Readers Roost: Kuro-Sil Guest Post #SilverDaggerTours

In a galaxy nearly conquered by Reptuuls, one boy will change everything, not by destroying them, but by befriending them instead.

Kuro-Sil: The Book of Humans, Reptuuls, and God

Book 1

by Michael Small

Genre: Science Fiction Fantasy

I am the Chronicler, hear my story:

In the year 5027, humanity will be enslaved by an alien race called the Reptuuls.

But what if I told you a young boy befriended their oppressors?

Orren Hawkins is a boy with a dream: to make friends with the Reptuuls, no matter the cost. It won't be easy due to the Reptuuls hatred of humanity. But by the grace of a long forgotten God, Orren has found two great and unusual friends, and they must learn to work together to rescue enslaved humans, as part of their destiny to unite man and Reptuul under God.

There's just one problem: Orren is himself a drulak, a slave of Reptuuls. Can he still accomplish his dream?

Will you dare read the true story of a forbidden friendship no government wants exposed? Then welcome, one and all, to the legend of the Kuro-Sil!

"This book was so different from anything I’ve read and I enjoyed it. Small did such a great job with this storyline and plot." - Yvette Garcia, Goodreads, 4 stars

"I found the whole concept of this book fascinating." "It’s a brilliant debut from the author." - Tami Wylie, Goodreads, 5 stars

“Beginning warm up training,” the drone said.
Orren spent a few minutes practicing with the drone. It floated around the boy, shooting a laser blast here and there. Orren dodged them easily, and managed to land a few hits with his sword. He was still a novice, but a close friend gave him three simple steps to an easy victory:
First, breathe. You can’t focus if you lose your temper.
Second, observe. There is always a weakness to exploit.
Third, stand. Stand tall and strong, and never let your foe use your fear against you.
These tips he took to heart, and he had learned a lot about proper sword training in a relatively short time.
Eventually, the warm up ended, and Orren felt invigorated. “Now comes the real test,” the drone said, “Skill level set to one.”
“Level one? Who set it there?” Orren said. His partner must have done that. It annoyed him when he was treated with kid gloves. “No, give me level five.”
“Level five is too difficult for young humans,” the drone said, “Are you sure you want to continue? This is your final warning.” The drone projected a “yes” and a “no” box in front of him.
“Yes, I’m sure!” Orren said, hastily pressing the “yes” option. “Now hurry up! I don’t have much time.”
“Affirmative,” the drone said, “let us begin.” It projected a humanoid hologram the size of Orren. It was armed with its own holographic blade to protect its owner.
“Alright, let’s do this!” Orren said, holding his sword firmly in both hands. “I won’t let you beat me this time.” Orren adjusted his sleeve, prepping a Reptuulian dagger he secretly took from his bag. This would be his key to victory.
Orren and the hologram circled around each other, Orren laser-focused on his prey. The hologram was just a distraction. His real target was the drone. The hologram lunged first. Orren sidestepped it, and lunged at the drone, striking a blow to the machine, making the hologram fizzle a bit. “Ha! Gotcha!” Orren exclaimed.
The image recovered, and quickly drifted to the side to avoid the drone as it shot three stinger blasts from its central eye. Orren dodged one, blocked another, but the last grazed his arm, giving him a sharp sting. “Ow! No fair, you’re too fast!”
“You chose this level, not me,” the drone retorted, its central eye light dimming in a mocking manner. “You get what you ask for.”
Orren lunged again, but the drone dodged. He swung to his right, but the hologram jumped in his way and blocked with its own blade. He clashed with the image again and again, hoping to find an opening, but he couldn’t find one. The longer this went on, the more frustrated he became, failing the first rule.
Orren backed off slightly, and crouched down, focusing his energy on his feet. As he did, he came up with a plan. First, he would throw the dagger, then he would boost forward with his energy stored up, and slash through the drone before it recovered. He hadn’t used this technique before, and he hoped he could pull it off.
But just as he was about to throw the dagger, he noticed something hovering in the air outside the barrier, out of the corner of his eye. He noticed it right as the dagger left his fingers, allowing for the hologram to deflect it easily. Orren was in shock, and he lost focus of his energy, making him stumble. His plan was ruined! He knew he shouldn’t have set the drone to level five.
But what was the floating thing? It looked like another drone. He turned to look, and the drone fired a concussion blast at his chest the moment he took his eyes off it, knocking him to the ground, his pendant falling off without him noticing.
“Hey! You cheated!” Orren complained.
“I only took advantage of your lack of focus,” the drone said, “You forget the most important rule of sword fighting–”
“Never take your eyes off your opponent, yeah, I know,” Orren said frustratedly.

Q: What book do you think everyone should read?
A: I am, admittedly, not the biggest and more well read person. I cannot think of what my top ten would be. All I can say are either The Lord of the Rings or Harry Potter. Generic answers, I know, but they are stuff I go back to again and again. Harry Potter is much simpler of a read, but always engaging. And The Lord of the Rings is such a grand epic with such great world building that I am in awe of Tolkien's skill. For other books I enjoyed over the years, I liked The Chronicles of Narnia, Eragon, A Series of Unfortunate Events. Ranger's Apprentice was also fun when I was younger.

Q: How long have you been writing?
A: I started writing officially on December 2015. I started stuff back in either 2008 or 2009, but the projects I made back then were just random writings of a teen, and not good enough to share with anyone, so I deleted most of them.

Q: Do the characters all come to you at the same time or do some of them come to you as you write?
A: A lot of them come as I write. I came up with the main cast years ago, though they went through a lot of changes over the years. For example, Kedrik and Nalari were originally going to be Reptuuls themselves, but I changed their species so the team will be more colorful. And Krull's seven minions were not part of my original plan. I only had his stupid fat minion Go'Loh at first, but I added more to make his team more intimidating. So yeah, a lot of them come about as I continue writing.

Q: What kind of research do you do before you begin writing a book?
A: I'm going to be honest, I don't do any research. I find doing endless research too restricting, and would stop me from doing any writing. I just write what I want to read. It's one of the reasons I dropped out of college, because I don't want permission before I write my dream story. I feel like I would die before I reach a point society tells me I'm ready. That's probably not a good mentality, and might bite me in the butt in the future. But I want to write and don't want to wait until I am fully educated. It's why I dropped out of college almost ten years ago.

Q: Do you see writing as a career?
A: I hope so. I don't have a big platform yet, so I can't make it a career yet. Hopefully things change. I desperately want to make it big someday, and have my story entertain a new generation of readers.

Q: What do you think about the current publishing market?
A: It sucks. Mainstream publishing has so many quotas they want you to reach before they would consider publishing you (Let's just say I wouldn't make the cut). And indie is equally frustrating. I wish I could post my book online and it catches on like wildfire, but you have to be lucky the algorithms notice you. Granted, I'm brand new, but it's not fun trying to reach out, especially if you're as introverted as I am.

Q: Do you read yourself and if so what is your favorite genre?
A: Primarily fantasy. I love getting lost in richly detailed fantasy worlds. I don't read a whole lot, especially since starting writing my next book. But I'm trying to make time now. Hopefully I can balance my life better. I mostly read adventure stories, with nonfiction thrown in there.

Q: What are you reading now?
A: I'm reading a book called Theft of Fire. I also just finished the most recent Stormlight Archive a few weeks ago (longest single book I've ever read).

Q: Do you prefer to write in silence or with noise? Why?
A: Mostly silence, though I do sometimes listen to podcasts or music. Most of the time it's to distract me. Though I do love to design certain scenes to some of my favorite music. It's incredibly riveting.

Q: Do you write one book at a time or do you have several going at a time?
A: Only one at a time. I only have one story in my mind, that being Kuro-Sil. I don't think I can do multiple books at a time, especially when it's not my career yet. I'm not Brandon Sanderson, after all.

Q: Pen or type writer or computer?
A: Computer. Writing by hand would be too much at this point. Though I do write down notes by hand if the need arises.

Q: Tell us about a favorite character from a book.
A: Probably Kor'Ba. Truthfully, I love all the Reptuuls. They're so much fun to write for, as they're much wilder and unapologetic about it. But Kor'Ba is such a good character to write for. His random outbursts are fun, and I love giving him his heart whenever he has a heartfelt conversation with Orren. And I love making him very loudmouthed on occasion. He's big, fat, and proud of it. Krull is also a lot of fun to write. I just make him as evil and arrogant as possible, and it's a hell of a lot of fun. Ti'Ran is a likable ally, Go'Loh is fun, because he's dumb and fat and loves to gloat about his weight.
I do also like writing about Harrison. Since I love writing about aliens, changing pace to write a more serious character like Harrison is a great way for me to shape my skills.

Q: What made you want to become an author and do you feel it was the right decision?
A: It was because it was the thing I had the most control of. I don't have to really answer to anyone else but myself. And it is the most invigorating thing to write. There are many other stories that have frustrated me on the way they played out. Becoming a writer myself makes me feel like the captain of my own ship. I can dictate how the story goes my way. It makes me feel alive when I'm creating.

Q: A day in the life of the author?
A: Yeah, I don't have a good method of writing. I wake up, have breakfast, surf the internet, write if I feel like it, and go to work if do that day. There's nothing else to it right now.

Q: Advice they would give new authors?
A: My advice is that, for anyone who wants to write but doesn't know how to start, I'd say just open a Word document or a pen and paper and just write notes. You might something, you might not. You'll never know unless you try. Also, try to search for a good editor, or anyone who will listen to your ideas. I found a good one, and if it wasn't for him, I don't think I'd have ever finished my first book.

Q: Describe your writing style.
A: I don't know if I have a writing style. I think I take after JK Rowling and how well she wrote the world of Harry Potter and how we see the wizarding world through his eyes. I also have some inspiration from, believe it or not, Lemony Snicket, as I have a somewhat unreliable narrator giving his own commentary throughout. That's the best I can say about it, because I don't know how to describe a 'writing style'.

Q: What is your writing process? For instance do you do an outline first? Do you do the chapters first?
A: Yes, I write the outlines first. I don't want to go in completely blind. In fact, I partially envisioned my main series like episodes of a TV series, and write the chapters from there, changing things around to better suit the narrative. I think there should be a good mix of planning and improvising, as you can't plan everything. Or maybe you can. I don't know.

Q: What are common traps for aspiring writers?
A: Probably the world building. I know it is a big trap to over expose everything. My first draft of “Rebels of Kuro-Sil” was way too wordy, and never got to the point. Which is why I gave up on that years ago before restarting it last November. Maybe also going too big too soon. My first book “The Book of Humans, Reptuuls, and God” has tension, but it is just a smaller skirmish in the grander story, like Spider-Man stopping a bank robbery. Doing a smaller scale story may help you plan for greater ones in the future.

Q: What is your writing Kryptonite?
A: My self-consciousness, and thinking everyone is already judging my quality. I'm always judging myself, and it's crippling. And also my perfectionism. I always would go back and re edit things too much in the past. Just going with the flow and not caring about the flaws in the early stages is what has helped me finish my next draft.

Q: Do you try more to be original or to deliver to readers what they want?
A: I try to write what I think works the best for the story. I try my best to be original, but no one is truly original. And I until I have a reader base, I don't know what readers want. I mean, I do know general things, like having heroes that grow and suffer, making a true heroes' journey, but I'm not a pro. I just hope they like what I have to offer.

Q: If you could tell your younger writing self anything, what would it be?
A: I might have given him my drafts so that it could be published earlier. Joking aside, I might just encourage him not to give up, because I have wanted to give up and fall into despair too many times, so I would have been a supportive big brother to keep him going.

Q: What’s the most difficult thing about writing characters from the opposite sex?
A: Nothing, in my eye. I just give them personalities I think is appealing for their characters. That's all. I think you can write anyone if you give them good stories to tell.

Q: How long on average does it take you to write a book?
A: Hopefully a year. My current project “Rebels of Kuro-Sil” took me around nine months to write the first draft. However, that was something I started in 2019, and would take me months to write a single chapter. And my first published book “Kuro-Sil: The Book of Humans, Reptuuls, and God” took me from September 2020 to June 2024 to write, despite being a three hundred seventy two page long book. I could have finished a year or two sooner if I had a good editor or more self confidence. But with Rebels being finished in under a year, I hope I can write the further series much quicker.

Q: Do you believe in writer’s block?
A: Yes. It took me almost four years to finish my first book. And my other book took me seven years to get something workable out. I think it all comes down to experience, especially if you're passionate about writing.

Thank you for your time, Michael!
You're welcome! Glad for you taking the time to ask me that.

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Michael Small didn't plan on becoming an author. He initially wanted to be a video game programmer, though he couldn't wrap his head around the subject. But he always had a story to tell, and seeing how woke and especially anti-Christian messaging had started infesting modern entertainment, he dropped out of college in 2016 and taught himself how to write, spending the years since creating his own world, which became his debut novel Kuro-Sil: The Book of Humans, Reptuuls, and God.

Michael is a Christian and goes to church regularly, using his faith to inspire his stories. He is also an avid gamer, and has been playing video games since he was three. He mainly likes pop culture stuff like movies, tv, and more recently manga, but he likes to try many things, like going on walks and drives, and working out (though he's not a pro at it).

He is currently thirty two years old and lives in Washington state.

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