Organ

Organ

Buy on Amazon
Digging Graves

Digging Graves

Buy on Amazon
Bulldog 1: Too Many Monsters

Bulldog 1: Too Many Monsters

Buy on Amazon
Bulldog 2: And Dead Mouths Open

Bulldog 2: And Dead Mouths Open

Buy on Amazon
John-J Anderson

John-J is an author whose work delves deep into the human condition, blending horror, poetry, and real-life experience. He is the five-star-reviewed mind behind Organ, Digging Graves, and Bulldog: Too Many Monsters.

When not writing, he rescues and rehabilitates stray and abused dogs, showing a compassion that stands in stark contrast to the darkness he explores in fiction.

Releasing Control, Finishing Chapters and Struggles with Publishing

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When did April fools day become just another corporate advertising tactic to milk into oblivion, I opened my phone this afternoon and saw shit jokes from companies trying to stay relevant with the young folk by posting unfunny attempts at April fools jokes. I know big business already destroyed most things we love; football, movie streaming, reading, podcasts etc, it looks like April fools has been added to the list of things made shittier by money (Yay!). 

Finishing Chapters

Anyway, I am back to work tomorrow. I took four days off as holiday giving me nine days in total to get my knee sorted and spend some time actually resting after a tiring (emotionally and physically) start to the year. Well that break turned out to be a disaster as I threw my shoulder out almost immediately upon the break starting, had a doctors appointment for me knee pain and caught a crappy cold that knocked me on my arse for three or four days. Silver lining, I got to catch up on Bulldog 3 and managed to finally finish that Cleo & Jacob final chapter. Now I am polishing off the Sloane chapters before finally closing it out with the final adventures of Vic & Baba, Bulldog 3 is closer to being completed than it ever has been and I am truly excited for it to just end now. 

I do feel bad about not enjoying this final stage, but for one reason or another this final entry into the Bulldog series has taken me the better part of eight months which have been at times extremely draining. Once its done, it will exist as my last book published via Amazon. I plan on moving away completely from KDP and Amazon, read my old blogs and you will understand why, but in short I want to get off the capitalist nightmare train. I am looking at other options; I did try Gumroad for a brief while with some shorts but it was just unengaging and filled with AI slop (the same as Amazon now) so I felt compelled to just abandon it before I invested too much time. Currently I am thinking of approaching publishing houses for my future novels and my short stories being posted on a Patreon account or Substack - WHO KNOW, this could all change with the wind as I am trying my best to decouple from shitty organisations. I will keep you posted through the blog, as currently its my only presence, that might sound suicidal for an independent self-publishing author but its the choice I made to detach from the evils of social media.

This idea of finishing chapters has been floating around my skull this month, with the animal rescue charity I work at slowly winding down to an eventual close and the third Bulldog book coming to its conclusion, I cant shake the feeling that this year will be about things coming to an end. The work ending is obviously sad, but as its completely out of my control I will just continue to help with the dogs as long as I can until I am no longer needed. I want to leave with no regrets behind me and as many animals saved as possible, that's the goal now. In regards to the book, it feels like a mountain, no scratch that, it feels like a swamp. Like I am wadding through a bog to reach dry land and every step I take that brings up doubt on chapter flow, character arcs and structure are slowing me into drowning. But it will end, all things do, and when its done I can close the book on this story that grew out from a simple bad dream one night and turned into a three part novel series. The last thing in my life that feels like its coming to a close is my time with Angel, she is well for an elderly cat with chronic bowel issues, constipation that is treated medically and muscle atrophy in her back legs. But as I watch her, even now as she sleeps at my feet, I can see her age catching up with her and the slowing down of her routine. I fucking hate it and it will break my heart in ways I don't want to imagine, but I can only hope she gives me more time as she is without doubt one of the greatest joys I have ever had in my life. 

Fuck, lets move onto something else.

I have been thinking about the idea of control this morning, as I slipped into a silly hour long spell of binging YouTube videos I asked myself where the lack of control came from all of a sudden. I don't know if I have mentioned it in a previous blog, but I have now gone 42 days without junk food and 30 days without Reddit. Both intentional. Two things that I felt had their own control over me and had negative effects on my daily life - reddit is a negative news mind-suck and junk food is just obviously terrible for you in frequent consumption (sugar, sat-fats, coconut oil, cooking oils etc). 

What I found was that after a while, I just didn't crave the sugary shite and instead found fruits and vegetables having a much sharper taste - especially fruits having a bit uptick in sweetness. So I wondered, what else do addictions dampen, if junk food is ruining over foods, does reading click-bait negative news cycle and engagement baited material online worsen our ability to enjoy longform content such as physical books, well-researched articles and good news? 

Well it turns out, yes. I have been following a "Good News" YouTube channel for a year or so now and the host jokes regularly about bad news getting more attention because we are being taught that bad news is more interesting and stimulating. Well, his views on the videos are almost half of those that are from negative content like the shitty "You wouldn't believe what XYZ said.." videos trying to stir up your emotions for no reason beyond keeping you on their platform for clicks, adverts and money. We released control of our own free-time and our own concentration, our own mental fortitude, to social platforms and terrible social influencers who wish nothing but to find new methods of keeping you strapped into their device. Consume....CONSUME. Fuck that. I would encourage anyone still reading to consciously unfollow and stop engaging with negative news/content, it is damaging your mind.

How many times have I ranted about this now? Feels like it was recent as well. Don't check that.

I have run out of things to talk about so I will leave it here. Once again, check out my books on Amazon while you can - I will shove a link for them below. Keep your chin up and dust those crumbs off your shirt, you slippery little flamingos. See you next time.





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