Omega: The Girl in the Box, Book 5
Crusader: The Sanctuary Series, Volume Four
(Title Withheld): The Girl in the Box, Book 6
Thy Father's Shadow: A Sanctuary Novella
Enemies: The Girl in the Box, Book 7
(New Series, Book 1)
(Title Withheld): The Sanctuary Series, Volume Five
Legacy: The Girl in the Box, Book 8
(New Series, Book 2)
Revelations: The Girl in the Box, Book 9
(Girl in the Box Book 10 to follow very early 2014)
Yeah, I know. I only released...what? Six books this year? Maybe not even. Let's see...Alone, Champion, Untouched, Soulless, Family and a couple short stories. But in fairness I also wrote half of Crusader and all of Omega, and I've really upped the amount of words I can write per day in the last month or so, where now I can just about double my previous daily output. So there's that.
Tell you what, rabid fans. If you don't hold me to it, I'll try for ten again this year (and if you try to hold me to it but I back off of it for my own reasons, you'll find holding me accountable about as easy as nailing jello to the wall. Good luck!). And since I've been full time as a writer for almost a year now, and I've learned a few tricks in the last twelve months, I think I might be able to pull it off this round. There are a few potential snags, of course, as there always are in any massive undertaking. One of them is that the Girl in the Box books are only going to get bigger from here on out, starting with book 7, as I start wrapping up the overarching plot to the series and bringing all the threads together. Same with Sanctuary; Book 4 is going to be big, Book 5 is likely to be the same or bigger, taking us into Game of Thrones territory with the size of the volumes. Another potential snag is that editing is taking me longer nowadays, because I pace myself on it to keep my sanity (I don't love editing the way I do fresh writing). My sanity may seem like an insignificant trade-off to you for faster releases, but I assure that for me, it is not.
As you can see up there, I'm also starting a new series. But why, you ask? Why would I do this to you - make you suffer, you poor unfortunate Sanctuary and Girl in the Box fans, who want nothing more than to see each of those respective series come to an end, so you never have to read one of my damned, torturous stories again...oh, wait. I hope that's not how you feel, though I'm sure you want me to get to it (it being the satisfying conclusion of the whole saga). Well, I'd like to get to it also, but I'd also like to broaden my career a little bit so I'm not a two-trick pony. More details on the new series to follow, but it'll be something different, something in the urban fantasy space but way, way far from Girl in the Box territory, and something I think hasn't been done quite like I'm going to do it.
There should still be plenty enough to keep both of the armed camps (please don't turn into Team Cyrus and Team Sienna) that are currently nestled outside my castle walls (boiling oil and sharpening of weapons well underway) happy in 2013. If not, alas...I can only do so much. Even if I could pull a James Patterson and hire an army of ghost writers to flesh out these books and write them for me so they could be churned out like some sort of bizarre Robert J. Crane factory of writing, I wouldn't. This is my stuff, and I'm kind of picky about it. Also, possibly a control freak.
Anyway, these are my plans. You'll notice there are no dates attached to anything. Why not? Because I never know when things are quite going to be ready and rather than arbitrarily assign a date which I may miss (and which will then cause me angst) I just release them when they're done. Sure, I could hold out on you, but why? When they're finished I turn them loose. About a month before they're ready I have a general idea, and I suggest when they might be out. Sign up for the newsletter and you'll never miss one (unless you send my emails to the spam bucket). I also tend to mention them on Facebook and Twitter, maybe even a blog post (which reminds me, when Girl in the Box 5 comes out, there will be a dedicated blog post here for people to weigh in with discussion in the comments section, VERY spoiler-heavy because of what goes on in the book - it's something new I'm going to be doing from here on out so you all can fight amongst yourselves - err, I mean so we can create a community). There are plenty of ways to keep apprised of what's going on in release world, and I try to make it easy for all of you, who I assume have lives, families, friends, work, etc to be keeping up with, to know when something new comes out. I'd like to make it easier, but outside of assigning those arbitrary dates and holding out on you until the date rolls around, I don't know how I could. For example, I think Omega will be out in mid to late January. If I wanted to be safe, I'd just say it'll be out February 14th. None of you would love me for that, even if it is Valentine's day, would you? So let's just say it'll be out by the end of January and call it good.
That's about all I've got for now. I'm sure this is going to make a few of you happy, a few of you may be upset ("WTFzorz only 3 books where is the Sanctuary love?!") and a few of you confused (Heather Rodefer is currently marking on her monitor with a purple pen to correct all the spelling and grammatical errors I have made thus far in the post) but I hope most of you fall into the first camp rather than the second (angry much?) or the third (crazy, just crazy, I tell you). I'm hoping to migrate more and more of you to the first camp as the year goes by, but if I fail then I'm sure that Heather would love to have all of you join her.
Actually...trying to publish ten books in one year? I might be the one who ends up there. Crazy? It could be the new normal.
Oh, well. Happy 2013, everyone!
Crusader: The Sanctuary Series, Volume Four and Broken: The Girl in the Box, Book 6 - Coming June 2013!
Thank you so much for two fantastic series of books. I started with Girl in the Box, polished those off pretty rapidly and moved onto Sanctuary. I read between 2 and 3 books a week, so I'm always on the look out for great serials as they keep me going for a bit longer. I loved Girl from the start and wasn't sure if I could love Sanctuary the same way, BUT by the time I got to book 3 I was so hooked I couldn't put it down and now my husband is sick of me yacking on about smart arsed trolls and acerbic elves. Anyway, just wanted to say thanks and I can't wait for the next release!
ReplyDeleteThank you! It's always nice to hear when someone enjoys your work, and even moreso when it leads them to a series that they didn't think they'd like. I just hope I can hit the goals I've got laid out for this year because I really don't want to let anyone down.
ReplyDeleteHaving waited for writers like Jean M. Auel, George R R Martin and Stephen King to take years to publish their next instalment, I can honestly say I will always follow a serial if the work is good enough. In only one case have I abandoned a series and that was due to the deterioration of the story and the writing rather than the wait for a resolution. I don't care if you take longer to publish, as long as the story is still quality, and surprising, and moving and all the other things a good book should be.
DeleteThank you for taking the time to respond. I have author aspirations, currently filed under 'At Some Point in the Future.' To hear back from someone who is making a successful living from great writing is inspiring!
I'm trying desperately hard to go in the other direction, to get books out faster (and spending more time on quality control as things go on, rather than less). I'm hoping I never get to the point where I degenerate, but I really hope if I do, someone will step up and let me know. Most of the stories are plotted in advance, I tend to know mostly how it's going to end, and I like to think that keeps me from retreading old ground or getting boring from hitting the same points over and over. I hope it does, anyway.
DeleteAnd I really appreciate the kind words. I consider myself fortunate every day to be able to make a living doing what I love. I also know that if you had asked me three years ago if I'd be doing this right now, the answer would have been an unequivocal no. At best, I might have conceded that someday I would have written a novel. That was on my bucket list, somewhere. So you never know, really. Things can change fast.
I'm absolutely in love with both series BUT at the moment I'm definitely in the "WTFzorz only 3 books where is the Sanctuary love?!" camp - We (husband, wife & 3 kids) are avid players of a little known game called World of Warcraft & the Sanctuary series makes me lol at all the guild drama seeing as we deal with it too - It strikes very close to the heart & I love the series very much for that - PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE show Sanctuary a little more book love this year - 2 books & a novella compared to 5 Girl in the Box books makes me cry inside
ReplyDeleteAppearances can be deceiving. I know how it looks on the surface, but that's gonna be close to 650,000 words for Sanctuary with those three books versus probably 500,000 for Girl in the Box for those five, if I get everything out. Girl in the Box books are just shorter, even if I do bring the word count up for them like I intend to going forward. From here on out the Sanctuary books are going to get bigger for a few, the plots are just growing in complexity as I'm trying to chase down, grow, and wrap up multiple threads. I'm going to write as many of them as I can this year.
DeleteWoW, huh? Played that once or twice myself.
If you don't give sanctuary more sweet luvin I will hunt you down, tie you to a chair and force you to read book after book of the worst grammatically horrendous novels I can find. My wife is an author, and nothing pisses her off more than that lol.
ReplyDeleteBut seriously......LOVE the sanctuary series. I read all three books in a day and a half and can honestly say you're one of my new favorite authors. So when I got to the end of book three, witih that intense ending and found out you were taking a break to work on girl in the box I was..............a tad bit upset (I actually yelled the words "YOU CAN'T LEAVE ME HANGING LIKE THAT!!!!). Keep up the good work and I hope to read more from you.
KEN
Your threat is making me wish I'd used a pen name to keep myself hidden, Ken, because that would be PAINFUL. I'm glad you like the Sanctuary books, and I understand about leaving you guys dangling over the cliff. I feel bad about it, really I do. But I would offer you a couple points:
ReplyDelete1) The Girl in the Box series is allowing me to make a very nice (okay, better than very nice, lately) living as a full-time author. It's paying very, very well. I keep a detailed spreadsheet, and so far this year I've sold 273 Sanctuary books and 3,301 Girl in the Box books. If I had to make a living on Sanctuary, I couldn't, which means I'd be doing another form of work, which means I doubt I'd even get one Sanctuary book out a year based on how big they're getting. By the time Crusader comes out, it'll have been about 9 months since the release of Champion, and it's a staggeringly big book. Heather Rodefer is the only one who's read what I have so far, and she swears it's the best one yet.
2) So far, between Defender (92,000 words), Avenger (122,000 words), Champion (147,000 words), Savages (11,000) and A Familiar Face (2400) I've published about 374,000 words of Sanctuary. Even if I only got out Crusader (will be about 300,000) and Thy Father's Shadow (will be somewhere between 40,000-60,000, I think) you'll essentially see the size of the series double this year. If I manage to get Master out, you'll see it triple, because I bet Master is another 300,000 word doorstopper. How big is 300,000 words? It's roughly the same size as George R.R. Martin's A Game of Thrones or Robert Jordan's Eye of the World. 800 pages.
And I'm sorry, but because it's an eight book series, Volume Four will end on a slight cliffhang note. No avoiding it, really. Anyway, hang on, it won't be too terribly long and you'll be agitating for the next book. Which will be called...
Oops. Not yet.
I just realized I outed the title of book five earlier in that reply. This is what happens when you don't sleep enough. Well, let me put it together for you in case anyone missed it.
DeleteMaster: The Sanctuary Series, Book Five