What motivated you to write The Silent Killer Below?

The British author, Lawrence Durrell with whom I worked alongside for a couple of years in Cyprus, once told me: “If you want to write a best-seller, write for Grade Six.”  The message is, I think, write so everyone can understand and enjoy. I have followed those words, and this is why “The Silent Killer Below” took the three awards and is becoming my own best-seller. It just keeps on selling.  

People, thousands of people, maybe millions wake up with unexplained back aches and various other unexplained plights and nobody tells them, it’s not their fault, their family, their job. It’s the negative Earth energy coming up from under the bed. Because American scientists don’t know how to handle or explain it, people don’t believe it.  The problem is people are being crippled and indeed killed by this phenomenon. The ridiculous thing is: the toxic Earth energy can be negated by the human voice.  I am writing a sequel: “The Silent Killer Below in High Places.”  People in authority, kings, presidents, CEOs, high-money traders, live and work in Geopathically Stressed Areas and do not realize their decisions can be influenced by Geopathic Stress. The thought is frightening but true.

Who is your target audience for this book? Why should they read your book, or how will it help them?

Anyone who sleeps and wakes up with an unexplained body ache. Anyone who has a bent and crippled tree outside the bedroom window. Anyone who is interested in the ancient art of Dowsing. Lack of knowledge can kill you or someone you love. Knowledge may save your life.  That’s the message of the Silent Killer Below books.

Are you ever concerned that the language of your books are either too technically difficult or too elementary and potentially insulting for your target audience? How do you decide?

If you want to risk getting a dubious best-seller, write insulting language. I do not, but I could. (I have a strange sense of humor)

How long did your book take to complete?

It all depends. All books demand research. Its knowing where to look that saves time, so my years as a journalist, broadcaster and news photographer provided excellent training for research. It’s a skill I still use today. Writing historical fiction provides an opportunity for great research and I always enjoy that. When my “Guardians of Stavka” novel came out, a lady who knows Russia well, asked: “Robert, when were you in Petersburg? You must have had a good time there.” “I have never had the fortune of being there, I told her.” She was stunned. She thought I must have known Joseph Stalin. “I didn’t know his parents wanted him to become a priest in Tiflis,” she said. “Research,” I said.

What is your goal as an author?

To have one of my historical novels made into a movie. My first job when leaving school was as a messenger in a studio making animated cartoons. Two years and I knew all about the industry, and it was from there that when I write – even today – I write for the visuals – the movies. Read any of my novels, and it’s mostly visuals, painting with words.

Why did you decide to self-publish?

So many authors have gone this path. For instance: Margaret Atwood, Frank Baum, William Blake, Ken Blanchard, Robert Bly, Beatrix Potter, Alfred, Lord Byron, Willa Cather, Julia Cameron, Pat Conroy, Stephen Crane, e.e. cummings, Charles Dickens. That’s just A’s to D’s Hemingway, too,

Did you use IngramSpark, Amazon KDP, or another company to handle the printing and distribution of your books?

Lightning Source, of course. All the way. All my books are also on Kindle.

Did you purchase your own ISBN or have one assigned to you by Amazon KDP or IngramSpark?

 I always purchase ISBNs and Bar Codes from Bowker.

Now that your book is in print, do you have any regrets?

Yeah! I should have spent more time studying and practicing marketing. I still have a problem with that.

What parts did you do on your own, and what did you hire out to have done?

Book and cover design have always been with Jera. When I can I always suggest a cover design, but Jera always seems to come up with something impressive.

What would you do it differently if you were to self-publish again?

Start earlier in my life. I wrote my first book – a nonfiction – on the British colony of Cyprus in 1956. It was rejected by four or five publishers, so I waited a few years, rewrote the thing as a fiction novel “Pentadaktylos.” That sells slowly but steadily—enough to have a night out once a month.

What was the most difficult part of writing your books?

I had a bunch of characters, several living in the present and flashbacks. When you write in two time zones, some 16 or 17 years apart, you have to maintain a continuity.  When the novel wraps up it is a conclusion some 50 years later. Most readers have enjoyed the story.

If you could tell yourself anything as a younger writer, what would it be?

Listen, I’m swinging through 89 and something I only learned in my late 40’s and that is keep an open mind. Do not judge because it will act as a limitation – and the last thing you need as a writer, fact or fiction, is a limitation. It will curb your vision and your writing.

What motivates you as a writer?

Life.

How old were you when you started writing?

About 8, according to my mother.

What skills, education, and/or experience have you acquired that helped you develop as a writer for this topic?

Everywhere you go, learn. Perform the five Ws. Who, what, when, where, why?

What marketing have you done for your book? What worked and what did not?

Get people talking about your book. Give free seminars or workshops. Write on a broad number of topics and you’ll always be able to teach others. I have written on spiritual lives, mystical journeys, Love and Heroism in war, the benefits, and dangers of Earth energies, sci-fi combined with deep religious history. At 84 – five years ago, I started studying Spanish to help me write about the Spanish Civil War. I’m just about fluent and have two novels in Spanish. The big benefit is it keeps my brain and memory from getting old. There’s nothing like learning a language to keep your upper story working.

Did you start marketing before your book was launched? If not, do you regret that decision?

I mention it on social media but never pay for advertisements until the book is in the bookshops.

 

How are you handling marketing with COVID closing many events authors often do, such as book signings and book clubs?

When people are restricted from moving, they turn to TV, laptops and reading books. I have sold more books during the Covid era than in comparable years prior.

Anything else?

Be on the watch for book-pirates. It was wildly prevalent five years back, but I think it still exists today. The way you find out? On Google Search write the name of the book by the name of the author. Nothing else. Then check the list of who is selling it and who is giving it away. The pirates are giving it away—a lure to get a person’s attention to buy other things. You don’t need a lawyer but there is a process for emailing the pirates with an official “cease and desist” order which they do obey. Most author associations have instructions how to do it. It’s protecting your work.

I enjoy writing. It is a form of escapism. I live with my heroes, sidekicks, and villains. Sometimes they get out of hand, so you have to stop, retract and start the trail again. The other thing: be ready to let your finished manuscript go. It’s like a parent letting his or her kid go off into the wild and woolly world. I sat on “Pentadaktylos” for years, always finding an excuse to re-write this, touch-up that.

Bottom Line: I would not have my writing life any other way, and this includes the crew at Jera. I always wanted to write a best seller. “The Silent Killer Below: Hunting and Healing Geopathic Stress” keeps on selling. It is stirring the pot of a problem hurting people and governments do not know how to handle it. So, I am doing a study (for my next book) and in the process I sent copies of my book to “people in high places” – Buckingham Palace, the White House, the Vatican in Rome, and forty others who are all having problems with Geopathic Stress. So far, Buckingham Palace has replied!  The lesson? Find something that really hurts people, write a book, and stir the pot. It works. Just write it – and enjoy and love the ride.