Bryan’s Novel: The Worker Prince

Summary: What if everything you thought you knew about yourself and the world turned out to be wrong?

For Davi Rhii, Prince of the Boralian people, that nightmare has become a reality. Freshly graduated from the prestigious Borali Military Academy, now he’s discovered he was secretly adopted and born a worker. Ancient enemies of the Boralians, enslaved now for generations, the workers of Vertullis live lives harder than Davi had ever imagined. To make matters worse, Davi’s discovered that the High Lord Councillor of the Alliance, his uncle Xalivar, is responsible for years of abuse and suppression against the workers Davi now knows as his own people.

His quest to rediscover himself brings him into conflict with Xalivar and his friends and family, calling into question his cultural values and assumptions, and putting in jeopardy all he’s worked for his whole life. Davi’s never felt more confused and alone. Will he stand and watch the workers face continued mistreatment or turn his back on his loved ones and fight for what’s right? Whatever he decides is sure to change his life forever.

Bryan’s website: http://bryanthomasschmidt.net/

Bryan and I meet on Skype to talk about his debut novel, The Worker Prince. After discussing our writing woes, I am able to get Bryan to open up to me about his writing. Of course, the first thing that comes up is about how authors are a pain in the arse, like to make trouble, and are total divas. This is, in fact, very, very true. Just an FYI for all you non-authors out there. And if you are an author and aren’t causing trouble, you’re doing it wrong. Also, studies show hats only worsen a receding hairline. Not that that has anything to do with Bryan or his writing.

Back on track. Kind of. After many jokes about hairy situations and something about a general surgeon, we finally get back on track, amazingly enough. Bryan was first introduced to the publishing world via the Digital Dragon ezine, where his serial of space opera stories were published. Four publishers then asked to read his novel that he’d finished. They wined and dined him, but in the end it was Diminished Media Group who signed Bryan. He continues to write short stories for the ezine, plans to add two more novels to his space opera series, while at the same time writing an urban fantasy, one of my favorite kind of novels to read. Cue happy dancing.

On another note, it’s that time of year again, and I don’t mean Halloween, Thanksgiving, or Christmas. No, I mean NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month). I ask Bryan if he would be signing up for it this year, in which he replies, “not officially,” but he thought about writing the urban fantasy during the month of November. In response, I tell him he should sign up for motivation’s sake. (“Be looking out for new NaNoWriMo posts from me during the month of November,” I say.)

Back to Bryan, who tells me he is currently in a professional writing workshop, as am I. Since we are both horrible at keeping the conversation about his writing, we decide it would be fun to make fun of Laura. This isn’t unusual for people to do; I should have expected it. After informing him of being abused in my workshop, he lets me in on what people are really thinking: “So, Laura’s scene here sucks. Let’s all rewrite it and make it better . . . GO!” My response? “Bite me.” This brings us to the conclusion that, as authors, we usually must cut what we love the most in our writing. So that random scene you just had to have is actually something that can be cut completely. It’s sad, really.

Right, right. Let’s get back to Bryan and his genius. After all of our kidding around, we are finally able to be serious (for about two minutes, mind you). Bryan talks of his writing by saying, “I seem to have poured through my life chaos, all my emotional realities into the scenes of [The Worker Prince], so emotionally it’s really real and powerful to read. The angry scenes, the sad scenes, the romantic scenes, all have this edge of realness from what I pulled out of my emotional life. So that’s interesting.”

Indeed, that is interesting. I inform Bryan, “You know, artists always feel more strongly and deeper than normal people.”

Agreeing, Bryan says, “Yes, we do feel deeply, which makes us passionate and powerful to deal with in emotional situations.” What we’re trying to say is, man or woman, we PMS like a mother when we get all emotional. BEWARE! You’ve been warned.

After many jokes about Fabio (trust me, you don’t want to know), Bryan tells me he wrote The Worker Prince for families to be able to enjoy together. “I really miss the days when families could share books and wanted to give that experience,” he explains. Bryan goes on to inform me he will be turning in the second book in this series at the beginning of November and to be prepared for improvement in his writing. After hearing such wonderful things about the first, I suspect book two will blow everyone away. On that note, I’d like to thank Bryan for giving me the inside scoop. Now go buy The Worker Prince today!

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