Happy New Year Everyone!

I finished several book projects in 2025. I completed Alien Times Series trilogy with Book 3, Retribution. I completed the audiobook version for Book 3 as well. I decided to create a KDP audiobook for Alien Times - Book 1, on Amazon to see how it compares to Google Play Audiobook. It was easy to create in KDP, but it only allows limited editing functions for now. The virtual voice choices are great, and I am pleased with the results. I plan to do more ebooks in the future using KDP audiobook tool. 

My writing plans for 2026 will include creating more audiobooks which I use to edit my earlier ebooks until I complete most of them. Then, I plan to write a prequel novella for Alien Times Series to use as a promotion tool. This will keep be plenty busy for the year.

My newest hobby is writing TV movie scripts for some of my novels. I took a beginning community college course on screenwriting to learn the basics. I bought Final Draft 13 and began my first script for my novella, G's Story. I thought a short story would be easy to convert. I soon learned there are many differences in writing novels versus scripts including the language needed, flow, action scenes, dialogue, present tense changes and more. It took me several months to cut the book chapters down to 26 Scenes/Beats, 3 Acts and less than 120 pages to qualify for screenwriting contests.

I finished my first script in December and have begun submitting the script to film festivals providing FilmFreeway pdf copies, Final Draft script files and adding a Screenplayer audio only script file for contest submissions. It's too early to see what happens, but it's a fun hobby if I don't spend too much money on future contests.

If you are interested in listening to the audio script, here is a link to Screenplayer: 
www.screenplayer.ai/screenplay-shared/cmjsw8lfg0559u028e26bh1st_share

Let me know what you think. I plan to work on my next screenwriter script in the summer using my full novel, The Formula. It will be challenging. I think this novel will generate more interest for TV movie producers.

The Holiday Season is upon us. This is the month I promote all of my books on as many sites as possible. I am always looking for new promotion sites for indie authors such as myself. Not many of them do as well as I hope for, but I keep trying to expand my reader base.

I am participating in the increasingly popular promo, Smashwords End of Year Sale, by offering a discount of 50% off all my books. The sale goes through January 1, 2026. Here is a link to my books: ​www.smashwords.com/profile/view/donviecelli

I am also participating in a new Bargain Booksy Win A Free Kindle promotion by giving away my ebook, Alien Times Series, in order to add new subscribers to my Newsletter. Here is the link: Science Fiction eBook and Kindle Giveaway – December 1st 2025 – Bargain Booksy
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​My writing plans for 2026 include creating Google Play Audiobooks for my Nanomachine War series of books and others as time permits. I plan to complete my first book-to-script for screenplay submissions. I also plan to write a prequel novella for my new Alien Times series Book 1. So far, my writing only serves as a rewarding hobby until I create a bestseller.

Interesting sidenote, one of my books was used to train Anthropic's AI and is subject to a lawsuit settlement payment. It appears they copied over 450,000 ebooks with copyright protection without approval. More lawsuits are in process with other AI companies. It pays to copyright your books as soon as they are written.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all!

I completed my first draft of my third book, Alien Times - Book 3, Retribution. It took longer than I wanted because of my volunteer work, and I could not decide what path to take to with the aliens in the story. Everything worked out in the end once I settled on a major plot theme that dealt with our West Antarctic Ice Sheet. It seems we are all faced with the possibility of the Thwaites Ice Sheet collapsing in our lifetime due to global warming. My whole series uses the climate crises as major reasons why the aliens are so concerned about what humans are doing to the planet. I hope I brought the climate crises to life in my series and what possible effects it will have on our planet if we continue to ignore the signs.

I plan to release Book 3 as a Preorder in August and release for sale in September. I will have all book formats available as well as an audiobook version. This will complete my fourth trilogy. I will work on spinoff stories going forward unless something special grabs my attention. I started writing in 2001 and am reasonably happy with my writing experience so far. I dreamed of being a writer since I was in middle school sharing stories with a friend in fourth grade. 

As a side project, I decided to learn how to write screenplay scripts and used Final Draft 13 software to convert one of my short stories, G's Story, to a script. I took an online course at my local Community College on screenwriting. I completed the draft and now must edit out all the novel descriptions that are unnecessary for the script. It is a totally different way of writing for a novelist, but I think I can do what is required. My end goal is to convert my full-length story, The Formula, into a script for submission purposes. I hope to work on the script over the winter. Wish me success.

​I continue to work on my next book, Alien Times Series - Book 3, Retribution. I am on Chapter 34, the midpoint of the story. I decided to collapse a large Antarctica ice shelf to blame one of the alien races for trying to destroy humanity. This will have worldwide repercussions of course, and now I have to build on the havoc that will result before I get to the main cause of the problem and how to resolve it. The story is still a work in progress.

I have decided to learn screenwriting so I can develop scripts for some of my stories to pitch to producers. I chose a short story for the first script and am working on ACT 1. I am taking an introductory screenwriting class to learn the basics and am using Final Draft 13 software for writing the script. I completed the Beat Board outline first which basically is creating Scenes for each Chapter of the story. I plan to finish converting the book to script format this summer. It's pretty easy once you get the hang of it.

I continue advocating for Regenerative Agriculture farming practices and climate-smart polices for the 2025 Farm Bill. Unfortunately, the current administration has their heads inside fossil fuel tanks and willfully ignore the damage global warming is causing to our environment. Nature will solve the problem for us, of course. So, I just hope I can survive a little longer from the impacts caused by burning fossil fuels and covering our soil with chemical fertilizers and synthetic pesticides. At least, the first thirty years of my life were lived free from the current toxic environment, but the next forty years have had a terrible effect on our children and the world. Time to change our ways before Nature has the last laugh.

Hello Sci-Fi Readers:

It has been a while since I added to my Blog. No particular reason for not keeping everyone updated on my writing. I just have been busy with my volunteer work on Regenerative Agriculture (RA) campaigns, which can be found on my website link here: Regenerative Agriculture - Don Viecelli Sci-Fi.

As for my writing, I completed Alien Times - Book 2, Confrontation in September 2024 and hope it was a worthwhile sequel to Book 1, Revelation. I am now working on Alien Times - Book 3, Retribution. I hope to complete the first draft by June. It is taking a bit longer than I planned due to my volunteer work on RA which has been seriously affected by the current administration purging of all climate related terminology and links from search engines; you know like trying to bury their heads in the sand to hide the truth from themselves. If you read Alien Times, you would know by now all about climate change and its effect on our world. Nature is not fooling around.

This theme is a big part of my book series. I also used the climate change theme in my UTOPIAS series starting back in 2014. I really did not know much about the causes of climate change until I joined the Climate Reality Project organization in 2020. You all know what is happening to our weather now, but you may not know how it works or what causes climate change. Reading my Alien Times series will make you much more knowledgeable on the subject, hopefully in a more entertaining way.

I publish a Newsletter every month with special book discounts on selected books as well as include free books available using BookFunnel promotions. Here is my March 2025 release: Don Viecelli Sci-Fi Newsletter March 2025

f you want to be informed of these promotions, fill in this submission request and get a free book in the process: landing.mailerlite.com/webforms/landing/x8w7z0

Keeping this Blog updated is a new goal of mine for 2025. Hope it is of interest to you.

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I am working on updating and re-publishing all three books in the series starting with UTOPIAS -Book 0, Climate Crisis. I released an updated version in October 2024 that included an audiobook format by Google Play Books. The ebook version is available at 50% off at $1.99 until the end of October. If you like sentient androids and a unique way to solve the climate crisis, this series may interest you. Here is a universal link for this book in the series: books2read.com/b/47JlpL

Please post a review if you like this book and/or series. I plan to update Books 1 & 2 before the end of this year with audiobook versions as well.

My latest book, Alien Times - Book 2, Confrontation is available on preorder at 50% Off for $2.99 until September 14, 2024.

This story takes off where Alien Times - Book 1, Revelation left off. The book description has the basic details when you check it out on Draft2Digital.

Here is the Books2Read website to get the book: Don Viecelli (books2read.com)

​I hope you like it.

​For those who live near Chicago, I will be attending the Chicago Printers Row Lit Fest Book Fair on September 8, 2024. I will be in the Midland Authors exhibit selling my books and handing out bookmarks with a free book offer if you sign up for my Newsletter.

Here is the book fair details link: Exhibitors - Printers Row Lit Fest

I will see you there!

It's been a while since I updated my Blog. So, here goes.

I have been extremely busy with my volunteer work for the past three years, mostly on regenerative agriculture (RA) issues and dealing with the 2024 Farm Bill. After much research and study on the subject, it has become very clear that we need to reduce CO2 greenhouse gas emissions as quickly as possible in order to stop the extreme weather events caused by climate change. RA practices can do this efficiently and cost-effectively using natures method of photosynthesis. Nothing works better to stop and reverse global warming. We just need the political will to enforce policies to stop using fossil fuels instead of renewable energy sources.

To aid in this effort of public education, I have used the background theme of climate change in several of my novels, beginning with UTOPIAS series of books. That is what got me started on this path. I continued the background theme in my recent books such as Alien Times - Book 1. In Book 2, it comes front and center with aliens trying to help us do what humans have so far failed at, saving the world from climate disaster and possible human extinction.

I have noticed that many other science fiction writers have also used this theme in several of their books. It only makes sense, since the weather has certainly gotten more unpredictable and severe in recent years for all to experience. It is no longer easy for climate deniers to claim it is a hoax from the liberal left. A good tornado, rain bomb, hurricane, heat wave, drought or sea level rise or other event will change their minds in a heartbeat. Blame it on God or nature instead of man will make no difference in the results. It is time to make a change in public policy if we want to stop what is happening to our environment.

If I am successful, my new book, Alien Times - Book 2 will help change a few more minds on what we humans need to do to survive our mistakes and make the future a lot more livable for future generations. I just hope we don't need the help of extraterrestrials to achieve this because time is running out.

Introducing My Latest Novel - Alien Times - Book 1, Revelation!

This novel took over a year to write, not because it was difficult, but because I became involved as a climate activist and spend a great deal of daily time trying to save the planet. Normally, I complete a first draft novel in 5 months or so. This time it took over 13 months. I finally released this novel on February 1, 2023 as a Pre-order on Amazon.com. It is on sale at 57% off for $2.99 until it is officially released on March 1, 2023! The audiobook version is available now on Google Play Books for $6.99. The print book version will become available soon.

The reason for the delay is the volunteer work I do now. It revolves around Regenerative Agriculture (RA), which is a set of farming and land practices that improve or regenerate healthy soil. I have learned that soil contains a living ecosystem that nature uses to grow plants and food without harming our environment. RA also has the benefit of greatly reducing greenhouse gases that are warming our planet too fast for nature to keep in balance. RA does this by sequestering carbon back into the soil through photosynthesis. If more farmers and ranchers practice RA, we can stop and even reverse global warming in one generation. This is scientifically proven. I recommend you visit the Soil Food Web site for confirmation.

I included some of the damage caused by climate change as a backdrop or theme in my new novel. The facts on climate change are for the most part accurate, but I may have embellished the timing of environmental tipping points to fit my storyline.

Even so, I tried not to make climate change of greater importance than first alien contact and the issues we may have to deal with when this occurs for real. I firmly believe aliens are already visiting us and we are just not ready to deal with what they expect of us. They probably are very concerned with what we are doing to our beautiful planet and to ourselves. Unless we become more attuned with nature and stop killing each other, they will not invite us to explore the galazy with them.

My hope is this book will give some insight on alien technology we may have in our possession per some reports using antimatter reactor propulsion systems that use Element 115 to amplify gravity waves to create space-time distortion fields for very fast and long-distance space travel. If any of this is true, we will all be in for a "really big ride."

Let me know what you think of my story once you read it. If everything works out, I will write Book 2 in my Alien Times Series as soon as possible.