Hello, dreamers. Welcome back.

As promised, with the Olympics over (and a week of mourning), I’m back at it, ready for the home stretch of 2024. The coming months promise to be extremely busy for me, due only in part to my writing efforts. But I’m cracking my knuckles and I feel ready. However, while I’ve already thrown myself back into writing, my return here will be slower. That said, here’s what to expect in the days, weeks, and months ahead.

Novel-Writing Season

As I may have mentioned once or twice, for me, the final stretch of the year from late summer to year-end is novel-writing season. As such, I will be devoting my efforts for the remainder of this month to fleshing out my notes on my next major project. There is, of course, one very minor problem…

I’m not entirely sure what my next project will be, exactly.

Obviously, right now I’m looking hard at Aquarius 1. I really, really love the story. It’s innovative. It’s unique. It feels like something that needs to be written. But there are still a lot of questions. I have a lot of note-taking to do. I have a lot of fleshing out to do, of characters, of settings, of…well, everything. Lately I’ve found myself reading up on everything from the evolution of sharks to quantum computing.

Reading Caliban’s War recently has been another eye-opening experience, but it’s only led to more questions. “What does the Challenger smell like?” for instance. Even as I’ve been writing this, I’ve jotted down several quick notes on my phone. And there are more all the time. I’ve found myself taking notes while I walk. I pause podcasts to jot things down, or worse, I simply tune out, my mind following a new strand of storyline, composing a scene in my head. And suddenly I tune back in, and realize I have no idea what the hosts of the podcast are talking about. Who lost one mph on his velo? What’s the key to fighting antibiotic resistance? Could you repeat that last political joke?

The point is, there’s a lot to do. Writing hard sci-fi is fun, but it can lend itself to certain abuses. Lately, I’ve been easing myself back into writing; testing the waters, as it were. I’ve written a couple daily sketches. Nothing overly long, much of it incomplete. But intriguing. I’ve begun working on my notes for Aquarius 1, as I said. But mostly, I’ve been doing something I’ve meant to do for some time now: taking stock of my outstanding projects. Over the coming weeks, I plan to allow myself to write freely, pursuing various stories and possibly taking up languishing projects, seeing what I can come up with.

However, there’s a problem. As I’ve said, there’s a lot to do before I start working on my next novel project. It will take at least a month of hard research, and to stay on track that research will likely need to be limited to whatever’s necessary for the first phase of the coming novel. So that’s a month of study for what will likely amount to oh, about seven chapters. That means that, at minimum, by the end of the week, I need to commit myself to my next project. One week to make what may be a decision that will decide the course of my life for the next several years.

At the moment, I feel I have four options:

Aquarius 1

It’s the logical choice. Over the past year, I spent a lot of time working on the story. It’s an intriguing departure from anything else I’ve written, while also being exactly the kind of story I’ve been wanting to write. I would need to do a great deal of research, but luckily, most of the research necessary for the opening phase (or two) has already been done. I’ve already written almost two phases worth of chapters (more if you count what was removed in initial editing), though most if not all of it would likely be pitched.

The more I get into this story, the more I like it. And there’s an added tactical benefit. As I’ve mentioned, I’m going to begin querying for Pioneers prior to the end of the year. There is always the distinct possibility that Pioneers will whiff out on queries (I am a new writer). If that ends up being the case, I’ll need a new novel to resume querying. And I really think Aquarius 1 is that novel. I feel so strongly about this novel that I’ve considered simply shelving Pioneers and waiting to query Aquarius 1. But I’ve waited too long, worked too hard, and received too much glowing feedback on Pioneers to just let it sit.

But, if all else fails, Karen Hernandez and the crew of Aquarius 1 may be the ones to propel me to the bookshelves.

Pathfinder

Sigh…so, longtime readers will likely recognize this title. Pathfinder is one of my longest-running novel projects. Originally the planned first installment of the Pioneer series, now relegated to Maybe-Eventually-A-Prequel-status, Pathfinder has been no small source of angst and frustration for me over the years. Since I first began work on it after completing Wide Horizon, it’s been easily my most reliable source of impostor syndrome. But, every so often, I look at the story and think “You know, why can’t I write this now?”

Unfortunately, now happens to be one of those times. Maybe it’s my recent work on the Turn of the Century series (which was originally intended as a tie-in with Pathfinder). But regardless of the reason, here I am. I know this much: Pathfinder would take a lot of legwork. Much of the research for the novel remains embarrassingly incomplete, even after the better part of a decade. I’d have a lot of work ahead of me. But, if it could allow me to finally work out the first adventures of Randall Holmes, it might be worth it.

The Pioneer Era

Honestly, this one is both the book I would like to write and the one I really think I should. Having spent so much of this year so far working with Pioneers again, part of me feels it just makes sense to immediately move on to the characters’ next adventure. But there’s a reason, in fact many reasons, I never got very far with the sequel to Pioneers.

Lately, I’ve had more than a few flashes of inspiration. Several of those have involved The Pioneer Era. But the fact is, the more I think about those recent ideas, the more it feels like these latest flashes only serve to underscore just how much more work needs to be done before I can do justice to The Pioneer Era. Pioneers took the better part of a year’s worth of research, as well as multiple rewrites accompanied by yet more research. The Pioneer Era is set to take place not just on Phecda 9 but several additional planets, as well as providing readers with their first look at my future’s Earth, all of it set over thirty years following the events of Pioneers. I’d like to think I’m ready for that. But I really don’t feel like I am.

Something Else

Alien invasion conspiracies! Post-apocalyptic colonizing with humans raised by AI! Humanity succeeded by a machine civilization! Slipstream fiction where the Axis won, but then collapsed and it’s the nineties and the ice caps melted! I’ve got all manner of crazy ideas. I could pick one. I could probably grunt it out in a matter of months. Minimal research, heavy on the character development and interpersonal drama. If I keep banging my head off things, who knows? I might just push the Dotiverse aside for a year and try something completely off-the-wall. I really don’t think I will. But I could! Who says I couldn’t?

What’s Next

So, if you’re one of my longtime readers, thrilled to see me posting again, and you’re wondering when I’ll be resuming my customary weekly and monthly posts, well…

Um…

The simple fact is, over the past year I’ve begun to feel there’s a disconnect between my efforts on this site and the returns. I gave blogging a game stab, but even after making adjustments and just writing my heart out, I seldom felt my blog posts were giving back anything close to the time and effort I was putting into them.

It’s the three letters that form the bane of every millennial professional’s existence: ROI. I am still very interested in using this website to communicate with my readers. I do plan to resume at least some of my weekly and monthly posts, particularly those that did generate a lot of engagement. Beyond that, however, I’m going to continue to follow the model I adopted earlier this year: if I’m not seeing views and engagement on a post, it will likely be discontinued.

Over the coming few weeks, I will gradually be bringing back my Sci-Fi Reviewed and Science in Fiction posts. Those have consistently been my most popular posts. However, most others, including my weekly flash fiction, will be discontinued. Free short fiction will continue to appear here on the site, but henceforth it will be posted sporadically and without warning.

Beyond that, I plan to pivot, using this blog primarily to communicate with my readers and expand my audience, while this site will continue its long-running transition from being effectively a one-person literary mag to being a platform for my books and novels.

More details will be made available as soon as I have them, which may or may not be sometime this week. Until next time, dare to dream. – MK