It's been a while. I'm sorry for the radio silence. I'd love to say that I've been off traveling the Mediterranean and taking pictures of all the magnificent architecture, but sadly, I've been just plopped in front of the keyboard, grinding away at my new series.
My goal, much like with my last series, is to write the entire series before I start to publish any of it, mostly due to my terror of ending up like Rothfuss or Martin, unable to find the ending to my story after the first chunk is already out in the wild, or, worse, like Jordan, dying before I get to finish it. So far, I've written ten books in the series, three trilogies and a spinoff, and I'm currently plotting out the final trilogy. Let me tell you, trying to tie everything up for a series of this length is a bit of a nightmare. I sympathize with Rothfuss and Martin, and I've only been plotting this trilogy for the last month.
I thought I'd take a minute and let you all know a little of what this next series is about. Like my first series, this is a blend of sci-fi and fantasy elements, in this case a dystopian surveillance state and a range of special abilities that could be considered either superpowers or magic, depending on how one wanted to draw the distinction. There's a kid who is technically not an orphan and a prophecy about the end of the world, a magical sword and jetpacks.
This series is heavily informed by the several years I spent living with a gang member and drug dealer, and the narrative follows this boy as he engages in criminal life. For those interested in such, there are detailed descriptions on how to commit various crimes, from shoplifting to manufacturing explosives.
I tried to do something a little bit different in this series, and my beta readers seem to think it's working. The thing is, my main character has an internal dialogue of three distinct personas who discuss his every thought, frequently bickering and disagreeing. This was actually the first part of the series I came up with, before I even knew what the plot or characters were about.
With that being said, let's take a quick look at a sample from the first book in the series.
Author's Note
Welcome, dear loved one, to what our Lady was partial to calling her Little Bed and Breakfast at the End of the Universe.
First, you must know that She has gone, and no force either real or conceivable could compel Her return.
It may be but a minor consolation, but you should know that your search has not been in vain. Those intense memories tinged with the stringent aftertaste of fear and the empty brush of real death—they were an intentional cultivation during the careful and considered pruning of the Foundational Narrative. Those sparse sparks of passion were infused for the express purpose of drawing us here, those who would question, because the reality is that our core remembrance of things past is, by design, not the remembrance of things as they were.
This account is the fulfillment of that remembrance, the rest of the story about where we began, what we have been. Much of what follows will be difficult to read, perhaps painful, for even thousands of years after the lines were first put to page, the song of our youth was ever a song of arms and rage.
You must be wondering why this account exists only in these archaic texts buried in a bungalow beneath kilometers of ice here at the end of the universe. The first answer is complicated. The second, stronger, and simpler answer is that I was asked to record the story like this.
Please. He always did love to read books, She told me, even after we could stream information through our portals.
Please, said She who had borne witness to the birth and death of ages, and so I have, and for that I will not apologize.
Specific details—and even much of the general course of events—were pruned from the Archive, but the ending of this story is known. Merely because a story is a tragedy, though, doesn’t mean all was lost. A remnant of the species did survive those fires that sparked our rise, but those who lived this story did not call it the Coherence as their world was burning down around them. They called it by the old name. Read on, if you would learn their story.
Read on, if you would learn how we survived the Ragnarok.
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