Andrew Seiple's Blog: Transmissions From the Teslaverse - Posts Tagged "dire"

Any post in a storm, hm? Yeah, this one's a day late, but so it goes. I got wrapped up in writing and lost track of time.

Which is appropriate, because I think Fridays are the day that I'll normally spend to tell you about my books.

Dire:Born released in November, and it's the origin story of Doctor Dire, supervillain and supergenius. It's a story that's more about people than it is about powers. So far the reception's been much better than anticipated, and I'm enjoying seeing my work read by so many people!

My current project is the sequel to Dire:Born, tentatively named Dire:Seed. The first draft is 23% complete as I write this. It should hit late spring to mid-summer, if things stay on schedule.

If Dire:Born's theme was about letting go of the past to deal with the present, Dire:Seed is about our protagonist (NEVER USE THE WORD HERO FOR HER! SO COMMANDS DIRE!) learning to work within the present, and build toward the future.

Can't go into more detail than that right now, but it's promising to be one heck of a ride...

The theme of my last post was worldbuilding, and there's a reason for that.

I posted it because that's pretty much what I'm doing with my writing, at this very minute. Instead of writing book by book, I've built an entire superpowered world to explore. Every book I release in the "Tales from the Teslaverse" series is going to feature characters and locations that can pop up again in other books. There's continuity here, and someone who gets namedropped in one book has every chance of getting their own short story, novella, or even novel in the future.

It's basically applying a top-down approach to writing, after applying a bottom-up approach to worldbuilding. I kicked around the Teslaverse for years before I finally settled down to write about it.

Dire? She's one of the characters I know best, and one of the most well-received, so I'm opening with her. She'll get a good trilogy, but there will be other fiction along the way, and eventually, more Dire books after the trilogy's done, and various spin-offs and crossovers and a glorious smorgasborg of modern superhero goodness with a dash of magic.

So settle in, folks, it's gonna be a heck of a ride if I can pull it off.

Oh, and for those curious, the Dire sequel is currently at 28% draft completion. It'll take a few months, but it's coming, it's coming...

Hey there. Short blog today.

I'm exhausted from the weekend. Three days of frantic typing, roughly thirty thousand words later, and the draft manuscript of the second book in the DIRE series is done.

I've sent it out to betas and editors... from here it'll take about a month, maybe two, to complete revision and rework. Also to get the cover art in, the artist is still finishing that up.

Wish I could get it to you all sooner, but... I refuse to skimp on quality, here. No way around it, it'll take time.

But in a few weeks, I should be able to get those of you who signed up for my mailing list a special surprise. Keep an eye on your inboxes...

Outlining has begun on the third book, tentatively called Dire:Time.

As to what it'll be about... well, let me put it this way; Who wants to see a temporarily time-trapped Doctor Dire punch out Hitler?

Shoot, who DOESN'T?

I'll see what I can do to make this happen. Sit tight folks, there's a fun ride coming...

After much work, many late nights, and an A++ performance by my cover artist, the second book of Dire's saga is done and available in the Amazon store!

Next up: Formatting the print copy, and getting that rolling. Createspace, here I come!

The Boonshoft Museum of Discovery is a small children's museum in Dayton, Ohio. It's got a beautiful location across from a park, and a heck of a lot of nifty exhibits.

It's also a venue for a lot of non-museum stuff, as I came to find out. Lots of weddings and even a couple of conventions. One such is Geekfest, and oh me oh my what a glorious time it was!

I'm still new to working the OTHER side of conventions. Normally I'm the guy with the backpack full of RPGs going around and perusing the vendors, and listening to the panels. This time around I was a vendor, and speaking on a panel. It's a nifty shift from my usual practices, and I found it fresh and amusing. Only downside was I didn't get much of a chance to play in any games or see all of the sights, but that's okay. I'm quite sure they'll be there next year.

It was a little one-day con that started after the museum closed from its normal hours and went until nearly midnight. I shared a table with a couple of friends of mine who make jewelry and sculpt little polymer dragons. It was a good night for dragons, I'll tell you that! Pretty good night for books too, as I found out.

Geekfest was a celebration of tolerance, oddness, pop culture, and letting your weird hang out. As such, I felt it safe to bring the tarot cards along and offer readings to those who wanted them. Pretty sure that little service sold me a few books too. Whether you believe in the tarot or not, a good reading can get you thinking about your life and your perspective, which is always good. It can maybe give your subconscious the chance to tell you something you've been ignoring or missing.

Oh, and I also ended up on a panel with Rob Boley, a more traditional author who's done scary fairy tales, and has a few more years of experience at this than I do. We got to discuss "Making your Dreams Real" with a couple of dozen folks, give or take. It was encouraging to see so many prospective authors, songwriters, game designers, and what have you giving us a half hour of their time in exchange for war stories from the turbulent fronts of creative endeavors!

(That last part may be a bit exaggerated.)

In any case, it was a joyful experience, and I look forward to being back there next year with more books and more things to talk about.

In other news... Dire:Time (Working title) is about 5% complete. Also working on the second half of Freeway's story, for those who are on my mailing list.

Peace, and I'll catch you later!

Afternoon, hombres and hombrettes! (Not a word. Totally should be.)

Friday's here, and it's looking pretty awesome. Got a local convention tomorrow, a thing called Stebbinscon. A little local one-day con. Mostly a vendor thing, and an excuse to cosplay for the local geek crowd. Which reminds me, I really do need to find some good garb at some point... I've got a few ideas, and it's always fun to let your fanboy flag fly.

In other news, I'm going in with a few other superhero authors on a discount deal. Starting May the 18th and ending the 21st, Dire:Born will be only ninety-nine cents! The other authors will be severely discounting their work as well... I'll post a link to the main hub once I get it. The guy in charge is finishing up the promo details as I type this.

...of course this means that I'll probably get some new mailing list subscribers, no idea how many. So I'm going to try to finish Part II of Freeway's story faster than I expected. Heh, speedsters. Always jumping the gun on you, hm? But yeah, I want that story ready to rollout to greet my new subscribers properly.

In other news, DIRE:TIME is about 15% done, and chugging along nicely. I'm trying something different with this book, by necessity. It's not just Dire's viewpoint; you'll get inside the heads of some old, familiar characters. Maybe some new ones too, depending on how the story goes.

Here's hoping the weather is as nice where you are as it is here in temperamental Ohio! Be well, and catch you later.

Much to do, much to do! I've chosen a path that means my idle time must be parceled out carefully. No summer break here!

Well, except for Origins. And Gencon. But hell, I've got legitimate career-type business in both of those. At Origins I want to try to talk to the people running the author's alley and see how I can get in next year, and maybe some following years. At Gencon I'm gonna help launch the RPG that I had some small hand in, and support my friends. Maybe even run a few sessions, which means I'll need to digest the rules...

...all while writing DIRE:TIME which is about thirty percent done, but is still going to tie up most of my June evenings. Also off-and-on July and August evenings as betas and editors help me make it awesome and refine it properly.

On the plus side, the cover art is coming along nicely. I should have a rough to show you all in a few weeks or less.

In other news, the book sale went well. However, I didn't get the mailing list signup rush that I expected, so part 2 of "In the Fast Lane" is on the backburner until I get to a solid stopping point with DIRE:TIME.

The trick with maintaining this pace is simple, for me: Work hard/play hard. When I'm not working, I'm playing around with video games, tabletop RPG sessions with friends, playing with my daughter, hanging out with my wife, and various amusements. This is necessary to stay sane. It also lets me tolerate and do my day job... I've tried doing nothing but work. Good lord is it rough, and quality suffers on all sides.

Eventually the day job won't be an issue. Gods willing, by then the income from writing will be enough that I can make the Teslaverse and various minor projects my main job, and be much happier for it. Not sure how many years it'll take to get to that point, but until then, I'll always be busy. All the time.

I can live with this. Happy summer, folks! See you next week.

Confession time:

I've been dealing with depression for most of my life. It comes and goes, and when it's upon me I see everything through a filter of bleakness. Small things seem much more important than they really are, and every setback is a tragedy of epic proportions, a negative reinforcement that yeah, the world is really as crappy as you think.

When it gets bad enough I just stop functioning entirely and withdraw, avoiding people. Eventually I get over it, but it takes time to recharge, and put my mind in order.

But there's a way to speed up the process.

If I use the time to create something, I lose myself in the details, forget about the way everything seems horrible right now, and just BUILD. And piece by piece, bit by bit, the depression seeps away, as my ever-busy, ever-critical mind is more concerned about the next bit, or where to put this really cool piece, or similar measures. And in the back of my mind I give the fearful part of my subconscious time to examine things and realize that hey, I'm not as boned as I thought.

And life goes on.

So yeah, caught in an online argument yesterday, the little things started piling up, and depression snuck up on me hard. I turned into THAT GUY, you know the one, and argued crappily. But when you do that, and you finally realize you're doing that, you make your apologies, kick pride in the arse, and shut the hell up until your head's in a better spot.

I've burned no bridges, thankfully.

And, depressed as hell yesterday, I spent a gainful two hours and got twenty-five-hundred words further into Dire:Time. My bad moods are your gain, people!

(I do well in good moods too, so please don't wish me ill in an effort to speed the next book. :D )

Anyhoo, Dire:Time's first draft is about 70% complete. I've already farmed out a few earlier bits for editing, in an effort to speed matters. I was shooting for late July for a release, but I'm a little behind schedule... No way to avoid that with Origins falling where it did. So it'll probably be August. I'll try to get'er out there before Gencon, but no promises.

Until then, I wish you all well! Keep on keeping on, and if you deal with depression, as I do... perhaps creating something will help.

And hell, if it doesn't, then what have you got to lose? If it doesn't cheer you up sure you'll be depressed but you'll still have a brand new thing to play with!

First draft of the third Dire book is roughly 90% complete. I just have a few more chapters to go...

Unfortunately, this does mean that we won't see a July release for this one. Even feeding it to my editor piecemeal, chapter by chapter, it's still going to take time for her to work her magic.

And that's not even counting the beta readers... no, this is going to be an August release, and probably not before Gencon.

Sorry guys, I was trying to get it to you as early as possible, but real life's a pain at times. Hang in there, and we'll wrap up Dire's first trilogy with a bang!

In other news, it looks like I won't be stuck working the booth all the time I'm at Gencon. But if you'd like to know when I'm around, feel free to stop by the Mindworm Games booth and ask for me by name. The owner will be happy to tell you when I'm available, and happier to tell you all about Exiles, the RPG...