I’ve never been happier to see a year end and a new year begin. Serious illness laid my family and myself low several times and then we lost two of our kitties. All I wanted from 2014 was to survive to 2015.
That achievement unlocked, like everyone else in January, I’m taking stock of the new year.
I’ve decided this is the year where I jump off the cliff.
First, I’m talking more openly about the challenges my family faces as our kids deal with autism and other special needs issues. I put so much of this into Phoenix Inheritance that talking about it is unavoidable.
I want this book to get as much audience as it can because, if a fictional version of my story can reach and help people, then all that blood on the page is worth it.
I had three new books come out last year, shining bright spots amid the chaos.
This year, I have one new book, Phoenix Inheritance, coming out on March 3, and The Curse of the Brimstone Contract and Ghost Phoenix will be coming out in paperback. But after that, nothing is on my publishing schedule.
Why?
Because I’m writing something new, something I’ve wanted to write for two years and put it off because other writing obligations and health issues had priority.
It’s time.
The tentatively-named The Crystal Tower is an urban fantasy, a modern-day Arthurian tale set in a city on the verge of falling apart, like Detroit, or my fictional Charlton City in Luminous and Ghosts of Christmas Past. The lead is Aurelia (Lia) Artos and there’s an equivalent to the Holy Grail and Excalibur involved. No vampires, no werewolves or other shifters, no witches, etc. There is an element of a Cherokee legend that, I hope, adds an entirely new twist to the familiar story.Someone mentioned Neil Gaiman’s American Gods to me as a possible influence and I put my fingers in my ears because I haven’t read it and now I don’t want to read it because while Gaiman is awesome at whatever he does, I have to do what I do without trying to imitate him.
I’m only half-finished with the rough draft so I’m reluctant to say more but I know that the events that happened in Ferguson, Missouri are filtering into this tale. I’m not going to duck racial politics but meet them head on. To do otherwise would be a slap in the face of those dealing with this in their daily lives.
I’m not sure what’ll happen after I jump off this cliff.
I may crash and burn.
But I know that the way down is going to be glorious.
Oh, did I mention I also want to write a novella that goes with the steampunk, The Curse of the Brimstone Contract? And it will have a romance with characters over 40? Yes, one appeared in Curse and one is mentioned numerous times. I have it outlined.
And I have to finish that comic book horror mini-series that’s been on the back-burner. That one scares me to write.
All the more reason to add it to this year.