Michael Morton is a retired Air Force officer, civilian Space Force employee, military sci-fi and fantasy author, and editor at Canon Publishing. In this episode, he joins to discuss his unconventional path to publishing, the craft principles that actually move the needle, and how a small press operates from the inside — including Canon’s firm stance on AI, scheduling realities, and what separates a manuscript that gets a yes from one that gets a pass. If you write military sci-fi, are weighing indie vs. small press vs. traditional, or just want to understand how a working publishing house thinks about authors, this one’s worth your time.

In This Episode

* Why Michael Can’t Write Contemporary Fiction: 20 years in space ops means security review would line-edit a contemporary novel into oblivion. The workaround was a far-future fallen empire where the physics still hold but the classification stamps don’t reach.

* Microgravity Marines Built Like Gymnasts: The Mist Marines in Silent Violence aren’t your standard tall, jacked Devil Dogs. They’re short, compact, and built for Newton’s laws.

* The JF Holmes Moment: A casual Facebook post in 2017 about something he’d been dabbling with. The publisher’s first reply: “Are you published yet?” That’s the line that flipped him from fanfiction hobbyist to working author.

* Bullet Points Are Secretly Fiction Training: Years of distilling general-officer briefings into five bullets read in five minutes turned out to be the same skill as writing tight fiction. Cut the words that don’t earn their spot.

* The Structure That Actually Works: Forget the outliner-vs-pantser fight. Michael recommends My Story Can Beat Up Your Story by Jeffrey Alan Schechter — 13 structural elements that give your story a frame without locking you into rigid outlining.

* The First $1,000 Is Theirs, the Rest Is Yours: A figure he’s heard repeated: your publisher’s marketing covers the first thousand dollars in sales. Everything after is word of mouth. Which is why Canon now writes “maintain a social media presence” into the contract.

* Canon’s AI Line in the Sand: Grammarly is fine. AI marketing visuals are fine. ChatGPT plotting your book — or mining other authors for “successful plot points” — is a hard no. The line is whether the creative work is yours.

* The AI Cover Loophole: A fully AI-generated cover can’t be copyrighted. Run that image through a human artist who reworks it into an original composition with different assets, and now you own it. The Fiverr artists who can do this fast are quietly winning.

* Why Prologues Get Books Auto-Rejected: Some readers will refuse to buy any book with a prologue, because the prologue almost always exists for the wrong reason — backstory dumping that should have been woven in through dialogue and exposition.

* What Kills a Submission in Three Chapters: If he doesn’t know who the protagonist and antagonist are by chapter three, it’s a no. If the first three pages are background instead of action, it’s a no. If basic Word grammar checks weren’t run, you started in the hole.

* The Rising Tide Argument: Voracious readers go through books faster than any single author can produce. Other authors aren’t competition — they’re the relay team keeping the reader’s habit alive between your releases.

* No Exclusive Contracts on Purpose: Canon actively refers authors to other small presses — Three Ravens, Chris Kennedy Publishing, Jump Master Press — for genres outside their lane. The bet is that authors who write across multiple houses come back better.

* 200 Words a Day Equals One Book a Year: Don’t compare yourself to the author shipping four books a year. Hold yourself to your own pace. The math adds up faster than people realize, and BICHOK — butt in chair, hands on keyboard — is the only rule that actually matters.

Guest Links

* Read the Fallen Empire series by Michael Morton: https://amzn.to/4cOW9BX

* Facebook: Michael Morton, @michael.mortonauthor

Kristin’s Links

* Editing Services: nonsensefreeeditor.com

* Newsletter: https://www.fictionalinfluence.com

* YouTube: https://youtube.com/@nonsensefreekristin

Timestamps

00:00 - Meet Michael Morton.01:09 - From Fanfic to First Publish.03:41 - Space Ops to Space Marines.05:41 - Microgravity Combat Mindset.08:38 - Character Over Hardware.11:12 - Learning the Craft.13:19 - Structure That Works.16:03 - Readers and Market Gaps.18:22 - Inside Canon Publishing.20:19 - Small Press Model Explained.22:12 - Launch Marketing and Social Media.23:33 - Social Media Dialogue.24:03 - Author Training Tools.24:32 - No Exclusive Contracts.25:16 - What Editors Want.27:05 - Common Submission Pitfalls.28:24 - Prologues Debate.30:45 - Small Press Scheduling.33:47 - Indie vs Traditional.35:04 - AI Policy and Art.38:20 - Writing Routine Advice.41:09 - Projects Coming Next.43:06 - Where to Find Michael.44:11 - Book Recommendation Wrap.

About This Podcast

Nonsense-Free Kristin is where independent authors and creators learn to build their platforms, master their craft, and create on their own terms—without begging for permission from gatekeepers who hate them.

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