This is going to be a weird year.

I’m going to call 2016 a repositioning year for me, which is better than saying I’m not 100% sure yet when I’ll have something new out.

I put out a lot of stuff last year: Regency Immortal, Immortal Stories: Eve, the Immortal Chronicles anthology, and The Spaceship Next Door.  That was after a 2014 with Immortal at the Edge of the World, the first four books in the Immortal Chronicles, another novel and short story under a pen name, and another short story under my own.  

I didn’t spend all of that time writing.  A lot of work went into understanding what did and didn’t work well, especially when it came to self-publishing but also with self-promotion.

My current writing project is the perpetually-not-yet-named Immortal 4, which will pick up Adam’s story a short while after the events in Immortal at the Edge of the World, and roughly at the same time as the events taking place in Immortal Stories: Eve.  Also pending, a second Fixer book, of which I’m about halfway done… with a pretty shaky first draft.

Both of these novels are continuations of my indie published novels, so here is where I get a little vague.

At some point in 2016, I anticipate being able to get the rights back for the four books I have with a publisher.  (That’s the three Immortal novels, and Fixer.)  I don’t at this time know what form this rights reversion will take or what will be involved, other than that I’ll need some new covers for all of them.

My hope is that this comes before either Immortal 4 or Fixer 2 are ready to go.  Otherwise, there’s a possibility they’ll sit on a shelf for a little while until the reversion is all sorted out.

I’ve received a lot of questions about audiobooks, too, so let’s talk about that for a second.  There are only two audiobooks out right now (Immortal and Hellenic Immortal) and those who have gotten them are rightly disappointed that nothing for Immortal at the Edge of the World has turned up.

The publisher has declined to do this, which is fine because they’ve given me back the audio right, so I can go do it myself.

I’m stuck on two points, though.  First is the cover.  I can put out an audiobook version of the novel, but I have to set up a different cover.  That means I may want to look into redesigning the cover for Edge right now, even though the audio cover and the print/ebook cover won’t match it.  But what that really means is I need to set aside time and money for the cover redesigns for all three books and all three of the audiobooks.  I’d have to do that anyway, but I’m inclined to wait until have a better idea of when those covers are going to be needed.

Second is the audiobook itself.  This is just about me and my learning curve and my uncertainty about this new market.  I’m told Audible and ACX (the places I could go to contract an audiobook) are easy and reasonable, but it’s still a whole new medium and sales channel, and I don’t understand it yet.

What I may do is get my feet wet with The Spaceship Next Door.  I haven’t decided yet.

What else?  Well, a Spaceship landed in my brain last summer and more or less took over the second half of the year.  I can’t rule out the possibility that this happens again.  Other than that, I’m well overdue for another Immortal Chronicle novella or two, so I may take some time away from the other novels to write one, if an idea strikes.

And there’s this blog, which should be updated at least once a week.  Hopefully.

Fingers crossed.

If you want to keep track of everything mentioned above, the easiest way is to sign up for my mailing list…

Liked it? Take a second to support Gene Doucette on Patreon!