It’s been a long time since I’ve posted, and a lot has happened in that time, not the least of which was getting an agent and then losing that agent when they left the industry. If you’ve been following me a while, you may remember I’ve written a handful of articles doling out writing advice. I decided to step away from that a while back since it only distracts me from my actual goal: writing. Plus, I think there’s enough advice floating around out there, and as I’m currently unpublished, it feels weird to get preachy about the craft. That being said, I’ll leave my old articles up because some were guest posts for other bloggers and this place would feel a little sparse without them. Maybe there’s a useful nugget of advice somewhere within all that angry rambling.
As for the new direction of this blog. I’m not sure. I hope the day will come when I can reliably give updates about my writing, but seeing as I’m still working about 50 hours a week, my spare time is limited and I prefer to use it for writing. With the upcoming release of my debut novel, ShadowBane, I’ve taken some time to reflect on my journey so far, and this post is all you’ll need to get up to speed if you’re here for the first time or if you’re wondering where I’ve been these past few years.
I first started writing seriously in January of 2017, drafting a book called Sundering. The idea for one book split into two, then three, and now it currently stands at a planned series of seven, but I’m getting ahead of myself. I “finished” Sundering in September of 2018, meaning I thought it was ready to query, but it wasn’t. After a lot of rejections, I participated in the December PitMad and received a publishing offer from a small press, which I eventually turned down. You can read about that here.
I did significant rewrites for Sundering throughout all of 2019 and early 2020, then began querying again during the summer of 2020. It was during this time that Sundering ballooned from a planned three or four novels into seven. This was also when I vanished from social media, because 2020 was not fun for people who make a living in the fitness industry. Or anyone at all. Like many of you, I was just trying to survive. In the fall, I was given an R&R by an agent with Bond Literary, and in February of 2021, I signed a contract with them.
In the spring of 2021, Sundering went on sub, and I gleefully started drafting my next project, a novel about demon-hunting twins in a world modeled off late 1500’s Japan. That project became ShadowBane, and I’m pleased to announce I’ve managed to contain the idea for this series to a manageable three books. Despite a brutal 2021, which culminated in the death of my father-in-law (fuck cancer), I managed to finish drafting ShadowBane just before the new year.
I emailed ShadowBane (a whopping 206,000 words) to my agent, knowing there would be significant revisions to make, and took some time to relax and play Elden Ring. Meanwhile, Sundering had gotten nowhere, unless you count a last-minute rejection at an acquisitions meeting, so I was looking forward to making some headway on this latest project. In March of 2022, my agent called me to inform me that he had not read ShadowBane, and he was leaving the industry.
That sure took the wind out of my sails. Especially because it was St. Patty’s Day, and I was not in the best state of mind for a business call.
He gave me a list of similar agents and offered to connect me, but I knew querying a 200,000-word monstrosity was going to be an uphill battle, even with the advantage of already being represented. I decided to take some time off and reevaluate my options. So I did that while writing a terrible screenplay just for fun and playing a lot more Elden Ring.
In September of 2022, I decided to self-publish. I wanted full creative control of my work and I was fed up with all the red tape and long waiting times of the traditional publishing industry. I split that 200,000-word monstrosity in half (this is where the trilogy was conceptualized, instead of a giant standalone novel that was actually under-developed) and began my revisions while adjusting to new ownership and an expanded role at the company where I had worked for the previous seven years. These revisions continued into the summer of 2023, where I once again spent a lot of time adjusting to yet another change in ownership and another new role at work.
Life is wild, isn’t it?
After a few rounds of beta feedback and self-edits into early 2024, I knew that ShadowBane was ready for a professional editor to help me take it to the next level before I launch it. That’s where I am now. I’m planning on a fall release, but given how volatile the past seven years have been, who knows what will happen? I’m just glad to be where I am, with the better part of a decade’s experience under my belt and the knowledge that whatever twists and turns this journey takes, I’ll have the patience and the discipline to see it through.
Thanks for reading. Been a while since I’ve written that. Might be a while again.