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What’s after The Day Magic Died? (Part 2)

7 Jan

With my series wrapping up in the first half of 2014, I wanted to share some ideas I’ve been working on for the second half of the year. Yesterday I shared a concept I’m calling The Dancer of the Red Sands. Today, it’s …

The Messenger of Allengia: At age 48, Jek has finally decided that it’s time to step out Messengerof the saddle as a Messenger of the goddess of truth, and become an abbot of his order. He welcomes the summons from the Temple of Allengia in Tilaundia. But he isn’t offered a posting; he’s given his most important message ever. It’s a message so important that he’ll be accompanied by two other Messengers: the boy he calls Biscuit, and the imposing mute, Hizardin. Because the last five solo messengers have failed.

This is another series that is intended to be a trilogy, but could actually end up being longer.

I have a fairly detailed summary for the first book drafted, and have written about 6,000 words.

Tomorrow: Truetouch

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What’s after The Day Magic Died? (Part 1)

6 Jan

With the fourth of five books coming out in February, and the fifth one due out in May, I’ve been thinking about and even working on what comes next.

So this week I’m going to share some story ideas with you to see what you think. At the end I’ll try to post a poll (never done that before), but feel free to share your thoughts along the way.

Let’s start with …

Dancer of the Red Sands: Farmers band together and Ferals stand alone, as people try to find some way to survive. The Beasts have overrun their land, and it falls to Tisa – an outcast Feral, now also disowned by the farm family who took her in – to set out in search of the army that was supposed to come and vanquish the Beasts.

This is a trilogy at this point. Just bear in mind that when I started The Day Magic Died, I thought it would be one book and it turned into five. But that doesn’t mean a planned trilogy will come out as fifteen books. I hope.

I have about 18,000 words written in the first book of this series, and about 5,000 written in the second book. I have a fairly detailed summary of the storyline completed as well.

Tomorrow: The Messenger of Allengia

What do you think of the Dancer of the Red Sands idea?

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What’s ahead in 2014

2 Jan

the-man-with-two-eyes-kindle-coverWhat would you think if I told you I already have 11 more books under way?

I’m going to go out on a limb and guess, “Finish The Day Magic Died series first!”

If that was your thought, you need not worry. The final two books in that series are among the first three or four books I plan to complete in 2014.

In fact, the plan for the first half of the year is pretty much set in … well, perhaps dried mud. It’s not really fluid, but it’s not exactly stone either:

February: The Dwarf’s Legacy, book four of The Day Magic Died.

March: The Man with Two Eyes, a Nascent Payne Mystery. This novella (under 30,000 words, compared to about 90,000 words for each of novels in my series) is the second in the series, The Hunt for the Wallaby.

May: The fifth and final book of the series The Day Magic Died. I am now ready to unveil the likely final name for this book: The White Silver House. Oh, and I’ve saved the best for last. This final novel will likely top 120,000 words, or about one-third longer than each of the other books in the series.

June: The third novella in The Hunt for the Wallaby series is due out. That may wrap up the series, or it may go into a fourth book. Not sure yet …

But even if The Hunt for the Wallaby goes into a fourth novella, that leaves the rest of the year as an open book. So what am I going to do?

I’m going to ask you to help me decide. All next week, I’ll be giving you brief synopses of upcoming book ideas, and asking you tell me what you think. This should be fun …

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A glance back before we drive forward

1 Jan


You readers rock!

As of Jan. 1, 2013, I had never published a single book. I’ve lost count of the number of articles I’ve written for newspapers and magazines and websites – or more accurately, I never kept count. But up until a year ago, never a book.

Now here I am at the beginning of 2014 with four books available on Amazon.com: three novels in my series The Day Magic Died, and a novella, a Nascent Payne Mystery titled The sort-of Murder of Fiona Galloway. (I know, I haven’t talked much about that series … yet.)

To top it all off, there are something like 10,000 copies of my books out there.

Wait, that doesn’t top it all. What tops it all is that you folks helped feed 90 families for a day. Based on the sales of my series in December, Rice & Beans Foundation will be receiving $90 to purchase food for needy families in Nicaragua. Thanks!

I am very grateful to you, my readers, and I promise you two things:

  • More books are coming
  • I will work to improve my writing

Here’s to a good 2014!

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Books Two, Three and Four coming along

2 Jul

Where have I been?

Writing. Not writing blog posts, but writing more of The Day Magic Died series.

As I told you June 21, Book Two, now tentatively titled Karia’s Path, is out to a few critical reader for their input. I’ve heard back from two of the four. One gave me two-and-a-half pages of notes, which is very helpful. She even spotted an issue with the storyline, which gives me an opportunity to fix something I overlooked before I make it available to all of you.

The other critical reader I heard back from? Well, she got so caught up in reading Book Two that she neglected to take any notes. She enjoyed it that much. That’s great, but I sent her back to look through it again and mark it up.

So, two of four down, but three to go. No, I’m not going to rush them. I know you want to read Book Two, but I want to be sure the book is ready for you.

Back in June I also told you I was making progress on the revisions of Book Three, The Hall of the Prophetess. Well, guess what? I finished the revisions, and it’s now awaiting proofreading.

So what am I doing now? You guessed it – I’ve started on the revisions to Book Four, The Legacy of the Dwarf. Because to write epic fantasy fiction, you gotta have a dwarf, right? Well, maybe not. Anyway, I’ve just started. In fact, all I’ve done so far is write a new Chapter One. And I was just looking at it, and it seems kind of flat still.

Ah well.

At least everything is still on track to release Book 2 in September and Book 3 in November. I’ll keep you updated.

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