Tag: Sword Keeper prequels

Nanowrimo anyone?

November is coming up, and with it, nanowrimo.  I’ve always wanted to participate, but every time it rolls around, it seems like I’ve got another project going on that’s more important.

This year is no exception, but I think I have a way around that.  The goal for nanowrimo is just to write something–it doesn’t have to be any good.  I’ve got a bunch of projects I’m currently working on, including Star Wanderers: Deliverance (Part VIII) which I hope to publish by Thanksgiving, but I think I can still do a just-for-fun sort of thing on the side, with the understanding that it doesn’t have to be serious.

What I think I’ll do is write a story where all of the characters from all of my previous books get caught up in some sort of a weird time-space dimensional warping thing, so that they end up in books where they don’t belong and universes where they never existed.  It should be a fun way to revisit some of them, especially the ones from the Gaia Nova books, which I haven’t really done much with in a while.

It’s probably not going to make much sense to anyone who hasn’t read my books, but who cares?  That’s not the point.  I may or may not put it up somewhere for people to read, but it may have some stuff from projects that are either unfinished or unpublished, so it might be a little obtuse even for the fans.  However, it seems like a really fun project, one that I can really run with, and that’s all that really matters for nanowrimo.

As far as my other projects go, right now I’m working on a heroic fantasy novel that’s a prequel of sorts to The Sword Bearer.  I have no idea where it’s going to go, but I’m taking a page from my favorite writer of all time (David Gemmell), with lots of violence, lots of blood, and lots of true grit and heroism.

At the same time, I’m still working on Sons of the Starfarers off and on, though I may end up putting that one on hold for a while as I figure things out with this heroic fantasy story.  It will get done, though–it’s definitely a story I’m itching to tell.  In a couple of reviews and emails, readers have asked whether I’ll ever write an origin story for the Hameji.  Well, that’s what Sons of the Starfarers is going to be, though the connection might not happen until well into the series.

There’s a couple of other Gaia Nova books I’ve been meaning to write for a long, long time, but I don’t know if I’ll be able to get to them anytime soon.  This nanowrimo project might spark something, though, since I’ll be revisiting a lot of those old characters.  And even if the nanowrimo novel itself is pretty bad, if it gets those projects on the back burner simmering again, then that will definitely be something.

Dang, I really want to get started with nanowrimo now!  So many wacky ideas … it’s like writing fanfiction for one of your own books!  In any case, I’d better get back to writing before I get too excited.  Don’t want to spend so much time thinking about writing that it becomes hard when I actually sit down to do it.

Later!

Laying the groundwork for a couple new series

So I just got back from vacation at Cape Cod, which turned out completely different from what I’d expected.  When I left, I said that I’d probably just write like I usually do, except in a different place.  Instead, I took a break from my WIPs long enough to catch a new vision for my career and come up with a really good idea for a new spin-off series in the same universe as Star Wanderers.

The story idea is really awesome.  I don’t want to talk about it too much, since I haven’t even written it yet, but the main characters will be Isaac and Aaron from Benefactor, and the basic premise will start out fairly similar to Outworlder.  From there, though, I expect it to take shape in some very different ways, turning into much more of an epic space opera.

I plan to stick with the novella series format, since I’ve had a lot of success with that so far.  I know that some readers complain about shorter works, but when doing a series of this type, it’s important to put out new titles regularly, and I can do that much easier with novellas than with novels.  Besides, there are a lot of other reasons why I prefer novellas, as I pointed out in this post.

That said, I expect these ones to run a little longer, such as the 30k-40k word (90-140 page) range.  But I won’t really know until I’ve written them.

Before that, I’ve got two more Star Wanderers stories to put out: Reproach (Part VII) and Deliverance (Part VIII).  Both of those are already written; I just have to run them by my first readers and make some revisions before putting them out.  If all goes well, Reproach should be out in September and Deliverance should be out in October.

So that’s the plan.  Career-wise, what I really need to do is replicate the success of Star Wanderers by starting some new storylines that follow the same series format.  It’s a little unnerving, since I don’t know what will stick, but I don’t want to be dependent on just one series–you’ve got to have multiple entry points.  Besides, this new series is a spinoff, so hopefully readers from the first one will carry over.

It’s at this point that I’m hitting myself, because what I really need is to have three books that I can release before Christmas.  In general, I’ve found that it’s better to wait until you have three books out before you make the first in a series permanently free.  I wish I’d spent a lot more time this summer writing new things, rather than revising old stuff or finishing up old series.  But oh well–better to start now than wait until next year.  And who knows?  Maybe I can still pull it off.

For this new series, I plan to invest a little more in cover art.  The NASA images have been good for Star Wanderers, but to really hit the publishing trifecta (title, cover, blurb), I need to commission some original art.  I have the money now, and probably the best thing I can do at this point is reinvest it.  Expect those covers to be awesome.

Oh, and the other elements of the trifecta?  I don’t have a blurb yet, but the working title is Sons of the Starfarers.  Pretty cool, eh?

So there’s that.  I’m currently revising Reproach, but I think I can finish that on the train and send it out to my beta readers before the end of August.  As for The Sword Bearer, I’m going to put that project on hold again, mostly so I can focus on this.  I’ve also been running into some problems with that project, mostly having to do with the worldbuilding.

For that reason, I’m thinking of doing a series of prequel novellas in order to flesh out that world and the backstory.  If it goes well, that should turn into its own thing, kind of like how Star Wanderers fleshes out the background for my Gaia Nova books.  I’m thinking of something along the lines of David Gemmell: heroic fantasy with a real focus on courage, valor, and unlikely heroism.  I’ve already got the first scene of the first book in my head, and it’s pretty dang awesome.

So many stories, so little time … I’d better get back to writing!