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(clicking on the cover will take you to Goodreads!) | Title: The Labyrinth House Author: Mark Rollins Published on: October 11 2014 Publisher: Luthando Coeur Part of a series?: No Get a copy: Amazon I Barnes & Noble What would you do if you entered a house that you couldn’t leave? Bradley Jensen, a young architect on his honeymoon, finds himself facing this very question when he finds a door embedded in a tree on a nature hike with his new wife. On the other side of the door is a mansion, and in the mansion are other people: a man from the 70’s, a former slave, and a young woman from the time of the Salem Witch Trials. They, like Bradley, can’t escape. They can’t open the door that leads to the exit; they can’t break down the walls. There’s one other person in the mansion, a man none of the others like to talk about. He’s like them, plucked out of the world and placed here in a mansion beyond time. Except he’s dangerous. Deadly. In order to figure out the mystery of his current situation and—hopefully—make it back to his wife, Bradley is going to have to confront this man, as well as something far more dangerous: The Labyrinth House itself. |
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It was during that time that I created my own super-team, probably because I was a big fan of books like X-men and the Teen Titans. Most of the plots that I came up with were very unoriginal. In college, I rebooted this team but eventually dropped it. After college, I wrote a speculative fiction work, and never really could get my mind off of it.
This is not to say that I don’t have experience writing other genres of fiction. After college, I wrote skits for a college-age crowd, and they were usually comedy ones, sort of like Saturday Night Live. I actually attempted to write a romance novel from the guy’s POV, and I might develop that one.
Architects think differently when they enter a room. They know what walls are load-bearing, and what is holding up the ceiling. They can detect weaknesses in the floor, and can do a free-hand sketch of their area with a very holistic knowledge of what makes the room tick.
In order to solve the puzzle that is The Labyrinth House, Bradley uses his aforementioned skills as an architect. By the way, Bradley went to Washington State University.
I think I wanted to create puzzles that would feel challenging, but you would not even consider a puzzle unless you knew there was a solution. It’s sort of like the FedEx logo, which has an arrow in it. Seriously, it is there. Once you see the arrow in the FedEx logo, you can’t unsee it. It seems so simple. A lot of the puzzles in the Labyrinth House are difficult, but they are always easy after you solved them.
As for what kind of puzzles are in the Labyrinth House, I just wanted types that I would see a point-and-click adventure. It would be nothing that you would have to think too far out of the box in order to solve; in fact, the problem is you are in a box. In point-and-click video games, there was always limits to what the player could do. This was always the frustrating part, because you always felt like you ran out of things to do and would never solve the puzzle.
So I didn’t really have any specific puzzles in mind, and might have been able to work in any puzzles, really. In the book, there is a puzzle with moving tiles that felt right, and that never changed. I like the idea that the user has to step on certain tiles to cross it, and it is sort of a combination of the opening of Raiders of the Lost Ark with Alice and Wonderland. It has a certain surreal quality that I wanted to be its own unique style.
I used to believe that writers should have a theme and then write a plot that fits it. Now I honestly believe that the best stories are those that have a situation, and the moral, if any, has to be found by the reader.
For this reason, I’m not going to completely answer this question, but I will say this. Everyone has been in a situation where they feel trapped. Perhaps it is a situation where you have a terrible job, and don’t see any way out but completely changing the status quo to something potentially even worse. In the case of The Labyrinth House, it is a situation where you are trapped and may never escape. This leads to the question of how you deal with it if you are in this scenario.
Considering that the characters find themselves trapped in a supernatural place, it is only natural to assume that The Labyrinth House kind of “has it out for them”. Of course they are going to look for reasons why they have been forcibly incarcerated, because most bad things happen for a reason. Sometimes, people are forced to look at themselves during a tragedy, and they often change, just so they won’t have to face more tragedy. So people might better themselves for the wrong reasons, but it is still the right thing.
Ike was a person who I felt really understood me, and I could talk to him about anything. He was really good at listening, and this is one of Joshua’s good traits. He also never held a grudge, which is also incredibly admirable.
All that keeps me busy, but not quite busy enough. Unless I have other writing work, I am always looking for a way to make more with my writing, or whatever job that I can get.
Some authors begin a work without knowing how it will end. Fortunately, I knew how the story was going to end, and I was completely satisfied. The only thing that was left to do was go through the plot one step at a time. I was able to spot points in the screenplay that I could make better, and made certain that one event did realistically lead to the other.
There is, of course, little changes that were made in the copy-edit review, but they really were quite minor. For the most part, I was pretty satisfied with it.
a b o u t t h e a u t h o r
In 2009, Mark decided to create his own tech and gadget blog known as www.TheGeekChurch.com. The purpose of the blog was to report on the latest in technology, as well as inform the church-going crowd (who are often not very technically adept) on the benefits of using more technology in the ministry. Since 2012, Mark has completely devoted his time to this blog, and considers it his ministry and mission. Recently, Mark has become a tech consultant, offering his years of experience in technology to consumer electronics companies. Mark currently resides in Pullman, Washington, with his wife and three children.