I (Chris) have been bad… but so has Heather!!! =-P~ We are not living up to our plan of posting more updates about stuff. Spank us (her)… we (she) deserve(s) to be punished. So what are we working on now? Stuff and junk. What kind of stuff and junk you ask? Book writing stuff and junk. Yes… please hit me (her). OK OK OK… here is what we are working on:
Morrigan’s Brood: Odin’s Chosen and Morrigan’s Brood: Dynasties of Night
While you readers are waiting for Book 3 of the Morrigan’s Brood Series to come out, we co-authors are writing books 6 through 8. Did we skip a few? No… let me explain. When Heather and I write a manuscript, we write until the story is done, then we rewrite and rewrite, mostly trimming or revising, but sometimes adding new stuff – especially when we find something that doesn’t jive anymore with how things ended up, as we need to add introductory content earlier in the story.
After we finish writing the manuscript, we send it to our editor and then incorporate her suggestions. After that, we will end up with a manuscript the equivalent of 700 to 1200 novel pages (were we to format the manuscript for book printing) in length. Anybody want to spend $40 or more for a single paperback novel as thick as a big city phone book? I didn’t think so. Depending on the post-layout page count, we will break the manuscript into two or three manuscripts, one each for a different book.
We look for obvious breaking points in the plot in order to split the manuscript into two or three, and thus far, we have had no trouble finding these breaking points. With the manuscripts now separated, we add prologues and epilogues where appropriate for each manuscript, and we also reintroduce settings and characters, to a degree, to the other manuscripts, so if you the reader were to pick up a book out of sequence, you would still know who the key players were and what they were about. Of course this also means that we need to come up with additional book titles, cover art, interior art, appendices, and other things, but that is part of the fun!
This also means that when you ask us about books 1 through 3 at a book signing event, we will blush and with embarrassment admit that we had completely forgotten writing about such and such in book 1. I have to skim our books before a book signing event in order to prepare myself for questions. Sometimes I don’t even remember writing scenes in one of our books (probably because Heather wrote it). Well, it is because we wrote books 1 and 2 over ten years ago, and what became book 3 we wrote about 5 years ago (though I will soon be giving it my final rewrite, so it should be fresh in my mind).
Getting to books 6 through 8, we have titles for two of these books, Odin’s Chosen and Dynasties of Night, but the title of the third book escapes us… not even sure yet how long the manuscript will be, but we know it will be at least two books’ worth. The emphasis of Morrigan’s Brood: Odin’s Chosen is a new line of blood-drinkers derived from, as you guessed by the title, Odin. A majority of what we are writing now is in this vein. In the 9th century CE, a Nordic king is chosen to lead a group of einherjar (warriors, called by Odin, who journey to Valhalla to basically fight, party, eat, drink, and fight some more) on a mission of vengeance against the Celtic blood-drinker lines. As with other lines of blood-drinkers, the einherjar, while in Midgard (earth), must consume blood to live and will die if scorched by sunlight or if decapitated.
Dynasties of Night, as the name implies, introduces in more detail some of the various Asian lines of blood-drinkers. This novel takes place when Japan began forming its own cultural and artistic identity, separate from China. Anymore about this book would reveal one of our most closely guarded secrets. Sorry, but no hints. None. Absolutely none. You will have to read books 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6 first. Sorry… but we love to torture our readers… If you only *knew* the secret. Yes… that big. Bigger than the end of book 2. Yes, that big. No more about it.
Morrigan’s Brood: Madness
Has anyone read our pre-release of our first short story, Morrigan’s Brood: Madness? If so, please comment. If not, please read, and then comment. Please? Thank you!
Events
For upcoming book signing events, look on our Goodreads calender.