard. Kyaa!!

♥ - Help me reach 10K reads. I post oneshot of the characters in story you choose for me to write about and what prompt you want me to write on. Note: Let's keep it clean for general masses. I'm not keen to end up in court, alright?

♥ - Help me reach 15K  reads. I'll provide some more world facts.

♥ - Help me reach 25K  reads. I'll get you to pitch me a prompt for the Gat Shiem brothers. Their time before Zaldizko. What would you like those cheeky four brothers to do. I'll write it. Note: Again, let's keep it clean. I pretty much like my squeaky clean record. Thank you.

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LGBTQ Justification

I'm still frustrated at a recent perception one person made in passing on my story tagged BL.  Their comment bothered me for the fact that it left me baffled.  Although, I could tell their intentions were meaningful and not spiteful; they were passing the comment with an objective perspective.

It also peeved me off with a feeling of injustice. Since their snap objective view was an askew logic (way off the mark) with no obvious reasoning as to how they came to their conclusion.

I could only presume it was made with a stereotypical impression in mind, and they didn't even bother to confirm their perspective as a fact.

Yes, one person can do that. As I see it, this one person could most likely represent a common perspective, which they happened call out.

Below is the story in question.  Apparently this story is seen as an incest between brothers based on blurb and cover.

Blurb: Brothers Corin and Darick Lochlea return from a ritualistic hunt to find their village razed to the ground by demonic magic. They are entrusted with a valuable gem called the Lifestone and a perilous quest to return it to the Temple of Nefarious on a desolate snowy mountain called Mount Lonely. There the Dragonieth will activate, compelled to save the kingdom from annihilation. Quests are not straightforward. No one tells the truth, especially by the power of the Dragonieth.

This baffles me to think someone saw the cover and blurb as incest between brothers.  If I'm wrong with this description and it is, someone please specifically point it out.  I can't see it.  I'm fairly certain if I removed the [BL] tag from the title. The perception would be a lot different.

I've been writing LGBT+ protagonists for years and have been mindful of keeping my characters from a good perspective and shade of light.  If readers pick up scenes they may find too sensitive, I make sure to remove them or tone them down.  Unfortunately, I have a very strong threshold and resilience to life (having received a lot of hard knocks). So, what is not sensitive to me can be so to others. I'm aware of this and grateful when it's called out.

I don't like promoting unhealthy relationships whether gay or straight. Nor do I want my readers to feel uncomfortable with my characters' relationships. Zaldizko was an example when I was made to realise that there were a few sensitive scenes. So, I made sure to tone these down or cut them out.

I can't help if readers feel uncomfortable about gay relationships or people in general. So, I make sure to let people know my books contain a gay protagonist and/or love interests by tagging them [BL] or [LGBT+]. That way, there's upfront transparency.

I've had my fair share of persecution and drilling on why gay protagonists and relationships throughout the years.  I've also been called out for trickery and not being upfront that my protagonist is gay, despite the fact that their motivations and the story progression was in the same vein and tone as a typical romance or fantasy.  Some times the protagonist just happened to be gay, but there was no romance in a story.  I still got chided for not declaring this like I had violated Customs.

This year, and last, was the first time I felt confident I could share out my stories without having to go through so much explanation to justify my character's "gay"; relying on tagging to be enough to satisfy the transparency.

So, having one person make a snap judgement about my [BL] fantasy containing brothers being a story of incest made me feel very disappointed.

One, I will never ever write a story with an incestual relationship. That creeps me out. Two, as stated earlier, I like to keep my relationships in a healthy light.

It only makes me think that there is still some ways to go to ensure snap judgements on gay protagonists aren't seedy; LGBTQ media is no longer a separate category, but just another element in a story.

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Try Zaldizko. Check the Verbatim.

Readers have been fantastically supportive of Zaldizko.

Below is some verbatim received to date from Webnovel:

Recent verbatim from Goodreads:

Give the story a go and be pleasantly surprised.  

I guarantee something different for a NA/YA Fantasy Boys Love.

Available for paid and free reading below:

★ Wattpad: https://tinyurl.com/wattpadzaldi
★ Webnovel: https://tinyurl.com/webnovzaldi
★ TapReads*: https://tinyurl.com/zaldiTap
★ Kobo: https://tinyurl.com/zaldiKobo
★ Apple Books/iTunes: https://tinyurl.com/ZaldiTunes
★ Amazon: https://tinyurl.com/zaldiamazon
★ Google Play Books: https://tinyurl.com/zaldigoogle
★ Royal Road*: https://tinyurl.com/zaldiRR

*Story partially posted.

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