August Status Update

Well, given that we've reached the start of a new month, I figure that it is as good a time as any for me to start talking about the rest of the year; so far, it's been pretty productive, and I have to admit that finally getting Polaris out of the door feels extremely satisfying. I've finished work on the second in the series, and it should be available sometime this week – I decided to do back-to-back releases on Polaris largely because the two books tied together very well. Indeed, the whole series is shaping up the same way, so it might be best to think of Polaris as a trilogy of duologies. If that makes sense.

I've now reached the stage where I can firm up my schedule for the next five months, and I'll have to admit at this point that there are two projects I can't talk about at the moment. One of which should be coming up in the next few months, the other will be something for next year, though I'll be doing the work on them this year. All that I will say for the moment is that I've got a lot of additional writing to do, and that I'll be having to work it into the schedule until November. Nevertheless, I'm very much looking forward to it!

So, then, what is coming up? Well, as I said, Polaris II: Nothing Left To Lose will be coming out in the next few days, and Alamo XXVII will be appearing some time in early September; that's my next project. After that, October and November are planned as Polaris releases, books tentatively titled as 'Terrible Swift Sword' and 'He Never Died'. December will see another Alamo release, a book as yet unnamed – but lest you think that you're going to be short of Alamo this year, I've got to .

I think that just about says it all. Five more books this year, four of which I have yet to write, but I'm quite confident that I should be able to maintain this schedule, especially now that Polaris is properly up and running. In a slight alteration to my original plans, I'll be keeping my focus tight on science-fiction this year, and concentrating now on building up for next year's writing – more projects that I'm very much looking forward too in the coming months.

Moving to 2018, then, I can happily confirm that Alamo will be continuing next year – that Dyson Sphere isn't going to explore itself, and I have a feeling that Alamo and her crew will be involved in the plotlines encompassing that for at least the bulk of the year, perhaps all of it. From a writing point of view, it's such a huge area to explore in terms of story potential that I don't see me exhausting it any time soon, though I can promise that those interested in grand space adventures will not be disappointed either. No spoilers, though!

Polaris is currently scheduled to conclude in January/February, and there will certainly be another science-fiction series to replace it – probably 'Fox Company', though I'm not sure at the moment what form it will take. (I've got two ideas. One of them set in the Triplanetary universe, one of them not, and both of them would work well with that title. And both of them are 'Space Marine' focused, one way or another – right now, I'm torn. There's an outside chance that I might start work on them this year, but unlikely you'll see them much before April next.)

After that, I've got a few other plans in mind, but I'll definitely be exploring historical fiction next year, with the ultimate intention of regularly adding it to the rotation; I've got some strong ideas about where I want to go with that, but aside from stating that I'll be in the realm of historical action/adventure/swashbuckler, with novels at Alamo or Polaris-length (I seem to be getting more comfortable with 60k than 70k novels of late for some reason...any thoughts on that are welcome. I've occasionally considered doing huge blockbusters, but I can't seem to make them happen. Though the model I've stumbled on with Polaris – series of duologies – seems to work in my head, so you can expect to see that more often.) There's a chance I might dip into post-apocalyptic as well – I've had some ideas along those lines – but that's for the longer-term.

So, the short version – Polaris in August, October, November, Alamo in September and December, with and in the mix as well!