All Knotted Up and The Flower Of Creation Launch

Greetings dear readers!

Here we are on October 1, 2020. It’s the full moon. A special one indeed: the Harvest and Hunter’s Moon, all rolled into one. The first one, the bit about the harvest, seems appropriate here, given that I am releasing not one - but two - new books today. All Knotted Up: The Price Of Fame (Book Two of The Druid Trilogy) and The Flower Of Creation: Every Show Needs A Finale (Book Three of The Druid Trilogy) are now available for your reading pleasure. Here’s the snazzy cover art!

This release is especially poignant for me for two reasons. The first has to do with mental health. I wrote The Druid Trilogy during the COVID-19 pandemic, when the isolation was at its worst. In my younger years, I suffered pretty significantly with anxiety and depression (so much so that I ended up traveling to Peru for ayahuasca therapy when I hit my rock bottom). Since returning from South America, I have been in what I would term ‘a good place.’ Life has had its ups and downs - I had a wonderful daughter, I started publishing books, relationship have come and gone. But the truth is that this pandemic put me in a dark place.

I know that I’m not alone in this - plenty of people have had difficulties coping with what’s been going on. But I honestly did not ever expect it to get as bad as it did at the height. Granted, there were other personal issues I had going on at the time - it was kind of like a perfect storm. And yet, throughout, part of the way I dealt with things was to write. If anything good has come out of this pandemic for me, it’s The Druid Trilogy. And to have it completed and available to the world now that the storm has passed… well, it’s something alright.

The second reason this means so much to me is because of reviews I received for the books. During my last few years marketing my work, I added a number of people to my mailing list (you can join here if you haven’t already!) As part of my welcome process, I ask people if they want to join my Advance Reader Team, which is composed of people who agree to read books before their release and offer reviews at launch. Earlier this year I added someone, Erica Jones, who I had no idea ran a book review blog of her own (called The Hearth - you can find it here). I ended up reaching out after she read and reviewed the first books in the series, Top Man: The Epic Wager (A Prequel to The Druid Trilogy) and The Hammer Of The Gods: So You Want To Be A Star (Book One of The Druid Trilogy) (her review of Top Man, her review of The Hammer Of The Gods) She told me that The Hammer Of The Gods was the best book she had read (!) and intimated to me that the books meant a lot to her… as in reading them was a significant experience.

Personally, I understand having this kind of an experience with a book. The Pilgrimage by Paulo Coelho was such a thing with me that I ended up typing out every word to feel the magic of its creation when I was learning how to write - there was joy, there were tears, there were emotions I never would have believed you could associate with appreciation of a work of art up until that point. After I did my work with The Pilgrimage and started writing The Yoga of Strength, I decided that this is what I wanted to try to do with my work. To inspire people, to touch their hearts.

As a result of Erica’s kind words about The Hammer Of The Gods, I asked Erica if she wanted to read early drafts of All Knotted Up and The Flower Of Creation. She said ‘yes’ and went on to devour both in short order, sending me messages from time to time about her experience with the books (they were all astounding). Again, the effect they were having on her life were beyond my own wildest dreams. Quite literally, I was doing for her with my words what Paulo Coelho did for me. What this means to me is indescribable.

Throughout all of this, we became friends. She even wrote the Foreword to The Flower Of Creation. When the reviews came in, I was completely floored (here’s Erica’s review of All Knotted Up, here’s her review of The Flower Of Creation). I shared them with a few people and there was some mock skepticism about whether they were real or not. My Dad joked that I wrote them myself, my uncle joked that my Mom and Dad wrote them, my friend said to me that they read like overzealous spam and asked if the author was a Nigerian prince looking to share his millions. But the truth is that I lived through all of this with Erica, a now-close friend with whom I have never shared the same room, let alone been within two thousand miles of her.

I’d recommend following The Hearth on Facebook - Erica’s got plenty of reviews (of other people’s work, even! :-P) on there and more to come.

So, yes. A Harvest Moon indeed. If you do pick up any of the books, thank you so much and I hope that you enjoy. Extra good karma for leaving a review when you’re done. ;-)

Much love,

Andrew