Novels Flow like Rivers from the Ocean of My Overactive Mind

How's that for a blog title? It's practically a whole article's worth of things to think about in just a few short words. Chew on it, people. Just chew until the gristle and fat melt in the heat between your teeth.

Seriously, though, I have been churning out the tales since the summer of 2012. I am in the final stage of prepping Mary of Cosmos for publication. That fun stage is called "compiling the errata," and it involves combing through every paragraph looking for typos that might have slipped through the cracks.

It is typically at this stage that I get absolutely sick of the novel I'm working on. Eventually, a mild fondness will return, right around the time it actually gets published. And then I will find things in the published manuscript that I wish I'd written differently or better, and I will lose some of that mild fondness for a long time.

And that, folks, is how it goes for each novel.

By the way, my editor had this to say about the Mary of the Aether series: "I have to tell you, I have LOVED working on this series. It is one of my absolute favorites! I’m pushing my 14-year-old son to read it, even if the titles all start with 'Mary.' He is a big fantasy buff and I think he would really enjoy the character developments and interactions. I could definitely see this series doing well if it just catches on like it should!"


I do believe that could be considered a ringing endorsement. I'll take what I can get.

Anywho, the last book I completed, you might recall, was a post-apocalyptic tale called Fading Man, the story of a man with memories of a place he's never been. His long journey to find this place brings him into a dangerous wasteland called Tockland. That's what we call the setup. Obviously, there is a lot more to it, including Pradeep and scadglings and bleakness.

That novel is currently being shopped around, which means I have queried every single literary agent and publisher in the known universe.

In the meantime, I have begun yet another novel. It will be novel number eleven. Yes, I've churned out ten novels since 2012. Why stop now? For the latest one, I'm returning to the fantasy genre with a book that is tentatively titled The Vale of Ghosts. If written well, it will be haunting, a bit creepy, and ultimately awe-inspiring. If not written well, it will grasp for those things and fall short. We shall see!

For the record, the ten novels I've written since 2012 are (in the order I wrote them): Mary of the Aether, Mary of Shadows, Shadows of Tockland, Bloodstone, A Whisper in the Void, Garden of Dust and Thorns, Mary of Starlight, Mary of Cosmos, Children of the Mechanism and Fading Man.

Now for a brief plug. If you haven't read Children of the Mechanism, check it out. It's dark, compelling, troubling, but ultimately hopeful, full of harrowing scenes set in the dark and dangerous passageways of a massive factory. We're talking hideous killer robots, strange machines, troubling revelations, and desperate escapes. If you buy it from the publisher's link, it's just $7.75, and that price includes both paperback and ebook.

There you go. Back to grinding through the paragraphs to root out typos. Fun!