The day I married my wife, she put her brand on me. No, it wasn’t anything in the BDSM realm (I don’t even know if I got that acronym correct). The brand she put was on my heart and I wouldn’t have had it any other way. Today is my birthday and we are finally at the age where we don’t really get excited to be another year older. In fact, I think I quit that when I turned 19 (drinking age in Wyoming at the time).

Well, speaking of Wyoming, my book hasn’t been moving nearly as quickly as I’d like. I know, I know, you don’t need to blast me with the very accurate advice that patience is not only a virtue, it’s absolutely necessary to have even a shot at success in this ruthlessly inconsistent business. And I do have a 90-day national-level campaign for its release just getting ready to kick off, and those who have read it and/or reviewed it have seen in it what I see in it, but as we all know, it’s a HUGE chore reaching the masses. A couple days ago a big change that started off as a small snowball discussion of branding (advertising branding) turned into a full-fledged avalanche (and believe me, we take those VERY seriously in Colorado, both the “coming hard down the mountain” kind AND our hometown NHL hockey franchise—RED WINGS SUCK! Sorry, that’s a form of hockey Tourettes that all Avalanche fans have {shakes fist} <~that’s for my friend in Detroit who never reads my blog; come to think of it, I have a lot of “friends” who don’t read my blog…I may be on to something here {shakes fist}).

Anyway, my wife, in her wisdom (i.e. BIG BRAIN) thought that no one was buying my book because of the gorgeous cover I made. Confused? Well, it wasn’t the cover, but rather the badass-looking cowboy on it. Not a big “Westerns” market out there, says she. Your branding is off, she thinks.

I always think I have thick skin. Hell, even my HEART has thick skin (I let her brand it!). But when people look at your masterpiece and want to dismantle it, even for the right reasons, well, for me I am admitting it: it stings.

One day, captured for all to see (and yes, there’s a reason it’s pink…EVERYTHING is pink).

And it stung. But with her, because she’s truly smart—like I think genius smart but she is too aloof and brilliant to submit to biased IQ tests to measure her aptitudes; she’s more than satisfied to leave marks in her wake that people stare at and think “genius”. Or better yet, the little things—a group, standing around, mumbling “I wonder how we…” and then BAM. She figures it out. It can be a bit emasculating, I admit. But it’s sexy, too.

Okay, getting off track here. So I remove the cowboy. Actually there’s two, so they both have to go. Well now it’s just oil derricks on the plains. So to heck with it, a new cover is born. But not mine. I don’t have the time. Plus, the vision—I can’t do it. I’m getting better and better with Photoshop—even planning on taking a few classes in my spare time one day a million years from now—so for the second time in my career I pay for a new cover (you remember how the first one worked out, right?).

Well the guy we find is awesome (Ares Jun) and, more importantly, reasonably-priced. And I’m on a bit of a deadline with this big marketing campaign (not so reasonably-priced) coming up in a few days or so. He comes through. But we realize, “Dark Prairies” doesn’t work any longer for this brand of R.S. Guthrie—for this EXPLOSIVE story. Too passive. Too, well, dark. (Besides, Heath Ledger has and will keep the franchise on “Dark” as far as I’m concerned—moment of silence).

But who RENAMES THEIR PUBLISHED NOVEL??

Apparently, I do. So I have spent several straight days, including, yes, my birthday (no, I did not mention it for any other reason than to show how dedicated I am to this new branding vision).

Blood Land

That is the new book. It’s already sold a few hundred copies and those who hold the “original” paperback, still for sale on Amazon until I can “retire” them in the next week, who knows? Perhaps when I become famous (another million years or so), you could hear a curmudgeonly collector saying something along the lines of “few know it, but Guthrie’s first in the series, Blood Land, it was originally called by a different name! Dark Prairies it was, and it was the same gritty, magnificent story but as the Ninth World War taught us: there can be too much darkness in the land, laying siege to the light, my friends. And so the name was changed, or legend says so anyway. Only a few copies were ever printed or sold. Even fewer remain. A signed copy you say?? Don’t jest. Guthrie hardly ever stooped to signing his own name…he became far too much like Russell Blake for that!”

In all seriousness, take a look at the new cover in its entirety (I can show it off more because it’s not mine, so I am not being arrogant or an egomaniac, like some bloggers believe me to be. Nah, I am only keeeeeeeeding). The designer, he really worked his butt off and made a striking cover. And you who’ve never been to my home in Wyoming might not realize the detail, but anyone who’s even spent time in the Wind River mountain range, knows the skyline shape of the peaks. They’re there. On the cover. And my fellow Pinedale-ites will see it there, even in the dark storm:

The Dinosaur’s Ridged Back.

Fremont. The monster peak. With that small Wyoming town lying peacefully below it, completely unaware of the big city terror that is coming.

But it IS coming.

Finally, any of you who want to hire my wife as their manager are going to have to get in line.

It starts behind ME.

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The blank page is dead…long live the blank page.

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