Space Opera With a Twist

Month: March 2022

Seasons

According to the calendar, it’s Spring in the Great White North, but Old Man Winter never gives up without a fight. After a week or so of balmy weather, we’re back into the freeze with light snow drifting down on this Sunday. Tomorrow will be equally chilly, but looking at the long range forecast, this is very likely winter’s last gasp in these parts until the end of the year. But when you’re immersed in other realities, such as the Ashes of Empire saga, does the passing of the seasons truly matter? And I’ve been living in that universe daily. Progress has been steady if not always rapid, but I’m past the one-third mark and closing in on halfway there. A June publication date seems reasonably realistic.

Other things are moving along as well. All of Decker’s War, Ashes of Empire, Constabulary Casefiles, and Ghost Squadron, have been published in Large Print Editions (available through your favorite book seller), and the Siobhan Dunmoore books are well on their way — in the next few days, the first four will come out in Large Print with the rest to follow in the first week of April. Speaking of Dunmoore, in my idle moments, I’ve begun kicking around story ideas, since she’s next on my work plan, once I’ve completed Imperial Ghosts. I have a particular goal in mind for the culmination of that series, and it just remains to be determined how I’ll get there, but that culmination will set the scene for Decker, Caelin Morrow, and Ghost Squadron.

Happy Spring to those in the northern hemisphere, happy Autumn to those in the southern. Stay safe, stay healthy, and stay at peace, fellow humans.

Marching Along

I don’t know whether time passes more rapidly as you get older, or your perception of time shifts into higher gear, but my – it’s already been three weeks since my latest book came out and we’re just over two weeks away from the official start of spring. As I got up this morning, I was reflecting that it seemed only yesterday when we last heard the honking of the geese headed south. And before we know it, they’ll be headed north again. Not that you can tell looking outside. It’s still snowy, icy, and cold around here, but the weather channel says daytime temperatures are about to head above freezing as early as tomorrow and pretty much stay there (with the occasional dip). The sun, however, is visibly higher, warmer, brighter, and sticks around longer, signaling the equinox is only two weeks away.

I’m making steady, if unspectacular progress on my next novel, Ashes of Empire: Imperial Ghosts, which now sits roughly between the one-fifth and one-quarter completion mark. I’d say you can expect it late May or early June at this rate. After that, I’m planning on the next Siobhan Dunmoore for a fall publication date. Hopefully, the world will look a lot better by then. And that, as they once said, is all the news that’s fit to print.

Stay safe and healthy, fellow humans. Peace.