📘 Books
110) An Act Of Kindness
109) Lurking Behind The Shadows
108) The More You Inhale The Better You Feel
107) Someone Brought A Gun To School?
106) The Youngest Of Five Brothers
105) Filling Daddy’s Shoes
104) Love Forgives
103) Don’t Let Your Dreams Bite You
102) 10 Pages A Day
101) A Ride With A Stranger
100) The Lamp On The Battlefield
99) The Forbidden Lake
98) There Is Something About The Things You Do
97) Who Stole Suzie’s Crayons?
96) Watching My Son’s Death Bed
95) During The Holiday’s At My Uncle’s Ranch
94) King Of The Ramp
93) More Than Just A Book
92) The Yeti & Lilly
91) I Visited The Wrong Website
90) Count Your Blessings
89) Tom’s Appendectomy
88) Peril Of A Threat
87) Don't Be Afraid To Ask Questions
86) Evil Can Be Good If It Wants To
85) Sarah’s Impossible Goal
84) The Persecution Of Benny Bones
83) But He Called Me A …
82) The Night We Were Left Alone
81) There Is A Gay Person In My Classroom
80) Jerry's Curiosity
79) The Story Of The Dog Hater
78) A Christmas Letter To A Father’s Jail Cell
77) Sleeping With The Bible Under My Pillow
76) The Video Game Console Bargain
75) A Message From A Dying Man
74) Going Into The World
73) Always Say Thank You
72) Brotherly Grudge
71) God Has Been Leading Me To Start An Orphanage For Years Now
70) Girls Like Excitement
69) Focus On The Solution Not The Problem
68) Finders Keepers?, … I Mean Really?
67) Everybody Has The Right To Believe Whatever They Want To Believe
66) Fake Pastor Exposed
65) Don’t Eat Food That Just Fell On The Ground
64) Falling Down Doesn’t Mean You Have To Walk Away
63) Don’t Run Away From Maths
62) Eating Like A White Man
61) Don’t Buy A Stolen Phone
60) Don't Cry Over Spilled Milk
59) Don’t Be Afraid To Learn How To Use New Technology
58) Come & Eat
57) Don’t Be Afraid Of Books
56) Daddy, Is Mummy A Saint?
55) Demons In Comic Books Are Just Entertainment
54) Daddy, I Feel God Wants You To Put Your Trust In Him And Not In Man
53) Have Faith In Your Faith
52) Chased By A Monster
51) Career Choice Pressures
50) Annie Sits & Thinks
49) But The 8.00 am Service Doesn’t Really Begin Until 8.30 am
48) Be Careful As You Read
47) Angels Watch Over Us While We Sleep
46) Don’t Laugh At People Because They Are Fat
45) Anything Worth Doing Is Worth Doing Well
44) Getting Back At My Little Sister
43) But I Want To Spend My Christmas Holiday Elsewhere
42) American Dream
41) An Adventure In The Woods
40) Angela’s Passion
39) He Knows My Name
38) He Told Me That Reading Is The Exit Door From Poverty
37) Honor Your Father & Mother
36) How The Scripture I Memorized Saved My Life
35) How To Make People Love You At First Sight
34) More Than Just A Cool Football Pose
33) Just So I Can Tell People That I Did It
32) Merry Christmas Not Happy Holidays
31) Lucy & The Tablet Device
30) Love & The Young
29) Investment Prayers
28) Lord, I Need Your Help My Daddy Fell Into A Coma
27) Love Is The Answer
26) Injections Freak Me Out
25) I’m Only Eating All This Now Because I Don’t Know If I Would Eat In The Evening
24) Music Is Locked Up Within Me
23) My Bicycle Helmet Story
22) The Devil's Helping Hand
21) They 'R Us
20) Super Hero At Comic Con
19) The Cute Little Puppy That Popped Up In My Backyard
18) Will’s Last Crazy Adventure
17) There Is Still Time
16) Well Thought Out Choices & Their Opposite
15) Those Who Tell White Lies End Up In A White Hell
14) The Man Who Took My Parents Away Forever
13) The King’s Heir
12) The Rude Boy
11) The Fool That You Knew Me To Be Yesterday Is Not The Person Standing In Front Of You Today
10) The Forbidden Book Stack
9) The Gang Leader
8) The Online Friend Who Changed Her Life Forever
7) The Accident On A Rainy Night
6) The Fantasy Of Job Security
5) The Business God Gave Birth To
4) Praise Him Through The Midnight
3) Mum’s Secret Life
2) The Warrior, The Prince & The Monster
1) All New Genes
Romantic Short Stories By Alfred:
46) A Wedding Ring For The Woman Behind The Mask
45) You Can't Be Good Without God
44) Listening To Her
43) My Husbands Last Cocktail
42) Keep On Working
41) It Is Not What It Looks Like
40) Above the Romantic Arabian Sky
39) Above All, The Shield Of Faith
38) Butter Her With Gifts
37) Handkerchiefs & Aprons
36) Changing The Spouse
35) After 60 Years
34) All Things Are Possible
33) Treat Your Achievements Like Bubble Gum
32) Thou Shall Not Say The Name, “Jesus?”
31) The One Who Never Got Married
30) The Marriage Improvement Book Experience
29) The E – Mail
28) The Couple That Loved & Saved Africa
27) The Couple Next Door
26) You Never Take Me Out To Dinner
25) The 31st Night Service
24) Tell Her That She’s Beautiful, Everyday
23) Still In Bed?
22) Smile Even When The Road Is Rough
21) Saved By A Stranger
20) Promotion from Upstairs or Downstairs
19) Our Financial Crisis Story
18) Our Cute Little Friend
17) How Lilly Makes Her Husband Do Anything She Wants
16) The Spooky Sounds From Next Door
15) Every Pastor's Nightmare
14) One Body
13) They Took The Nativity Scene Out Of City Hall
12) God Answered My Prayer For Christmas
11) Just The Two Of Us This Christmas
10) If You Want Sensual Get Married
9) Enemies On My PC Screen
8) My Soldier Comes Home
7) Called Against the Norm
6) The Christmas Letter From A Jail Cell
5) Shedding Tears & Burning Memories
4) All Men Are Dogs
3) When My Husband Snores I Hear Birds Sing
2) How Can He Love Me When I'm Fat?
1) The Secret, The Letter & The Writer
Books published by Alfred
https://blog.alfred.vip/search/label/Books%20By%20Alfred
Watch Book Reviews by Alfred: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC12NbnEnJ5IUqg8ZLLUn-9A
Send Alfred A Thank You For All The Free Books
Pay What You Like.
🌇 GET TO KNOW 'ALFRED THE WRITER' INTERVIEW:
✨ Tell us about yourself; who are you and where are you from?
My name is Alfred Benjamin King. I was born in Nigeria, Africa. Both my parents are Igbo from Oguta in Imo State, Nigeria.
I'm a Christian. I love to create. I believe that it's my purpose in this world to preach the gospel especially through Entertainment.
So I create Entertainment products with a purpose and distribute them for free.
✨ What inspired you to become a writer?
Honestly, it was Money at first.
In my early teens; around the age of thirteen I wanted to start publishing a music magazine in Port Harcourt, Nigeria, Africa in the 90s. It was to feature popular song lyrics, music celebrity gossip, and made up fantasy stories about celebrities.
I wrote one made up Celebrity fantasy story that the only two people who read it at the time from my notebook I cared around liked it.
They liked it so much; even more than my rapping so much so that one kept encouraging me to finish the story even telling me in my raps I should rap stories and focus on storytelling in my raps that it would improve the quality of my raps.
✨ How long have you been writing?
To be honest we all started writing at least creative writing when we were in school from the first day in elementary school we were told to write an essay by an English Teacher. When we were given homework like: write an essay about "How You Spent Your Holiday."
Everybody who schooled in Nigeria; at least in my generation and the generations around that were given that particular essay topic to write about whenever we returned from a holiday.
Perhaps there may have been essays given to us to write before that particular one was given to us to write, but every Nigerian's first plunge into the world of creative writing started in school.
Therefore you can say I started creative writing as soon as the English Teacher taught us to write Essays in Nursery or Elementary School. That's how long I've been writing creativity and making up my own stories.
However, as far as how long have I been writing as a profession goes.
In Nigeria, back in the day aspiring to be a writer or a musician was not done. It meant you were aspiring to be a loser. Aspiring to be a musician meant you were wasting your parents money by them paying school fees and you were a fool and also ungrateful.
As for wanting to be a writer. I didn't even know someone could even say they were a writer as a profession until my 20's.
There was no such thing as "I want to grow up to be a writer."
That sounded like a wasted life.
Maybe a girl who was planning to be a housewife could say she wants to be a writer. She can be expected to write one or two books in her own lifetime in between the cooking and cleaning; but even that was rare.
Nobody in Nigeria at the time would waste school fees money on a girl only to come out and become a writer. As for a man, that kind of foolishness of becoming a writer was out of the question. As a man you would have many responsibilities; you would have to feed your family, feed your parents when they get old and even help your younger siblings. It was irresponsible and the mark of being a failure to even look in the direction of being a writer.
Apart from the plate of disappointment you would be serving your parents by becoming a writer; nobody in Nigerian society at the time would respect you as a man.
If you where in school in Nigeria back in those days; you had to want to be a Doctor, A Lawyer, A Banker or A Chemical Engineer.
I didn't even know back then there were more than 20 professions in the world.
As a male who grow up in Port Harcourt where a lot of all the oil jobs where; I wanted to be a chemical engineer like every other male child around me.
Till today I don't fully know what vf chemical engineers do (and I don't care to find out), but since everybody else wanted to be a chemical engineer I wanted to be a chemical engineer too.
✨ What advice would you give a new writer, someone just starting out?
Don't quit your day job, and if your day job isn't a writing job; get a writing job then quit your non-writing job.
Then if you must; do all your independent writing when you're not on your professional writing job hours. Do it in your spare time.
✨ How do you handle writer’s block?
I don't have writer's block. If you have writer's block it means you have nothing to say, and if you have nothing to say; the world would be a better place if you say nothing at all.
Perhaps you should wait till you have something to say. Go out live life. Experience the world. Listen more than you speak. Observe everything. Be inquisitive. Ask questions but avoid being annoying. Understand in the world. Seek understanding (Proverbs 4: 7). Seek understanding why things happens, why people do the things they do. Soak in the world around you with your spirit of observation and you would have an inexhaustible stream of things to write about for a million lifetimes and more.
Another thing as it relates to writer's block that you must know is that if you have something to say but are having problems with putting it down satisfactory on a page; your problem is coming from your lack of technical understanding of how to write a good story.
You may have written many good stories in the past, you may even have a few best sellers and awards but because of you lack of understanding of the wealth of information and secrets to craft a good story you are currently struggling.
The thing is you can write a great story based off inspiration, chance & a great idea alone; and that's what helped you through in the past, but what's going to happen when the inspiration isn't there, a great idea isn't coming, and you have to write a story because you have a deadline.
You would suffer because you didn't take time out to story how to write a good story, the elements of a great story, tricks and tips of the trade of storytelling, etc.
I strongly advise every young writer to commit to reading and studying every book they can find about how to write a good story. Throw away the ideas you read that must be thrown away, and incorporate into your own writing the ideas you read that would improve your writing. You would often find both a lot of helpful and useless tips within the same book; but keep reading.
Read and listen to interviews and podcasts where host or guest authors give tips or say things they didn't plan to be a tip but is helpful and improve you on your journey as a writer.
✨ What, in your opinion, are the most important elements of good writing?
That question requires an entire book for me to answer.
Perhaps someday I'll write a book dedicated to answering that question.
For now I'll leave with this: write characters everyday people would talk about even though they don't want to talk about characters from movies or books.
Your characters should be the only thing that best embodies and communicates things everyday people may want to communicate or describe to another person. So they have to choice to use your character as a reference point to best describe things or character traits in people they want to talk about as they go about their day.
That's how your writing become a part of culture and changing culture; it starts with your writing changing language.
✨ What comes first, the plot or characters?
It depends.
When I'm writing a series or something I plan to make a franchise out of. Naturally, the character has to come first.
However, when I'm writing like a stand alone novel that I don't plan to make a series out of; the plot comes first.
✨ How do you develop your plot and characters?
That's where the importance of understanding the technicalities of how to write a story comes in.
This is where begin to you apply all that you've learnt and read about how to write a good story.
To answer this question you have asked would require a book all by itself because I use every single thing I have learnt over the years on how to write a good story to guide me in developing my plot and characters.
✨ How do you come up with the titles to your books?
The title always comes before I write the book. I know what I want to talk about and I just know or can quickly figure out what title best encapsulates what I want to talk about.
I don't waste time choosing a title especially since I know I can always change it mid-day while writing the book or even after writing the book. I just can't change it after publishing the book.
So there's more than enough time to improve on or choose a better title until the book gets published so it's not an issue.
Several genres already have a style to their title so when you know where you are going with your story and what genre you are writing for; you should be able to come up with decent titles for your project that fans of that genre would accept.
Of cause you can take it a step further as you should and consider marketing when you pick a title. What would ring a bell? What name can you change the name to that would turn more heads and cause more sales.. or downloads in my case? What title would get people talking? What title would make the News?
Consider all these and choose a title without compromising on your values.
✨ When did you first consider yourself a writer?
It first started to sink in a dark period of my life where NEPA took light and there was no electricity for over a year.
I had no college degree level skills. I wasn't in school. Didn't have any money of my own and I felt like at the time the world wouldn't even remember I was here.
All my previous dreams and aspirations didn't seem like they would come true or at the very best they were on hold indefinitely.
I had a laptop though so I would go to a cyber cafe and pay them to charge my laptop with their generator and also post a bedtime story for free on the internet as well as a bedtime story for married couples.
That way there would be at least something left on the earth to prove I was here.
Then it became obvious to me I was setting myself up to be remembered as a writer. Something previous to that, that I wouldn't want to be remembered as.
When I had nothing left or nothing at all in my eyes at the time, I still had the ability to be remembered as a Writer.
Now it's been so many years since I've been in that dark space but even though I'm more likely going to be remembered for an array of successful businesses and organizations; I still smile to write Writer as a profession whenever I fill out a form asking for my occupation.
✨ Describe your writing space.
I write in bed on my phone. Today, I never sit down at a table and write on a laptop. Never.
I'm in bed swiping away using the glide typing feature on my android phone.
It's either that or I'm placing the floor in the living room using voice typing on my android phone where everything you say it immediately converted to text.
Or I just do a full on audio recording then upload the audio to a software that would covert it to text (transcribe it), then I get in bed with my phone and make corrections.
✨ What time of the day do you usually write?
Anytime I have time.
✨ Describe a typical writing day.
I don't know how to answer that. I write everyday. I get in bed everyday. If I'm awake and not watching a YouTube video or listening to a podcast; then I'm writing.
I plan my day to typically revolve around creativity. Creating something productive. That's how my day is planned to start out but sometimes life happens. Things need to be done around the house. People visit. I need to go out (which rarely happens). Etc.. etc... stuff happens, but still majority of my time goes to creating music, books, comic books, or sadly watching YouTube videos which I seriously need to cut down on.
✨ What is the most difficult part about writing for you?
I don't find anything difficult about writing. Again, because I learnt and know and keep learning the fundamentals and elements of how to write a good story.
If you know this and keep learning you'll never find any part of writing difficult. Rather you'll have more ideas flowing forcefully through you... more stories seeking to be told that time in each day would allow you to put down.
✨ What would you say is your most interesting writing quirk?
Next question.
✨ Do you hear from your readers much? What do they say?
They say positive and encouraging things. I remember when I first got an encouraging comment from a reader. I saved a screenshot of it and it was the first of a series of screenshots in a folder full of encouraging comments about my writing.
✨ How do you do research for your books?
Google.
I google search. YouTube search; that's it.
Most of the time if I want to write about something it's something that I already know about or I just learnt about one aspect of that thing. So in my project I'll keep my writing to that one aspect of that thing. I don't have to be an expert on everything that has to do with that thing. I just write and communicate that one thing that interested me and weave it into the story.
Also, I must add. One of my favorite Pastors once said that the sermons you see him preaching are not what he is studying now. They are not sermons he's studying today. What he's preaching is what he has lived through the years not what he's currently studying.
He doesn't open the bible to get notes to build a sermon. He opens the bible for his own personal walk with God. When it comes time to preach a sermon on a topic; he pulls from the wealth of information he's already known that's within him and puts that out.
It's the same way it me. I love knowledge. I love to know stuff.
When it comes time for me to write on a topic I pull from the wealth of information that's already in me on that topic. Going to Google or YouTube search is just extra... it's just extra topping on a perfectly good Ice Cream Sundae.
✨ What does success mean to you?
Doing what God tells you to do.
✨ Is writing your full-time career? Or would you like it to be?
No! It would be unwise to look at it as career much less a full time one especially since I don't get paid from it.
A career has got to be by definition something that pays you. I don't get paid from my writing. I give away my entertainment products for free so I can't look at writing to put food on my table even though I have a Patreon account and I'm open to receiving monetary gifts from the public.
It's neither steady, predictable or certain.
I look at writing the same way a Preacher should look at preaching. It's a calling. It's something I must do not something I should look at as a career or something I should make bread from.
✨ Writing can be an emotionally draining and stressful pursuit. How do you deal with emotional impact of a book (on yourself) as you are writing the story? Any tips for aspiring writers?
What on earth are you talking about?
If writing a book feels like a vampire is sucking your blood; you need deliverance.
✨ How do you handle literary criticism?
By ignoring it.
✨ I mean, how do you deal with poor reviews?
I repeat, by ignoring it. Critics generally don't even know what they are talking about so why listen to them.
Now if you had asked me about comments from my readers; that's a different matter.
My readers actually read my work. They care about my work. They want to keep reading my work; so if they have a complaint it's best I listen.
Note that one reader's opinion is not enough to make me make changes however if majority of my readers what a certain change or don't like a certain change that I made then I am obliged to listen to their wishes. They are the audience. They are the ones the product is created to serve.
If someone walks into a restaurant and asks for a burger you can't give them a salad. You have to give them what they want.
So if my audience is requesting for something or don't like something I have to give it to them. I won't however give them no
