Welcome to the final part of my retrospective series of blog posts covering the events of my past decade! As you know if you’ve been following the series, I’ve been covering all the ups and downs of the past decade and the events that influenced my writing over the past ten years. This is part five of the series of posts. If you missed the past parts of the series, you can read them here:
Part One | Part Two | Part Three | Part Four
Click the link below to continue reading the fifth part of this series!
In 2018, I started writing again in earnest, which was a big deal for me, because (as you’ve seen), I wasn’t doing much writing in the preceding few years, probably due to being entirely too busy to squeeze in any writing and prioritizing other activities over it. What I think really helped with getting back into the swing of things was when Permuted Press and I hit on the idea of a seventh anniversary new edition of The Becoming, in which the novellas from the previously published The Becoming: Origins (the Permuted Press edition from 2015) were spliced into the book appropriately. We ended up using just The Becoming: Brothers in Arms (Theo and Gray Carter’s novella) and The Becoming: Deliverance (Remy Angellette’s novella) and cutting them into the first half of the book, then going from front to back on the entire book and cleaning it up, tightening the sentences and language, making a few tweaks here and there, that sort of thing. The end result was a manuscript that had been much closer to what I had originally envisioned way back in 2010 when I first started writing the book—but ended up having to cut down due to overall genre expectations. This new version of The Becoming was released on the seventh anniversary of the original edition’s release, in November 2018.
This sort of gave me a little bit of a bug for writing, and I started revising some of the books I had written and not released yet. I began studying up on proper marketing and release techniques, and I started working on a release schedule for 2019 and 2020 (which has dramatically changed and pretty much continues to do so each month). The writing and releasing really escalated beginning in summer 2019.
In July, I republished the original novella edition of The Becoming: Origins, partly because why not? But also because I was working on drafting a quick get-it-out-of-my-head copy of The Becoming: Bloodlines, which will be the next book in the series and which, in rewrites, doesn’t look a thing like the super rough draft I wrote in July.
In August, I released the first part of The Deadening, entitled Collapse. This is a project that has been festering in the back of my mind since 2012, and I figured it was about time it saw the light of day. I’ll be releasing the rest of the parts over the first several months of 2020.
In September, I (re)published The Unnaturals at the very end of the month. The reception seems to have been good—or, at least, my sales are better than they were the first time I released it, which is probably a pretty good indicator of reception.
And then, in November, I republished Hellforged, which is the second book in The Unnaturals Series. The reception on that one has been similar to The Unnaturals, which makes me supremely happy, especially since I have plans for the rest of the series.
And I decided to take December off from active releases while I worked on the releases for the first quarter of 2020.
Which brings me to a quick look forward at 2020. This year is going to be a wild one for sure. My plans are probably pretty ambitious, and I’m hopeful that I can keep up with everything.
So far, I am intending to release Wicked Creatures, the third book in The Unnaturals Series, in January, with the fourth book, Reapers, coming in March and the fifth book, Equinox Rising, in May. I’m not sure at this point if there are going to be any books beyond book five. I’m leaning towards yes, if only because I do have some ideas I’d like to play with in that universe that I think would be really interesting not only for me to write but for you guys to read!
I’m also loosely anticipating releasing The Becoming: Bloodlines in April, if not sooner. This book is giving me fits. I’ve had to rewrite and start over a few times, mainly because I have to get reacquainted with some of the characters and their emotional quirks. That has proven to take more time than I thought it would, tbh. (I will definitely keep you guys posted on the progress of this over on my FB page.)
In addition to releases in The Unnaturals and The Becoming, I’m on schedule for a prequel trilogy for The Unnaturals Series, with the books titled Nightfall (a re-release, coming in June), Revenant in July, and Cursed in August. These books involve werewolves, poltergeists, and a witch-sorcerer power couple who gets their hate on for the main characters.
I’m also aiming to release The Hollow Men in September. This is, at current, a standalone novel with a premise I don’t want to share yet, but trust me, you are going to love it. It will definitely be me jumping back into some of the horror-style writing I’ve done in the past with The Becoming Series, and I think you guys will enjoy it. Depending on how the writing and reception goes on this one, I’ll explore turning it into a series if it warrants it. I’m just not hanging my hat on the idea yet.
And then, in October, I’ll be releasing the first of a new series called Marked by Darkness (series of the same name). Book two, Elysium Burning, is loosely sketched for November, with the third book, Babylon Falling, scheduled for December. This series is going to be based in The Unnaturals Universe, but it will feature all-new characters dealing with a completely new scenario/issue. (Think Venom meets Supernatural, if you want a teensy teaser lol.)
So that pretty much covers my decade and looks forward to my (likely) overly ambitious 2020 plans. What do you guys think? Are you looking forward to the next year’s releases?