Wow, was 2018 busy for me as a writer. It may not show as I signed on with Clayborn Press to do some of the heavy lifting on my science fiction work, but I managed to get all of the planned Compact Universe into revision as well as resurrect the Jim Winter pen name and its crime fiction. Northcoast Shakedown is not out with the second and third Nick Kepler novels, Second Hand Goods and Bad Religion, as well as a standalone caper, Road Rules due out soon.
So what will you see from me in 2019?
Right now, I’m getting Jim back into circulation. So the first four novels of that salvo will take us through March. In April, I’ll resume handing off the Compact Universe to Clayborne Press with Broken Skies (which requires some unexpected cleanup. Oops.), Warped, and Tishla, followed by this arc debuting in a single volume called The Homefront Arc in July. In August, I’ll move over Second Wave, then resume new work with the final three novellas, The Amortals, The Exile, and Flight Blade, which comprise the Gathering Storm Arc. In December, we’ll pile that into one volume, as well as release No Marigolds in the Promised Land as a paperback. Aaaand…
In the lead up to Storming Amargosa, I’ll be serializing a new novella, Among Wolves, in the newsletter. So if you subscribe before then, you can get a little inside information about the final piece of the Amargosa Trilogy.
But what will I be writing this year?
For starters, Storming Amargosa requires some major additions and revisions to line it up with the previous three novellas now awaiting revisions and beta. So that will be a major time suck. Also, I am currently shopping Holland Bay to agents. Since I don’t want to get caught with my pants down, I’ve already started the follow-up, call The Ridge. Yes, it most definitely will need one or two more trips across the keyboard, maybe a professional copy edit (if a major publisher gifts me with a budget for that) by my former editor, the talented Stacy Robinson (Keep that in the back of your mind, Stacy. I might be calling you later this year!), and a few brutal betas. That will be followed by another crime novel, the first Nick Kepler novel since 2012’s Bad Religion and Kepler story since 2014’s Gypsy’s Kiss. This will be for a bigger small press than Clayborn, a little seasoning for Holland Bay as it makes rounds to major publishers. In reality, it’s at the request of my wife, who is a major Nick Kepler fan. Happy wife, happy life. The only detail I will give is that it’s 2005 and Nick is in New Orleans. You do the math.
“But what,” you ask, “about science fiction?”
Glad you asked that! While the Compact Universe is probably done for a while (Fear not, new stuff will carry you into 2020!), I do want my science fiction work to carry me into major press as well. To that end, I have the first of a prequel trilogy planned, a novel of wormholes and accidental exploration (and where that cult to Marilyn Monroe got started) entitled Down the Rabbit Hole. I’ll work on that after I finish my business in Monticello, Ohio, and with Nick Kepler in New Orleans.
If all goes well, I should be able to lay the groundwork for the third Holland Bay novel, tentatively called Harbourtown. And who knows. Maybe I’ll be doing three novels in 2020 as well! But believe it or not, this has not been nearly as busy as 2018 was. There was a point where I didn’t think I’d get all the remaining Compact Universe books in the can. Now?
Who knows? I even now have time to write short stories.
Or do I?