A local author has spent the last ten years working on his book series and now it’s seeing an international release.
I sat down with J.N. Marlow, creator of Black Wolves, to talk about his new release and the process behind writing his story.
“It's kind of like a ten-year project, but I wasn't actively pursuing it. It was behind the scenes while I was doing anything else, right?” — J.N. Marlow
In 2016, J.N. Marlow started writing in the notes app on his phone. Ten years later, the story that started on an app is now a published work, with a second and even third book on the way.
During those ten years, he worked as a choreographer, network marketer, in sales, logistics, and content creation, and even in men’s fashion, all while continuing to type in his notes app.
“A year and a half ago, I decided to pursue it. I wrote the entire story, book one, on my notes app. It took me three months, but everything was already planned.” — J.N. Marlow
So, he found an editor who helped Marlow refine his writing.
“She was just like, ‘Why is there no formatting here? What's going on? Also, no offense, but have you ever read a book before?’ And I'm like, ‘Self-help books, does that count?’ And she's like, ‘You got to read within your genre.’” — J.N. Marlow
The push to publish came from the online reception Marlow got after posting parts of his story on writers’ websites and gaining an audience.
“One of those alone generated about 200K views, and so I was very surprised. You know, there's people reading online, like, okay, now I have to keep up now, because at first I was just putting it out there just to test where my audience is and stuff like that.” — J.N. Marlow
That explosive feedback didn’t end online, with his following pushing to read more about his high-fantasy epic, which brings themes like steampunk and futurism together with heavy inspiration from ’90s anime to bring that energy to the page.
“I like that era because it opened kids’ minds and it allowed them to be patient…”
“I wanted to incorporate a story that has so much lore, that has so much, you know, action and stories with multiple different characters, and just integrate that. All of my inspirations are combined in this book.” — J.N. Marlow
Marlow teamed up with his dad, who became the artist for the book. They worked back and forth on the art design while Marlow wrote and edited the book.
