Hi guys!
We’ve decided to start updating here weekly with three separate posts:
- Sunday News – Updates on our writing, our publishing schedule, promotions, etc. May include word count bragging or self-flagellation.
- What’s Up Wednesdays – What the Darksbanes are up to in a post. Personal updates, fun stuff, anything goes really.
- Fandom Fridays – Fan art, character info, in-character posts, and maybe even the occasional short story. Basically, stuff for fans of our series to enjoy.
In addition to these three weekly blog posts, we’re going to start updating the Newsletter monthly on the first in addition to release announcements. Each update will include links to the prior month’s blog posts as well as the usual stuff: Our books, updates, and some other books you guys might enjoy.
We decided to make these changes in order to open ourselves up more to our readers, and offer you guys more of a chance to keep up with what we’re doing, and how long you’re going to have to wait for that next Dakota novel, etc. 😉
If you have any ideas or suggestions for what you’d like to see on the blog or in the Newsletter, please drop us a line at contact@darksbanebooks.com and we’ll be happy to consider your suggestions.
So, with that said, I’m going to continue this post with the first official What’s Up Wednesday post!
Heyo Darksbane fans!
So, this week has been pretty fab. As I speak, Anna is putting the finishing touches on her latest novella (final revisions. Tomorrow, we’ll be getting it ready to launch!) and we’ve managed to both re-outline Risen and solidify our new and improved sleeping schedule as well.
I know a lot of you are probably bummed to hear that Risen is in the “outline” phase, but it’s not as bad as it sounds. Our process is kinda odd. We work out a story long before the first words get on the page. Anna and I like to talk out our stories before we write them, so we end up discussing the plot for weeks (or longer) before the outline ever gets started. Usually, we’re making notes and even voice recordings of conversations that will occur in the story and yes, it’s basically roleplay, but roleplay with the intent to plot a novel in mind! We did this earlier on, outlined the story, then let it set for a while during the fourth quarter of 2016…
So here’s how it went down. Blooded came out and we worked on the Dakota Shorts compilation that I hope you guys have had a chance to read by now. (Anna’s shorts in it are super good. She totally showed me up.) Then we worked on getting Dead Girl’s Ashes out which was good because we were ready to launch the new series. Then November happened. Well, partway through November anyway. Anna finished Dead Girl’s Ashes and we managed to launch it halfway through NaNoWriMo. And you know what that crazy lady did next?
She wrote two more novellas that same month for the launch of the Plundered Chronicles Kindle World. I wrote one too, but the deadline crept up on me and I ended up having to turn Bring Me the Horizon into a novella series. I really wanted it to be one novel, but we had a contract and I ran out of time. So instead, I’ll be working on it on the side and releasing it some time later this year. Anna’s two novellas resulted in one of the most fascinating series I’ve read in ages, and I’m honestly a huge fan of the Steel & Steam stories she’s invented for the first ever LGBT Kindle World.
December was busy. Holidays, family, and a little bit of a break for us. We worked so hard last year. Even when I wasn’t writing, I had some really heavy battles to fight. We needed a little rest, and I hope you guys understand. <3
January, we got back to work. Anna wrote the third Steel & Steam novella which will be available very soon. Now? Well, she’s about to dive into Dying Ashes #2. Rewriting it, that is. She’s already written the whole book.
And I’m officially working on writing Risen. I started working on it earlier in the month amid redesigning our website, (I hope you guys like it! I worked so hard!) hiring a PA, and managing a bazillion other aspects of Darksbane Books… then realized it was missing something. So I sat down with Anna to figure out what was wrong with the story.
We analyzed the plot and figured out what it needed…and after much debate, many notes, and plenty of snarky one-liners, we managed to get a new outline worked out.
It’s been a longer wait than I wanted for you guys since Blooded, and I’m sorry for that, but I needed to stew on this plot to get it right. There’s some major changes in store for Risen, and well, I just wouldn’t have wanted to screw it up. Hopefully, it’ll be worth the wait.
So this seems more like a Sunday News than a What’s Up Wednesday… But maybe that’s because it’s the first one. I’ll get it figured out as we go, eh?
Hope you guys are having a great week, and be sure to tune in Friday for our first Fandom… uh… Friday. c_c
I’ll just show myself out.
