12-31-2022
This will be my last post of the year, I figured rather than dumping another one of my prewritten posts, I would give a little more specific info about the status of my writing and The Descendant Saga as a whole. So for a moment, permit me to digress.
Earlier this year, due to staffing issue’s my publisher, the Immerser, threw in the towel, and admitted they wouldn’t be able to push the book series any further forward. In April of 2022 they reverted all rights for The Descendant back to me. I subsequently spent June and July researching and querying agents, planning to get a second edition printed, and relaunch the series. But I was told that no one would want an already printed book, that it had to be new and shiny. So I spent August and September editing new drafts of the books. Coming up with complete new drafts of the first and second books, and coming up with new tittles for all four already completed manuscripts.
Then, as I am sure a few of you are aware, November is National Novel Writing Month also known as NaNoWriMo. I used October to review the 35k words already written into the long shelved manuscript for book five, and then I spent the six weeks of November and the first half of December writing book five of The Descendant Saga, finishing the work on Sunday the 18th, first day of Hanuakkah, the weekend before Christmas.
Book five turned out to be a 114,200 word monster. The longest single book in the series yet. It was originally intended to be tittled “Anvil of Souls” and a paper copy (207 pages of 8.5×11) was printed out and delivered to one of my beta readers as a Christmas gift. How ever, due to the length, it has been split into two books, increasing the total planned number of books in the series from nine to ten, and the new book six of about 63,000 words will be called Anvil of Souls. The first half of this manuscript, the new book five which is a little over 51,000 words, Will probably get some more girth added to it, and it as of yet doesn’t have a title.
All of that brings us through my writing of 2022 to the present. With book 5 completed, passed out either electronically, or in hard copy to four of my five beta readers, I have decided at the behest of one of these beta readers, to work on one of my other projects. The plot has been in my head for years, I just haven’t had any characters to fill it. I’m not ready to start writing on it yet, but I have outlined the plot, writing what was in my head into a couple of word documents and started researching names, and folk lore and such. These two books will be classic high fantasy and YA urban fantasy romance. Which, yes I know is very different from the more than a dozen sci-fi books I have written.
I will also, be querying aggressively for The Descendant as I am writing these other books. “The Circle of Ness” and “My Girlfriend’s a Goddess”. The Descendant remains my main focus, and I will query for it appropriately. But with six books written, two of which have already been through the hands of professional editors, I feel it needless to keep writing in the series until I actual can market them. So while querying I will be writing these fantasy books, and possibly, break into other markets get my name out there. Maybe one of those will sell to an agent. If it does I can use that as a Segway to bring the entire Descendant Saga to publication too, I’m just creating options.
But between querying, writing a book or two, my daily trip to the gym, the 42 hours a week I put into my ‘professional’ job, installing a new carb, intake and exhaust manifolds on my ’86 bronco, the carb rebuild and ongoing restoration of my ’78 3/4 ton square body, The ’84 Cherokee I just bought with the intent to gut and make a tube chassis rock crawler with its driveline, and my YouTube channel and all the other things I do to try and keep myself in the public eye in hopes of publication… My biggest concern is having the time to do it all. My goal’s for 2023, in order of priority, are to get both of those fantasy books written, get an agent before my next birthday (in September) and get both the ’86 and the ’78 back on the road.
That being said, the first thing to happen will be the ’86 Bronco getting finished. It was running last week, and my crazy self decided to use my Christmas bonus to buy a big ol’ four barrel, dual exhaust headers and a new intake manifold. All the old Iron is already stripped off the block, so hopefully I can bolt on the new manifolds, carb and then tune the carb and be good to go before the first week of 2023 is out, my only concern is the alternator bracket getting in the way of the new exhaust manifold, So I might have to get a little red neck with my welder to fix that. We shall see…
I still have the list of agents I built in June/July of 2022 and I will double check the ones I have not already queried and if they are still accepting submissions I will start there. I Don’t have to return to my normal day job until Tuesday the 3rd of 2023 so I’m hoping to get one good query off before returning to work. In short, very busy, lots of projects, more writing to come, agents will be queried, The Descendant will go on.
I am not afraid of my goals, I am not afraid of failure, because failure is not an option. A writer must take rejection like a fighter takes punches. I’m going to the gym, I am to do both. It is not over, until I win. Stay hungry my friends, and happy new year.
Chace Randolph 