"Released": A Book By Thomas Walker

[Thomas Walker]

7 hours ago, JudyO said:

Can I make a suggestion? Knowing the ultimate end, maybe you could make smaller stories that fit within the framework of your already completed story.

The problem isn't coming up with ideas for 'slice of life', the problem is that the formula is chewed to bits. People arrive, culture shock, they make some friends, they see the world for what it is, they are baptized.

 

I managed to stretch that to five books by mixing up who gets Returned, and where they come from; but the main character of this series is the Thousand Years themselves; and that journey is more or less done. The fact that you're thinking along these lines means that the books; and the JW literature has succeeded in making Paradise real to you.

 

There are a few writing projects that remain half finished, and I want to get them done, for my other Pen Name; and then I believe I shall return to Bible-Based stories; but not likely to the New Earth Series. At least, not completely. There will always be room for novellas and short stories within the framework; but those would be harder to pull into Hardcopy until more of them are done.

 

7 hours ago, JudyO said:

Matt, the elderly sister who loves your books would like to know when it will be released as a hard copy? I checked on Amazon, and nothing yet, so I hoped you might have some timeline? Thanks!

I have ordered a proof copy of Released, currently listed as 'on the way', but as I live in Australia, Amazon won't ship a paperback to me directly, due to local tax law. I need to route them through intermediaries; and if you're following the news, you know that the postal service is moving a lot slower than normal right now. Another week or three, at least; but it is coming.

 

5 hours ago, Leonard Match Valid said:

Great Surprise.

Great Imagination.

Investigative reality

An excellent quote for the dust jacket of my future biography, should someone ever write one.

 

5 hours ago, Leonard Match Valid said:

Wow. I would like to congratulate you, Thomas, on your dedication to writing the books. Fascinating. 

Thank you, and I'm glad you like them.

 

5 hours ago, Leonard Match Valid said:

I would like to know, sorry if you have asked before ... but are there other languages?

Any possibility of translating into Portuguese? I would like to present and present my wife and of course to friends here in Brazil.

To my shame, I only speak English. But I've spoken with a brother on this forum who is translating the book into Korean for the brothers there. If anyone wants to do that for other languages, they have my full blessing to do so, and publish the translations on Amazon, or anywhere else. Amazon has the option to list more than one 'producer' or 'contributor'. I've never done it myself, as I've only ever published my own work; but listing 'Thomas Walker' as the author means I can put the translation on my author page, to spread interest.

 

Not sure how the royalties would work with multiple 'creators', but anyone who puts that kind of effort in deserves their full cut.

 

5 hours ago, Dages said:

DEEPL is an excellent tool that I use daily for my Translator job... it's not perfect, but it's incredibly good, and it has Brazilian Portuguese (DEEPL é uma excelente ferramenta que uso diariamente para meu trabalho de Tradutor... não é perfeito, mas é incrivelmente bom, e tem português brasileiro = with DeepL)  

The only translation service I've ever used is Google Translate, which is famous for messing up the translation. And, of course, if things are 'lost in translation', I'd never know, because I could only read the 'before' picture; which I why I've never been game to try.

[Thomas Walker]

So, I thought everyone might like to know: The Postal Services of two different countries came through, despite distance, pandemic, and general strife. I got a look at my proof copy, and decided my target demographic is forgiving enough to accept the offering.

 

Submitted for your approval, "Released" is now available in Paperback.

 

Those who have been waiting, enjoy!

[Wanda Hill]

Thank you, Brother..just ordered!

[pnutts]

On 8/14/2020 at 6:33 PM, Thomas Walker said:

There are a few writing projects that remain half finished, and I want to get them done, for my other Pen Name

Great. I enjoyed those other books. May have missed one or 2 later ones.

[Thomas Walker]

2 hours ago, pnutts said:

Great. I enjoyed those other books. May have missed one or 2 later ones.

I'm so glad! Tell your friends, post a review! The unfortunate truth of being a self-published author is that obscurity is far more likely than piracy.

[Myew]

So, I finally managed to finish reading this one. It's the end of a series, one that I really appreciate for how much you have helped me to hope for things that I had not been able to imagine. The finale has left me with mixed feelings of ambiguity. There is only one way that I know how to properly express this: https://youtu.be/N_dUmDBfp6k?t=111

 

[Thomas Walker]

9 hours ago, Myew said:

So, I finally managed to finish reading this one. It's the end of a series, one that I really appreciate for how much you have helped me to hope for things that I had not been able to imagine. The finale has left me with mixed feelings of ambiguity. There is only one way that I know how to properly express this: https://youtu.be/N_dUmDBfp6k?t=111

 

Aw, thanks. You took the fish right out of my mouth. 😄

[Naruwa]

I just finished Released. So glad you included and updated previous characters, but still want to go back and reread them all. 

It was a little too sci-fi for my simple mind to comprehend, but food for thought. 

I was not surprised at the ending, but shocked at my reaction to it. I found myself sobbing—couldn’t stop. Wondering why it so affected me, I thought of two reasons. One, in back of my mind there has lurked a nagging fear that somehow I might fail to pass a test of faith. And two, my number one weakness is fear of man. For example, I can witness to one person at a door but cringe when I see a group sitting on a porch!

 Even though it’s just a story it’s very believable. So now Brother Thomas you have given me a good reminder of what could happen. But even better, to focus on Isabel. Thank you so much.

P S.  Amazon wouldn’t let me post a review. Do I need to be a member?.

 

[Thomas Walker]

22 hours ago, Naruwa said:

I just finished Released. So glad you included and updated previous characters, but still want to go back and reread them all. 

That's a relief. Some won't want to go back and start again, knowing the ending.

 

22 hours ago, Naruwa said:

I was not surprised at the ending, but shocked at my reaction to it. I found myself sobbing—couldn’t stop. Wondering why it so affected me, I thought of two reasons. One, in back of my mind there has lurked a nagging fear that somehow I might fail to pass a test of faith. And two, my number one weakness is fear of man. For example, I can witness to one person at a door but cringe when I see a group sitting on a porch!

Really? Me too. I think part of the reason I wrote it that way was because it was the most basic fear that JW's have. After making things as big and modern and different as it got; the deciding factor is something that applies to us today? Seemed like a twist worth adding.

 

22 hours ago, Naruwa said:

P S.  Amazon wouldn’t let me post a review. Do I need to be a member?.

To be perfectly honest, I have no idea what reason Amazon has for allowing one review and denying another. Sometimes it's membership, sometimes it's something else. My dad tried to post a review on one of my books once, and they decided he was 'too close' to my username, and figured it was a fake review put up by me. Amazon tries to bounce false reviews; and the system they have for that is not really skilled at it.

 

Fortunately, JWTalk doesn't have such limitations. 😅

[Hope]

@Thomas Walker -  as I mentioned in the first book's thread, I read them all within three weeks and they blew my mind!  Especially the last chapters of this one! 🤯😲😵😢  I was thinking of this series again this past Sunday during the WT lesson about the resurrection-  having read your books felt like having a behind the scenes pass. 😃  Happily, a sister in my breakout room had read your books, too... we had the best time dishing about them!

 

Thank you for your hard work. I've shared these with everyone. 🥰

[Thomas Walker]

3 hours ago, Hope said:

I was thinking of this series again this past Sunday during the WT lesson about the resurrection-  having read your books felt like having a behind the scenes pass. 

I live in dread of the day a new books comes out that dramatically contradicts the series in a fundamental way.

 

3 hours ago, Hope said:

Thank you for your hard work. I've shared these with everyone. 🥰

It's showing. A surprising number of people are buying the first book in the series this month. I'm only 'advertising' it here. JW's are remarkably good at word of mouth.

[jayrtom]

Thomas, do you have interest in translating your books into another language?

[Thomas Walker]

9 hours ago, jayrtom said:

Thomas, do you have interest in translating your books into another language?

To my shame, I only speak English myself. The internet's translation services are notoriously unreliable; and even if I used them, I'd have no way of reading them to check their accuracy. 

 

I understand that a brother in South Korea is translating JSY into Korean. He has my full blessing to publish the finished product, on the understanding that he adds my name under the 'Author' option.

 

To be honest, I have no idea what that will do, since all my works are self-published; but if someone takes the time to translate a full-length novel, I'm happy for them to collect the kudos and royalties involved. 😄

 

As far as I know, he's the only one actively translating anything. If anyone else wants to, they have my blessing, as well as my thanks. I'd love for these books to be available to those who don't speak or read English; but I am not equipped to make it happen.

[jayrtom]

2 minutes ago, Thomas Walker said:

To my shame, I only speak English myself. The internet's translation services are notoriously unreliable; and even if I used them, I'd have no way of reading them to check their accuracy. 

 

I understand that a brother in South Korea is translating JSY into Korean. He has my full blessing to publish the finished product, on the understanding that he adds my name under the 'Author' option.

 

To be honest, I have no idea what that will do, since all my works are self-published; but if someone takes the time to translate a full-length novel, I'm happy for them to collect the kudos and royalties involved. 😄

 

As far as I know, he's the only one actively translating anything. If anyone else wants to, they have my blessing, as well as my thanks. I'd love for these books to be available to those who don't speak or read English; but I am not equipped to make it happen.

Thank you. I was considering translating it to Portuguese myself

I take your blessing as an authorization

 

 

[Hope]

12 hours ago, Thomas Walker said:

I live in dread of the day a new books comes out that dramatically contradicts the series in a fundamental way.

 

It's showing. A surprising number of people are buying the first book in the series this month. I'm only 'advertising' it here. JW's are remarkably good at word of mouth.

"Word of mouth" is pretty much our job description, right? We're professionals! 😉😄

[LeolaRootStew]

I just read the whole series this last week with my Mom, so we could discuss as we went. The last book we read out loud just so neither one of us got ahead and had to wait to talk about the juicy details. 

 

We both feel a little traumatized about the ending, mostly because of the realization that the 1000 years is not the goal, it's the final part of phase one of humanity. The real stuff starts just after. It's such a long time in the future. 

 

Spoiler

HUGH AND KASUMI:

 

We were both yelling at Hugh and Kasumi for wanting to leave, shouting with joy when they successfully reasoned that it must be a trick, and left with our mouths open when they actually left. I knew right then that they deserved to die, but we didn't know if you would actually have the guts to kill them off, lol. The absolute horror of having to read that the ark doors began to close - and from the perspective of the outside! It still makes me shudder. It is nightmare fuel (literally, it gave me nightmares).

 

It was sad, but necessary. They were dead the second they left, so there was no other ending for them. If they had enough faith to walk through the crowd they would have had enough faith to stay in the first place. If they had trusted in Jehovah to make decisions for them, they wouldn't have followed their own hearts. They made the same mistake Adam and Eve did - they chose to follow themselves.

 

DEXTER:

 

I'm glad Dexter got a happy ending. He was a great lesson in what forgiveness looks like from Jehovah's perspective and ours. I have often thought about what justice looks like for someone who predates on children and never gets caught in his lifetime. They would receive the same punishment and hope as their victims - death and resurrection. I suppose I wouldn't feel completely sure of their transformation until they survived the Final Test, but until then I would keep my distance.

 

It is not Dexter's fault that his daughter died, it was her choice. The angel tried to talk her down for hours and she still made the choice. If he had been a good father in the old system, it's entirely likely she would have survived long enough to be judged at Armageddon and the outcome would have been the same, but without the blame going to Dexter. It's a hard lesson, but it's all about choice. This is why it's good to not dwell on revenge fantasies - they will likely never happen or they may even be our undoing.

 

JAMES:

 

James was my favorite character, and his marriage to Atxi was my favorite couple. I can't help that I grew up on pirate stories, so this is a dream come true for me. I cheered as he crash-landed like a legend into the Ark. His fight with the traitor First Mate and Smitty really shows that there will be consequences in our relationships for the choices we make now. I know I had the mentality that the NS was a clean slate, but people don't really work that way. People will always remember how you treated them.

 

THE ANGEL: 

 

I liked how the angel(s) appeared in the stories, especially in the concentration camps. We don't know how Jehovah helped us exactly, but we know He did; it was a nice nod to that. I'm also assuming that's how the demons knew what form to take when they went tricking people. The spirit of the air being demonic whispers that seem to be your own thoughts was a nice touch.

 

FINAL TEST:

 

I never considered that the Final Test would involve building something, but it does have elements to it that make a lot of sense. It would be easier to tell that people are passing or failing if we had some task to fulfill visibly. Of course, Jehovah could just read our hearts, but I like this option of taking refuge.

 

MEGAN/BIGGS:

 

As far as Megan and her family, I must admit that I would have reacted differently. When Megan ditched Biggs to go after their daughter, my instinct was yelling at him to ditch them all and go straight for the Sanctuary because this was an individual test. I honestly can't see myself running away from the Sanctuary for anyone, unless they were literally incapable of moving by themselves. Adam chose Eve over Jehovah, so I was having intense anxiety any time someone appeared to be doing the same, though I have given it further thought and only Hugh and Kasumi truly did that.

 

GRANT:

 

I love a good redemption story. He quickly became one of my favorite characters.

 

JEHOVAH: 

 

My favorite part of the whole series is that I felt Jehovah's presence in the world the whole time - and even felt His absence during the Final Test. Being able to speak to Him directly was the healing balm I needed after Hugh and Kasumi, and it wasn't something I had imagined for myself, but now I desperately want. I look forward to this time period. 

 

AUTHOR'S NOTES:

 

I loved the Author's notes in the book because they really eased my overactive conscience. We all have different ideas of how things could play out (we've had plenty of disagreements in this forum, alone), and simply acknowledging that helped me to stay engaged in the story instead of subconsciously rationalizing that if I was reading it I must also agree with it.

 

I have more to say, but I think I'll stop for now. Thank you for getting my imagination going. Being able to read through the different timelines made me feel the temporal length of the 1000 years in a way my own imagination did not.  I didn't narrow down different phases and schedules and jobs to do in that much detail. I now realize how busy we will truly be - we'll probably need every year.

 

[Hope]

ALL of this @LeolaRootStew - including all the people at the ending. Sheesh, that bit freaked me out for days... I still think about that entire last book.

 

I recommend this series to anyone who will listen @Thomas Walker. Your imagination, writing skills, and endeavor to keep it as scripturally based or possible are so admirable. I am grateful for your books. They really help the imagination of a more literal person... like myself. 😉 

[Thomas Walker]

4 hours ago, LeolaRootStew said:

We both feel a little traumatized about the ending, mostly because of the realization that the 1000 years is not the goal, it's the final part of phase one of humanity. The real stuff starts just after. It's such a long time in the future. 

 

It's only eternity. What's so long about that? 😁

 

It wasn't until I started writing this series that I got an idea of just how big a job it would be. To be honest, that thought was encouraging for me, because it struck me that rebuilding/teaching/cleanup was just the first project.

 

When the Tower of Babel went up, God saw a fallen humanity with everything in their reach. Imagine what we'll be like under a united rule, of perfect people, with no worries about tomorrow... and then we'll look to the universe and say "What's our next project?" Because whatever it is, it'll be amazing. Clean Up and 'Graduation' will take us a thousand years. Whatever we do next? Two thousand. After that? Five thousand. And we'll just keep going.

 

But in the meantime, reviews like this are what authors live for. Knowing I've both given you food for deep, spiritual thought; and the basis for tearful nightmares, means I've done my job. 😇

[Dages]

You did a great summary @LeolaRootStew

I cried for so many reason at the end.
Really it's my favorite novel series in the whole world 

[FionaM]

You did a great summary [mention=69748]LeolaRootStew[/mention]

I cried for so many reason at the end.
Really it's my favorite novel series in the whole world 

I must admit the ending traumatised me a little. OK... a lot. I did NOT like the ending at all. BUT after thought, I realised why. I could see myself. And I didn't like how I felt I could make that exact choice.
It's caused me to really think about my trust in Jehovah and its something I have had and continue to work on. I don't want that ending.

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