Urban Reviews:  Start by telling our readers about Butta and the Tower of Bling.
Corey A. Burkes:  Butta’ is an adventure thriller for everyone, but centered as an ‘every woman’ person for, well … every woman. Butta' is someone that people can really identify with. She has just as many regular thoughts and 'highs and lows' as anyone else…especially when she is going through some extraordinary situations. After the murder of her family at a young age, Butta’s primary focus is to get the man that caused her all this pain. However, the man she wants to extract her vengeance upon is a global powerhouse diamond czar. Killing him could extend her problems, so she wrestles with her conflict to go the murderous route or take the high road and use the system against him as he has against her. Meanwhile, she’s joined with a close set of friends to help her commit, at the very least, the grandest diamond heist ever from a high-tech vault outfitted with a 'torture chamber level' security system. One of those "thieves check in, but they don’t check out" scenarios.

Urban Reviews:  What inspired you to create this story?
Corey A. Burkes:  In the summer of 2006, I heard my cousin Walter Wilson wrote his first book, Against All Odds, within a year. I was like, ‘I’m really, REALLY lazy’ if my cousin can say he was going to do it and get it done … and I’ve been supposedly writing for years. You know how you can do something for a long time, but not really doing anything at all? That’s how I felt, so I swore that I would publish my first book and be about it instead of talking about it. Within a year since I made that promise coming home from my cousins book signing, Butta’ was produced. I am a filmmaker at heart, and this story was originally a script I wrote years ago with a male character as the lead. In fact, the lead was actually the character ‘Fade Barrows’ in this story. I changed the lead to a female, totally re-engineered the story flow and here we are. Mission accomplished. No matter where Butta’ or my writing career goes, I think that (next to my children) this was my greatest accomplishment. I said it and made it so. And let me tell you, it felt really good. This isn’t an endorsement, but this is living proof of ‘The Secret’ in action, if you know what I mean.

Urban Reviews:  Will there be a sequel or will we see more of Butta in the future?
Corey A. Burkes:  Oh yes…Well, it depends on how well the first book does. The great folks at Skyelight Literature are very, VERY happy with the way Butta’ is turning out and her possibilities in the future. So far, we’ve been getting extremely positive reviews for the story so it’s going in the right direction for me to develop that bigger story I wanted to tell. We’re just trying to give the public more time to get into the first book before we release the next one. I foresee Butta’ with stories that carry on as long and as diverse as, say, James Bond would. In the near future, BestsellerTrailers.com and Skyelight are producing a revamped book trailer for the book. From the models I seen them bringing on board and the storyboards I’ve been reviewing, I don’t think anyone will ever have seen anything like this for a book before. Goodness…it might as well be a short movie version of the book! The Butta’ book trailer should be out around Late October or so. There is also talks of spin-offs, bringing a Fade and/or Kasey story of their own. I can’t wait to do one for Fade … his story practically writes itself.

Urban Reviews:  Explain to our readers how you got into the business.
Corey A. Burkes:  After I did my 'tell it on the mountain' promise to the heavens that I would finish my book, I had some decisions to make. First of all, I knew the industry just doesn’t publish anybody who has a manuscript. Self-publishing is HUGE these days, allowing anyone to get their work out there, but I didn’t have the money to do the marketing. Boy, let me tell you…that’s a story all its own when I tell you the adventures of researching P.O.D (Print on Demand), Vanity Presses ,and all those other nifty get-published-now programs out there. For awhile, I was completely content with either not owning 100% of the rights of my story or giving up 75% of any royalties. I mean, it was better than going to a regular publisher and getting rejected at the gate (which is common in this industry.) I can’t picture HarperCollins getting past the title. ‘Butta’ and the tower of what?? Sorry. We’ll pass.’ I think that’s the issue with a lot of people out there. As long as they can get their story out there, their willing to take a cut in rights or pay. Those are just the dues we have to pay. However, this is where I thank God often for focused determination and, most of all, Ebony ‘Skye’ Phillips of Skyelight Literature. Without her, this book wouldn’t have gotten as far as it has. I had a little less than half of the book written when I shared it with another cousin, who shared it with someone else who knew Skye was looking for her first title to publish. Her company was new and she wanted to do something different in the African-American literature market. Both of our views were on the same page with what was out there and she loved the story, especially since it featured a Black woman counter to those so often featured in some sort of relationship drama, street hustle or acting in some disrespectful manner. What she liked most was that it was Black characters that didn’t let the 'streets' tell the story, but let the characters tell the story. Next thing you know, I’m told to just keep writing.

Urban Reviews:  Do you have any upcoming projects?
Corey A. Burkes:  In the back of the book are two bonus stories, The Shyster Club and Alone. The Shyster Club is a comedy about an organization that helps spouses cheat with various excuse packages and elaborate escapes for the cheating male while a high powered divorce attorney is hot on their trail to bring them to justice. The story is designed to give the, ‘oh no he didn’t’ response with most women. It’s a lot of fun and it’s based on an audio theater mini-series podcast I wrote and produced two years ago. It’s still playing as a matter of fact. And even though I only did three episodes, I get a lot of listeners to the website (www.desktopepics.com) every month. Alone is a lot more serious. A psychological suspense story about a year-long group session with people who claim to suffer from being alone and then someone tragically dies during the course of that year. The story touches on that emptiness we feel in a world of billions with deeply written conversations between characters of various psyches we will all be familiar with. Later on, a story called ‘Sleight Of…’, a thriller about a magician caught up in governmental scandal, trying to protect a collection of witnesses to the death of the President. The trick behind that book is being able to visually engage the reader with events that will make them think they saw things that may…or may not…have happened. I’m really trying to do different things...not just in storytelling, but how the story is delivered. A friend recently suggested that I would do well writing some erotica after reading some stuff I had written a long time ago. Well, my answer to that is I’m too new right now, trying to establish myself as a general market fiction writer. To be honest, Zane has that market locked up pretty tight.

Urban Reviews:  What challenges have you faced being a new author?
Corey A. Burkes:  Being a new author is the number one challenge in itself. It’s really hard to get someone to review your book within the same few months of its release. Suddenly, there’s a lot more books out there than you thought and reviewers are up to their necks in books to read prior to yours. How in the heck will anyone ever see ‘me’ in the mountain of other books out there? So, my strategy is to give something new the best I can…to stand out. I met a fellow author Tahjaleenie J. Tahji or better known as Mega Body at the New York Black Expo. He wrote G-String Dream's: Confessions of Male Exotic Dancer. If you ever want to learn how to get your book sold, watch this man in action. He gets in your face, puts the book in your hand … talks to everyone and acts as if everyone goes way back! I spent the day with him at the Black Writer’s Guild of America table and learned a lifetime within those 7-8 hours. Plus, he’s truly a good and sharing person with information about this industry. Another challenge has to be marketing to the mainstream as well as our own culture because the money is in both arenas. On one hand, I’m not trying to make Butta’ a story that has to have every known hip-hop cultured reference in it because being Black is not all about being hip-hop or urban. Watching white-folk listening to Mobb Deep or Jadakiss proves it’s a state of mind, not color. Then again, I’m not writing it void of African-Americans and softening the approach in order to satisfy the Caucasian market that feel things can be ‘too black’ for mainstream readers. So, in order for me to sleep well at night, I just wrote it with my personal mentality involved and let the characters be. I’m still assessing the challenge on that one…cross market interest…but so far, two White newspapers gave positive reviews and I was pleasantly surprised.

Urban Reviews:  Who are some of your favorite authors?
Corey A. Burkes:  First has to be a new friend of mine, Anthony R. Riche. He wrote this great book called Finally! How to Stop Dating Losers Forever. A really cool brother whose like family these days the way we keep meeting at expos and talking. Carl Weber’s work is cool. I love his references to my old hometown of Jamaica, Queens. Actually, I have to credit his writing as a reminder to be detailed about locations. My other favorites are Walter Mosley, Toni Morrison, Omar Tyree, and Quentin Carter. Funny thing is, now that I’m writing fulltime, I haven’t been able to read as much as I’d like.

Urban Reviews:  What do you want people to know about you?
Corey A. Burkes:  That I’m a diverse writer. I’ve been given the nickname ‘story engine’ because I just come up with concepts. I'm averaging about 10 a week. Almost all of them I’ve storage away, waiting for the time to publish or produce to film or audio. It's literally a vault of ideas that I just can’t wait to come out. I’ve been writing since I was five-years-old, and I am positive my place in life is to entertain people as a storyteller. If it weren’t for the bills, I would honestly do this for free and be happy for the rest of my life.