Quick update (yes, I’m still alive)

19. June 2012 · Write a comment · Categories: Heart of the Nebula, Novels, Stars of Blood and Glory, SW I-IV: The Jeremiah Chronicles, Untitled (Desert Stars companion novella) · Tags: , , , ,

I just had an awesome weekend.  Saw the most amazing cave complex of my life, toured Kakheti o a TLG excursion, met a bunch of really cool people, and hung out with them in Tbilisi for a while.  I’ll have to save all that for another blog post, though, probably in a couple of days.

Rumor has it that the judging was finished for the first quarter Writers of the Future contest over the weekend, and all the finalists were contacted.  I didn’t get a call or an email, so I’m probably not a finalist this time around.  Oh well.

In any case, I’m very much looking forward to getting the results so that I can finally publish this dang story!  It’s been way too long since I published anything, and while there have been reasons for that (moving to another country, starting a second career), I really need to be publishing new stuff more regularly.

Here’s what I want to publish before the end of the year:

  • First and second parts of Star Wanderers (my Writers of the Future story).  This is a novel I plan to publish in four parts, with each part being its own self-contained story.  I blogged about it a while ago…more on that later.
  • A companion novella to Desert Stars.  This is still just in the planning stages, but there’s plenty of backstory to draw from, and I really would like to revisit that corner of the Gaia Nova universe.
  • Either Heart of the Nebula or Stars of Blood and Glory.

That last one is going to be an ambitious undertaking, since both of them are still in the alpha-reading phases right now.  Also, I don’t now whether I’ll have regular access to a reliable source of electricity in the fall, which will further complicate things.  However, I do believe it’s possible to put out one or the other before the end of the year, though probably not both.

All of this is still up in the air, though, and I can’t promise anything except to get Star Wanderers: Part I up as soon as the results come in for the Writers of the Future contest.  It’s already formatted and ready to go, just need to fine tune the blurb and hit “publish.”

And of course, before I move on to any of these other projects, I have to finish the one I’m currently working on.  So so long!  I’m off to the library to write.

Coming along nicely

11. October 2011 · 5 comments · Categories: Bringing Stella Home, Desert Stars, Heart of the Nebula, Novellas & Novelettes, Novels, SW I-IV: The Jeremiah Chronicles, Untitled (Desert Stars companion novella) · Tags: , , , , , , , ,

First things first: the latest post for the Bringing Stella Home blog tour is up over at Michael Offut’s blog; you can find it here.  Michael asked me to blog about Brandon Sanderson’s English 318R class, so I recapped some of my experiences, including the best advice Brandon ever gave me.  Go check it out!

The revisions for Desert Stars are coming along nicely.  It’s funny; for the past three months, all I’ve wanted to do is work on this novel, but it turns out that taking a long break from it was probably the best thing I could have done.  The distance has helped me to take a fresh look at my prose and cut out all the extra trimmings that were just bogging things down. For example:

Draft 3.0

Jalil paused before walking down the narrow aisle of the train, rows of lights tracing a pair of parallel lines down the dark blue carpeted floor. The place felt oddly familiar, and not just because of the similarities with the trains in Aliet Dome. In fact, this one was much smaller and narrower, so that he and Mira practically had to walk sideways just to get down the aisle. The seats all faced forward, too, instead of alternating like they had in Aliet Dome. And the way the interior of the cabin was curved like a pipe, so that the ceiling blended into the walls and floor–it brought back a memory of him staring out a window at a glowing blue horizon, with the sky dark and starless overhead.

Draft 4.0

Jalil paused briefly in the door of the train, staring at the parallel rows of lights running down the dark blue carpet. The place felt oddly familiar, like something out of a dream. Perhaps it was the way he and Mira had to step sideways through the narrow aisle, or perhaps it was the way the walls of the cabin curved naturally into the ceiling and floor. It brought back a memory of him staring out a window at a glowing blue horizon, with the sky dark and starless overhead.

Just from simple stuff like this, I’ve cut almost 5k words so far; I wouldn’t be surprised if I get this baby down to 90k-95k by the end.  Even though the story is pretty solid, the distance has helped me to take a fresh look at my prose.  And hopefully, my writing has gotten better in the meantime.

So Desert Stars is coming along nicely.  I plan to have this draft finished by October 21st, and publish it *hopefully* before Christmas.  The main thing holding me back is funds; I’ll probably have to drop around $750 for editing and cover art, with maybe a month to get it put together in ebook form.

So how to come up with $750 before the end of November?  One possibility I’ve been toying with is doing a fundraiser like my friend Anthon did for his Danakil expedition.  $5 would get a copy of the ebook with special mention in the acknowledgments, $10 would get that plus one or two other ebooks, $25 would get that plus all of my releases over the next 18 months, etc.  Or something like that.  If you’ve got any good ideas for the upper donation levels, please let me know.

Once Desert Stars 4.0 is finished, I plan on jumping straight into Star Wanderers 0.3.  Heck, I’ll probably start that project tomorrow!  After that, I’d like to do a companion novella for Desert Stars.  That shouldn’t take longer than a month.  And don’t wory, I haven’t forgotten about Edenfall; it’s kind of gotten pushed onto the back burner, but I fully intend to finish it at some point.  If all goes well, it’ll be up and published before the end of next year. As if that wasn’t enough, the BSH blog tour is making me want to revisit the sequel, Into the Nebulous Deep.  I finished that project back in May, so it’s definitely had enough time to stew.  And then there’s the New Rigel novel–gah!

Okay, first things first: Desert Stars, then Star Wanderers, and while my first readers are working on that, I’ll write the DS companion novella.  Once I’ve gotten back the feedback, I’ll revisit Star Wanderers, submit the first part to Writers of the Future, and then finish the novel.  That should keep me busy until Thanksgiving; anything after that, I’ll figure it out as it comes along.  Oh, and some point in there, I need to find a new job.

So much to write, so little time in which to write it.  Fortunately, things are going very nicely right now; if that holds up, this is going to be a very productive month.

:)

Writer’s angst & post-convention ennui

25. August 2011 · 13 comments · Categories: Bringing Stella Home, Desert Stars, Edenfall, Genesis Earth, Novellas & Novelettes, Novels, Sholpan, The Back Burner, Untitled (Desert Stars companion novella) · Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,

In spite of the title of this post, I’ll try not to get too emo.  Not sure how well I’ll succeed, but at least I’ll try.

Worldcon was great, but it put me into something of a writing slump and I’m not sure where to go next.  I was planning on writing the as-yet untitled New Rigel novel, but I want to get Desert Stars published before Christmas, and that would involve doing another major draft before sending it off for edits.

The trouble is, it typically takes me at least two months to do a rough draft.  I can probably finish Desert Stars in about a month, but I’d still want to start that project somewhere around the end of September.  Since I don’t expect for my first readers to get back to me until then, that leaves me with a single month to fill.

To further complicate matters, the place I’ve been temping at for the last two months wants to hire me full time.  In some ways, that’s awesome; work is work, after all, and even though I won’t exactly be saving the world, it’s not a bad job either.  On the other hand, 40 hours of warehouse labor per week is going to make it very difficult to do everything I want with my writing career.

Now, don’t get me wrong–I’m not complaining.  This seems to be the dilemma that every aspiring writer faces at one point or another, and most of my friends have understandably chosen the stable paycheck over the ever-elusive lucky break.  But with where I’m at–young and single, without any debt or obligations to pay off–and my long term career goals, I worry that I’ll end up settling if I take that path.  Besides, I’ve gotten used to “starving” over the last year and a half, and it’s actually not that bad.

What would REALLY be awesome is if they would hire me part time, and I think I might be able to negotiate that.  In the meantime, I’ve got to figure out what I’m going to write in September.  Here are my options:

Untitled (New Rigel)

This is the project I was most excited about before Worldcon, but now…well, I’m still excited, but post-convention ennui is not a pretty thing.  Basically, it’s a full-length novel set within the Gaia Nova universe, and an indirect sequel to Bringing Stella Home. 

I’ve already written the prologue and I like where it’s going, but I’d have to really bust my butt to get it done before October.  Then again, I usually drop the first draft somewhere in the middle, so allowing for that, it might still be good to go ahead.  However, it’s generally a bad idea to plan on screwing things up.

Edenfall

This is the sequel to Genesis Earth, and the second book in a planned trilogy.  Since it’s YA, I could probably pull it off in a month–YA is generally shorter than adult fiction, and Genesis Earth took me about a month to pound out once I knew what I was doing.  I’ve already got the story outlined and ready to go, so no problems there.

The big reason to do this project is that the first book is starting to have some success, and that’s naturally going to drive reader interest in the sequel.  I’ve already gotten some scattered emails and comments about it, asking when it’s going to come out.  Also, since there’s less pressure on me right now, bumping it up the queue might be a good idea.  There’s a reason some people are afraid of success.

Desert Stars Companion Novella

Now here’s an interesting idea: I could spend the next month working on a companion novel to Desert Stars, much like I spent the last month working on Sholpan.  The advantages to this plan are obvious: not only would I have another full-length novel ready before Christmas, but a $.99 novella to go with it–that is, if all goes well.

This is a project I haven’t given much thought to, but it wouldn’t be too hard to come up with something.  It would also get me excited for the revision of Desert Stars in October.  The main disadvantage is that I don’t know how well this “companion novella” concept will work out in the market–if Sholpan tanks, I might have to scrap it altogether.  But as Dean told me at Worldcon, you can’t let thoughts of the commerciality of a project get in the way of the creative process.

That’s what’s on my plate right now.  Preferably, I want to choose something I can finish within a month, while juggling work and the publication process for Sholpan.  Oh, and I also want to throw in a blog tour for Bringing Stella Home–more on that later.

So, to open it up to my super-awesome hardcore fans (all three or four of you), what do you think?  Of these projects, what do you most want to see?