Coming up on the end of the year seems like a good time to reflect on how my writing has been going, as well as planning out a few resolutions to spend more time working at it for 2017.

It’s been a pretty rough year for me as an author, to be honest.  I’ve stalled repeatedly on my “main” novel for a couple of years now, and the frustration of that was enough to really hurt my overall interest in writing as a result.  Add in a job that is pretty stressful, and it was very easy to justify doing anything else except for writing.

Thankfully, the tail end of the year saw me getting back into it.  Part of the reason I started this blog was to give me a chance to write a variety of things, and I’ve combined that with working on a variety of projects new and old.  It may make everything a bit slower going than I would like, but it keeps me sane.

Here’s a brief summary of current projects and how I’m going with them:

Freeburn (working title)

Type: Novel

Genre: Sort-of-post-apocalyptic action spy thriller

Description: A former soldier turned failed British spy named Marcus Freeburn is sent to Sydney, Australia to meet a contact, only to be shot and left for dead. When he recovers, he finds that the country has been the target of a chemical agent that has brought society to its knees, and that he is the number one suspect for instigating the attack. Now Freeburn has to work out who is really responsible, but first he will need to learn to survive in the terrifying world he has found himself in.

Status:  I’ve been kicking this one around for years now.  I’m on what I still consider to be the first proper draft of the manuscript with about 80,000 words written.  I’ve recently changed a great deal of the plotting and created a proper outline, resulting in me rewriting large chunks.  Slow and steady at this stage, and I am hopefully to have an actual complete draft done during 2017.

Rise (A Story of the Death Throes Unending)

Type: Novella

Genre: Fantasy

Description: A decrepit inn is attacked by the undead forces of a Necromancer cabal in the middle of the night, defended only by  a band of rowdy mercenaries and a healer of uncertain origins. As bodies fall and the inn burns, the only certainty is that nothing is quite as it seems as the dead rise in the town of Riversedge.

Status: Another story I had worked on for a long time and stalled on, version 10 is completed and sitting awaiting some final edits before going back to my beta readers (my wife Sam and my friend Tristan) and hopefully being ready to submit to publications.  I really quite like how twisty and fun this story is, and I’m looking forward to finally getting it out there.

This story is a part of my burgeoning Death Throes Unending fantasy setting and serves as a prequel of sorts to the novel series currently residing on my hdd as about a dozen dot points and some character descriptions.

Corsair Squadron (working title)

Type: Novel

Genre: Military Sci-Fi / Space Opera

Description: In a far-flung future where humanity has spread across the stars, a group of misfit pilots and soldiers are brought together in a mission to clandestinely undermine the imperialistic control of previously independent worlds, but in doing so may spark a war that crushes the people they are trying to save.

Status: I’ve wanted to write a sci-fi series from the moment I first watched Star Wars, and that was an idea that was only reinforced by reading, watching, and playing various awesome things over the years.  I’ve sketched out the first book, an overall plot that could setup a trilogy of books, and have written a couple of chapters to get a feel for one of the main characters and how I want to present the world.  I’ve also doodled a great number of truly awful spaceship designs.