Another year has turned over! 2015, wow.
I hope this will be a great year for me in terms of completing manuscripts and perhaps starting new ones. Right now I’m working on final (I hope) edits for THE KEEPER OF THE MISTS for Michelle at Knopf, which I hope I will finish today or tomorrow. Then I will immediately switch back to the rewrite of THE MOUNTAIN OF KEPT MEMORY for Navah at Saga. Then I will do the quick revision of the first 100 pages of THE WHITE ROAD OF THE MOON for Michelle and send that to her. By then, I expect Caitlin will have sent me her comments on the current draft of THE WINTER DRAGON, and I will revise that one more time and then send it to Navah. It isn’t due till next spring, but I expect I get it to her before that. Meanwhile, the complete draft of THE WHITE ROAD is due this September, so I’ll need to write the rest of that.
All that and I would still very much like to finish the sequel to HOUSE OF SHADOWS this year. And perhaps start a third BLACK DOG book. So this will be another busy year for me.
What is it that keeps me going with all these layers of rewrites and revisions and so on? It is not the sheer drive to write, believe me. That’s great when it happens, but it’s not something I count on, and it has nothing to do with revision anyway. Partly what keeps me going is a sense of obligation (I have contracts! With deadlines!), but also important are things like this:
Badass Book Reviews’ top reads of 2014
… and all the reviews and comments written by everyone else, all year long. Thank you all.
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The world would be a poorer place without your books. I hope 2015 brings you continued success and that you wish to write for many years to come!
Wow – you’ve got a lot on your plate. I’m sure I’m not your only fan eagerly waiting to get my hands on the finished books!
Thank you, Robert and Cheryl! Yes, this will be a busy year, but thankfully three of the four books under contract are *mostly* finished. I do think of spring break and the summer slowdown in terms of what project I’ll be working on, though!
Happy New Year!
Your books-in-process update emboldens me to ask some questions on that subject, if you don’t mind.
You mention wanting to start a third black dog book, does that mean there is a second book out there, which I haven’t found yet? Or is it somewhere in the publishing process, and is there a projected publishing date known? What is it’s title?
Are all four titles you mention above new standalone books, or are any of them sequels? I really liked the Floating Islands world, and wondered if you would write any more stories in that universe – it seemed to have plenty of room for interesting sequels.
I really liked the City in the Lake too, but it felt complete in itself; maybe because it read a lot like a Patricia McKillip story, and she very rarely writes more than one story in the same setting. Anything else in that style or storyverse would be lovely, of course, but an unexpected pleasure (for me).
Is there an e-book edition of House of Shadows? It’s the only one of your books which I haven’t been able to buy on Kobo, and I wondered if it wasn’t visible/buyable in my region, or if it just isn’t out as an ebook (yet), and I should just go buy it on paper instead of waiting for the ebook to become available.
Ah, the second Black Dog book! Titled PURE MAGIC, btw. That is a slightly more complicated question now than it used to be. Yes, there is a completed 2nd book, which I like a lot. Yes, it is ready to go. I will definitely bring it out myself, but I am waiting to see how the noncompete clause for S&S looks and whether my agent can get me permission to bring it out later this spring, as I intended. I will be letting people know as soon as I can, but contract negotiations can take longer than you’d expect.
A Floating Islands sequel: I guarantee that eventually there will be a sequel. I would even like to write a third book in that world, too. Again, there are questions about just how and when that will happen. I will open the question with RH after the terms of this new contract are met and then we’ll see.
A sequel to CITY: No. I also feel that it is complete as it stands.
House of Shadows: there is definitely a Kindle version. If there isn’t a Kobo version, well, that would really seriously tick me off. I will see what I can find out, but it may not be available in your region. In that case, well, at least the cover is pretty, so hopefully you will not mind having a paper copy.
The new titles: No sequels, all standalones, all in unique worlds. RH in particular specifically requested non-sequel standalones, which I guess they feel are more marketable somehow.