An art sample from the third(!) DISHONORED book
Well it’s happened again. An idea has struck me so forcefully and totally that I might have to rearrange my entire writing schedule for the rest of the year and next year to accommodate it.
As I’ve written before, my plan for the second half of 2021 looked like this:
July - A Century of Wind, Fire, and Water book 4
August - A Century of Wind, Fire, and Water book 5
September - A Century of Wind, Fire, and Water book 6
October-November - Dishonored
Next year I was looking at something like this:
January - Geriatric Hero of Prophesy
February - Pregnant Lady Hero
March - Billy Richmond and the Appliance Wars
April - Billy Richmond and the Upside-Down Stamp Brigade
May - Billy Richmond and the 1990’s Star Wars Knockoff Adventure
July - A Century of Wind, Fire, and Water book 7
August - A Century of Wind, Fire, and Water book 8
September - A Century of Wind, Fire, and Water book 9
October-November - The Bounty
But this idea, which is actually two ideas, grabbed me and won’t let go. They are the sequel ideas to the Dishonored book I’m planning to write later this year. The basic idea for part two had been in my head almost as long as the idea for part one, but early Sunday morning while pooping the whole plot just burst into my brain. Then, today, the whole plot for a third story burst in there too. I wasn’t pooping this time, in case you were wondering. I was eating lunch and then WHAM, there it was. I wrote down a summary of the whole 21 chapter book in the span of half an hour. That hasn’t happened since I got the idea for El Dorado in late 2019, which delayed the writing of Dishonored. That’s right, Dishonored was originally going to be my late-2019 project, but it got bumped when El Dorado’s plot hit me like a bolt of lightning. That’s how long I’ve been sitting on this story and now that I’m finally about to write it, the ideas for sequels have come with a frenzy.
So what does that mean for my other series, A Century of Wind, Fire, and Water? If I delay the writing of books 4-6, I can always make it up in the first half of 2022, which would probably push the Billy Richmond trilogy into 2023.
I don’t want to delay A Century of Wind, Fire, and Water, but even now, less than two weeks away from my intended start on book 4 I have only a rough outline of the 19-chapter plot. I’m leaning toward delaying it and hoping that more ideas of inspiration will come to me just as they have done for Dishonored.
So that’s it. As I write this I’ve talked myself into it. I’ll spend my lunch hour tomorrow redoing my calendar, and when I’m done, this will be my new writing schedule for the foreseeable future:
July-August - Dishonored book 1
August-September - Dishonored book 2
October-November - Dishonored book 3
So that’s three books to end the year with instead of four, but that’s only because I expect the Dishonored books to have a lot more art, and they’ll be longer too. Next year will look like this, Lord willing…
January-February - A Century of Wind, Fire, and Water book 4
February-March - A Century of Wind, Fire, and Water book 5
April-May - A Century of Wind, Fire, and Water book 6
May-June - Geriatric Hero of Prophesy
July - Pregnant Lady Hero
August-September - A Century of Wind, Fire, and Water book 7
September-October - A Century of Wind, Fire, and Water book 8
November - A Century of Wind, Fire, and Water book 9
That’s being realistic, which means losing not only the Billy Richmond trilogy but also The Bounty, which is the sequel to El Dorado. Oh well, I suppose it’s fitting that the El Dorado sequel be delayed as payback for the original delaying Dishonored for so long.
Anyway, that’s the plan. I’m sure it’ll change in a month!
In the meantime, here’s an art sample I just finished of a character that will play a pivotal role in the Dishonored sequel I dreamed up earlier today…
I’m not sure which order I’ll write these three books in, as they’re not going to feature the same cast of characters, only the same setting and culture, but I think I’ll start with this one, technically part three of the trilogy, and then do the first Dishonored book. Each of the three has a distinct identity that sets it apart from the others, despite each being set on the same island group, in a shared culture, around roughly the same time period.
The first book is a revenge story mixed with a coming of age tale. It’s called DISHONORED: THE LAST SON OF YUMEA
The second book is a high seas pirate/adventure story. It’s called DISHONORED: THE SONG OF REDEMPTION
The third book is a traditional fantasy/quest. It’s called DISHONORED: THE DEMON PRINCE
Due to the episodic nature of the stories, there’s room for more tales to be told, but as of now those are the three I’m concentrating on and hope to have finished by the end of the year. Truth be told, I was kind of banging my head against the wall trying to crack books 4-6 of A Century of Wind, Fire and Water, and while I’m sure I will eventually come up with something, it’s a relief to know that I have a trio of tales that I am 110% ready to write as soon as July comes around.
Until then!