The Space Trooper’s trilogy was a fun change of pace. Prior to starting, I’d never worked with another author to create a story, nor had I worked with a publisher. I can say without reserve that working with Rachel Aukes was one of the highlights of my writing career. To share thoughts with another creative and then struggle to mold a story from often disparate ideas was quite a lot of fun. Also, Rachel is just fun to hang out with. It’s fair to say that we forged a long lasting friendship that we both treasure.
If you haven’t yet started on the Space Troopers trilogy, I’d highly recommend checking it out. I don’t like spoilers, but it’s not much of a giveaway that this is a coming-of-age story of twins separated at birth who come together to fight tyranny.
Here’s a bit of a surprise, though. Rachel and I decided to mix things up and I ended up writing Peyton’s story and Rachel wrote Jai’s, which is a gender reversal for us. I personally love writing strong female heros and Peyton is probably the most powerful character I’ve written or at a miinimum, she’s willing to step over lines most of my characters have avoided. You’ll have to let me know if you think she goes too far. Rachel is more comfortable writing complex male characters and she did a fantastic job with Jai.
As to working with a publisher. There’s one thing that stands out to me when thinking of my experience with Aethon. Rhett and Steve (co-owners) are highly driven, high quality people. I consider them as friends and imagine we’ll have a project or two in the future, who knows?
It wouldn’t be a newsletter without talk of current project progress and a prediction of what’s coming next. Most authors creat annual calendars and know at least a year out what they’re working on. I didn’t choose the adjective fickle for my company name arbitrarily. Stating what I’ll do in three months is nothing but a guess for me. I change my mind regularly and really just go where the muse drags me.
What’s that mean for releases? Well, there’s very good news. A yet unnamed Privateer Tales #20 is 85% written and I’ll finish the rough draft in February. That probably means it’ll be released in April, not March like I’d hoped. Also, I’m about 75% rough draft on my next gamelit / LitRPG, Wizard Prince, which is in the same universe as Drakon Prince. I’d hoped to have that out in February. What was I thinking? So no, that’s not going to happen, but I will finish it and probably release in the second quarter of 2022.
You’d think with all this going on, I wouldn’t be thinking about my next project. I am. I have three contenders for my attention. #1 – next Junkyard. #2 – first book in a Privateer Tales spinoff, #3 – Oldest Starfighter. Each project is exciting in their own way and I won’t know which is on top until I complete Privateer Tales #20.
I hope you’re staying well. Janet and I have been a little under the weather this week but we seem to be on the mend. And since it’s 11 degrees outside, I find it hard to complain too much about being stuck inside.
I hope this newsletter finds you well.
Here’s a link to Rebel’s Strike – https://fickledragon.com/rebels-strike-amazon/
Happy Reading,
Jamie
