Premortal | by Damien Passmore

About the Author

It seems that it is easier to write a novel than it is to write about yourself, self-promotion (or even self-description) not necessarily being a favourite of mine. Nevertheless, for those who may be interested, let me start with those things that mean the most to me.

I am married to a wonderful woman, Lisa, and have four beautiful children (Mitchell, Chelsea, Erin & Kendyl, who has only recently joined us). We live in Maitland, New South Wales which is a semi-rural community situated approximately two hours drive north of Sydney, Australia.

Those five individuals are my life and everything else is secondary to them.

By profession I am a financial adviser and, prior to that, was an accountant. Not an author’s natural breeding ground to be sure. So I guess this begs the question as to what motivated me to write my first novel.

I can’t say that writing a novel was something that I had always wanted to do, occupying an ever present place upon my personal bucket list. Rather, it was something that came upon me all of a sudden. It was as though this realisation came to me as ‘you should write a novel’ rather than ‘I might write a novel’ or ‘maybe one day I’ll write a novel’. Having received the urge in this manner, it became something I knew that I must achieve, rather than being something I would like to achieve. This was fortunate because getting to this point has been a long (five years) and arduous journey, and I don’t think that ‘might’ or ‘maybe one day’ would have been sufficient to bring me to this juncture.

While being wonderfully supportive of almost everything I’ve ever done, to say that Lisa has been supportive of this project would fail to put you in possession of the facts. Until recently, she seems to have thought that this was my rather lame attempt at a mid-life crisis, and was certain that it wouldn’t amount to anything.

My older children (Mitchell, 15 and Chelsea, 13) were equally certain that my lofty aspirations would not amount to anything.

For this reason, it has been necessary for me to take on this project very slowly, so as not to disrupt, to any great extent, the normal ebb and flow of an already busy family life. This, coupled with the fact that I was in no position to give up my day job, have culminated in the protracted five year turnaround time to write and publish Premortal, the first book in the Premortal Series.

Notwithstanding this lack of initial support, I’m glad to report that in recent times each of my most precious detractors have begun the thawing process and their icy stance is softening. Mitchell has recently read the book and went so far as to give it a rating of four out of five. The target age of the novel is fifteen and upwards, so it is too early for Chelsea to read it, however I think that she has taken heart that her brother is now an advocate. Lisa, who is bound to be my hardest convert, has just started the book so we will see where that goes….

As a writer I have absolutely no pedigree aside from a love of reading and a love of all books, particularly fantasy fiction. I have no English degree or major, and at the time of writing this brief personal introduction I have not won any prize in the field of writing.

Recently, I entered my first competition with Premortal (the Los Angeles Book Festival) and was pleasantly surprised to receive an honourable mention. I have now entered the book in several more competitions and anxiously await the results. I’ll keep you posted via the blog if there are any exciting developments on this front, as I plan to leave this section of the website unchanged, regardless of my success or otherwise, such that it will remain as an authentic starting point for my journey from the point of publication of the first book in the Premortal series.

To tell you a little more of myself, I was born in South Africa and emigrated with my mother and father at the tender age of four, such that I consider myself an Aussie in every respect. I come from a mix and match family with one brother, one step-brother, two half-brothers, two step-sisters and three half-sisters. The divorce and remarriages occurred while I was young, such that I consider each step and half-brother and sister to be as much a brother or sister as they could possibly be.

Although he has never written a novel, my father was a wonderful story teller and, though I have only been back once, I still feel that I have some understanding of South African culture and I have a soft spot for both the people and the quirky accent. If I had a wish it would be to one-day have finances to start some kind of work to assist the underprivileged in South Africa, as the divide between the have and have nots appears broad.

That is more than enough about me as it is too early to tell whether the Premortal Series will be successful enough for anyone to care.

In regard to the series, I have plans for four more novels and the plan is to release one each year, starting with ‘The Fall’ in 2016.

While one novel per year may appear a lofty goal for a person who has just taken five years to complete his first, I have learnt so much over the course of the past year that I’m sure that I’ll make comparatively short work of the future books…..

Anyway, I really hope that you enjoy the journey the series takes you on!

Blog

Contact the author

Hi guys, The ‘contact’ section of this website is not currently functioning. Should you wish to contact us the email is premortalseries@gmail.com

Character release

Masias character reveal now up! Next release up in a month.

Wattpad release

Chapter two is now available on Wattpad!

Exciting FREE offer on Kindle kicking off within the next six or so hours. Will last for one day only so take advantage!

All good things have to come to an end

Unfortunately the huge price discount on Premortal has now come to an end. Please note that introductory pricing of $2.99 for the Kindle version still applies which is great value.

Exciting price discount

For the next month the price of Premortal on Kindle has been slashed to 0.99c. This is an 80% discount on the retail price of $4.99. The cost of the paperback has also been reduced by 20% to $14.49. Note: above prices are in US dollars.

Hollywood Book Festival Result!

We are pleased to announce that ‘Premortal’ has received an ‘Honourable Mention’ in the Hollywood Book Festival. Check out the ‘Awards’ section of the website to see all of the results from the various book competitions entered.

Character release – Ham

We are now well into the Character releases with the fourth character, Ham, released this week. Enjoy!

New York Book Festival Result

Premortal has received an ‘Honourable Mention’ in the general fiction division of the New York book awards.

Character release – Michael

The character releases have now commenced, the first being Michael. Head to the ‘characters’ section of the website to check it out.

New York Book Festival

After quite a severe surfing accident, that saw me emerge from the water with a forehead wound that required 28 stitches, I’m back on deck. This week the winners of the New York Book Festival are announced. A good result in that competition would be wonderful so fingers crossed!

Winner!

We are excited to inform you that yesterday ‘Premortal’ was announced the fantasy fiction winner of San Francisco’s ‘Beach Book Festival’! This week has been a big one for competitions and after securing an ‘honourable mention’ in both the Paris and San Francisco book festivals, it is very exciting to have taken the top fantasy […]

Amsterdam Book Festival Result

Hi All, The award recipients of the Amsterdam Book Festival were announced today and I’m pleased to advise that Premortal has received an ‘honourable mention’ in the highly competitive fiction division. The competition receives entries from all over the world (in several languages) so to receive this recognition is very pleasing. There are a number of other competitions […]

Welcome to my first blog

Welcome to my first blog. The primary purpose of this section is to let you know how the Premortal Series is progressing, both in terms of its physical delivery (the release date of future novels) and also its success. This week and next should be exciting as ‘Premortal’ has been entered into a number of book festivals […]

Introduction from HP Productions

Introduction from HP Productions: Welcome to ‘Premortal’ the first novel in a series of five books that will blow your mind. Premortal is a unique fantasy fiction novel that explores life before living. Although set in a time and place that you cannot remember, once launched into this alternate reality you will become so enchanted by it […]