Robert Biehn Casts The First Stone of His Exousia Chronicles, One Reader at a Time

Robert Biehn first dreamed up The First Stone at fifteen. Twenty years and eight rewrites later, he's finally launching a novel that's also building a world readers can step into and claim as their own. On the 70th episode of the Science Fiction & Fantasy Factory, host Mookie Spitz, an official Grafter Corps member according to Biehn's faction quiz, talks with the author before his debut lands. The First Stone, book one of the Exousia Chronicles, arrives in early January 2027. The YA dystopian fantasy follows siblings Cass and Evelon through a world that runs on law, metal, magic, and power. Cass wants to protect his sister. Evelon refuses to stay his little sister. That tension comes from Biehn's own childhood, when he felt responsible for protecting his older sisters, and his story asks who you are when your powers, titles, money, and relationships disappear. Biehn's launch plan starts from one rule: serve the reader. He treats fans as citizens of the world, not customers, and he has built the machinery to prove it: a faction quiz that sorts readers by moral choices instead of favorite foods, a puzzle game with faction leaderboards, a Discord chat, a weekly lore newsletter, dual-sided Cass and Evelon cards with trackable QR codes, and a new quiz that matches readers by the moments they loved in books like Mistborn. He also has one conversation at a time with his growing fan base and community, from Facebook videos to a grocery bagger with a dragon tattoo, and he plans live book experiences with character voices, an original song, and games. Biehn calls himself a hybrid author, and explains why. He passed on offers from bigger publishers, wary of notes that change characters to chase a demographic, and chose Storyteller Media for the freedom to run these experiments. The publisher adds Macmillan distribution, industry know-how, deadlines, and a stamp of approval, and its sister company, Curiosity Entertainment, could fast-track the books toward film and TV. The Guest Robert Biehn is a hybrid author and the creator of the Exousia Chronicles, whose first book, The First Stone, is a YA dystopian fantasy launching in early January 2027 from Storyteller Media with Macmillan distribution. A sales and marketing veteran who once hosted the tech podcast Digital Dilemmas, he spent twenty years developing the series and rewrote the manuscript with Michael Braff, the editor behind Red Rising. He pairs that traditional backing with indie-style direct marketing: a moral-choice faction quiz, a puzzle game, a Discord community, a weekly newsletter, and live book experiences. He and his wife are narrating the audiobook together. Visit exousia.world and get your pre-launch copy or visit Amazon. Want to be on the show? Have feedback? Send Mookie a text! Support the show