Set Sytes's Blog
November 5, 2023
India Muerte
Ahoy!
I have important but unusual news to impart.
India Bones is no longer India Bones. India Bones is India Muerte. This is his name, has always been his name (I, Ministry of Truth, reaching back into the past to change it), will be his name going forward.
As such, the series title has changed, as have all the individual book titles to reflect this.
I completely understand how unorthodox this is, this late in the game – 5 books deep. But this change has been a long, long time coming. It’s been a thorn in my mind for years and was not undertaken lightly. I eventually accepted, after much stubbornness, that I was in all likelihood not targeting my audience effectively. Too many people considered India Bones parody fiction (of Indiana Jones) instead of a playful homage. Even if they understood it was a homage, it didn’t land as I’d wanted. There was a strong sense that the series was being appraised as geared only/primarily towards children.
As the series rapidly matured, away from its youthful, most playful beginnings, the series title became more and more of an impediment. Every time I tried to promote the books, I was faced with this. And what’s more, I knew it myself. It just took a long time for me to commit to doing anything about it. After all, I thought it was too late. India Bones was already his name. I was used to it, attached to it. Maybe my existing readers were as well.
But eventually I decided “too late” was better than “never”. And I wanted, needed, a stronger pitch going forward. One that not just myself, but any readers, existing or potential, could feel more confident in.
I am sorry to anyone who doesn’t like this change, or who feels confused or jarred by it. I realise that to change not just a series name but the MC’s name is a drastic move. I hope you will understand, and that you adapt to it as I have slowly, grudgingly done – it was hardest of all for me, who has written so much about India. But he does remain India – his first name, at least, I couldn’t possibly change. That would be far too jarring. I decided on Muerte as his second name partly because it fit the morbid allusions of his prior name, yet was more elegant, removing the sense of silliness/parody, with the added bonus that it was a sign of his Mexican heritage from the outset.
To accompany the new name, I have relaunched the series with new, improved typography (and very slightly revised covers, not that most will notice I’m sure). I hired a new editor who has polished up the most recent novel, India Muerte and the Great Frontier. And there have been minor other interior changes for the books. All in all, these are new editions for a new start.
I hope you will support this change – or at least begrudgingly allow it – and follow India Muerte into his future adventures.
The post India Muerte first appeared on Set Sytes.
July 3, 2023
India Bones and the Great Frontier is here!
I apologise for the wait since the last India book, so long after already declaring I’d finished the second draft. There’s been big life changes and their accompanying demands, waiting on the lovely cover art (by Martina Stipan, same as the others), a smorgasbord of new story ideas stealing my attention… Mostly, I just wanted to let the book sit for a while so I could go back to it with fresh eyes and work on it more.
Anyway, the new India Bones book is here. This one takes us away from the Caribbean, to explore the domineering nation of York, and the wild Frontier beyond.
India is 18 now – a young man who has come far from his days being a street rat on Mexico Island. As with Pirate Blood, this is a more mature novel than the earlier ones, dealing with slavery, nationalism, manifest destiny etc. But this is also very much a book about the land itself, its myth and promise, and of course the journey…
The next tale, you might be pleased to hear, will hark back to earlier innocence, with some fun artefact-hunting adventure – but in a very different environment to any yet seen in the series.
I hope you are continuing to enjoy this pirate fantasy series, with the India bones and the Great Frontier no exception.
You can find the series to date, including the new book, here.
The post India Bones and the Great Frontier is here! first appeared on Set Sytes.
January 23, 2023
New cover art for India Bones!
It’s my pleasure to present to you – beneath this bunch of boring text – three new gorgeous pieces of cover art for Books 2-4 of the pirate fantasy series India Bones. I’ll also add the cover art to the first book, revealed previously but here without the lettering, to the collection so you can see all four together in their unadulterated glory. I hope you’re as fond of them as I am.
Martina Stipan has been the artist for all of them, and will (fair seas permitting) continue to create the art for the final three books in the series as they are published. I can’t wait to see the covers to come.
As for writing news, I have finished the second draft of the fifth in this series, India Bones and the Great Frontier. But I’ll save talking about that for when it’s ready. In the meantime I might give my eyes a break from it to work on my myriad other projects, many of which are piling up ready to see a future light of day. I’m looking forward to bringing you more of this universe.
It may be a miserable season in our own world, but as long we batten down the hatches, brave the inclement weather, and all pull together, we’re sure to see sun again.
India Bones and the Ship of the Dead
India Bones and the Indigo Caves
India Bones and the Hunt for Black Atlantis
India Bones and the Pirate Blood
The post New cover art for India Bones! first appeared on Set Sytes.
September 23, 2022
SAVANA: Book 6 of The Fifth Place is here!
As promised with my previous blog update, the second piece of news I have to give.
The sixth book of The Fifth Place is finally published. This is the penultimate entry in the series, paving the way for the endgame, the final showdown. Our antiheroes start this book in a really bad way, and it’s up to them to break out of it in order to defend against the incoming retaliation of Fifth.
There was a fair amount of catharsis in writing parts of this, even more than DANCER. Overall it is not as wholly dark a novel as its predecessor, but it does go to some very emotionally dark places. I have hesitated, wondering if I have taken things too far at times – but then it would be a disservice to the characters to lie on their behalf, to pull punches and not let them truly fall apart, to restrict them from acting as terribly as they do just because we all want them to be heroes and Good People.
You can find the book here.
I have not done this before, but if you are interested in content warnings, please scroll under the following cover art to read them.
Potential content warnings:
Grief, PTSD, emotional abuse, threat of physical abuse, torture, reference to sexual assault
The post SAVANA: Book 6 of The Fifth Place is here! first appeared on Set Sytes.September 11, 2022
New cover for India Bones and the Ship of the Dead!
I can’t believe I haven’t posted here since December. I’m sorry, I’ve just had no good news until now, where it’s all piled up at once. I’ve been working away reformatting The Fifth Place series into new editions, re-editing DANCER, working on SAVANA and making sure that too is up to scratch. I accepted I needed to be better at polishing that series.
I’ve also been writing lots of ideas for not just the future of India Bones but other titles in that world, realising to myself in a moment of revelation that they all form a shared universe that covers centuries (maybe even millennia) of history. I can’t wait to bring you more of it.
And on top of that, I’ve been busy buying a house… and gaining (and then losing) a girlfriend over the past 6 months. So there’s been some upheaval, and I’m sure there will continue to be.
Anyway, I have two chief bits of book-related news, the second of which deserves its own blog post.
For now, let me share with you my gorgeous new cover art for the first India Bones book. This is a commission by one of my favourite artists, Martina Stipan. She is going to do unique covers for every book in the series and I can’t wait to see more. They’re the covers the series always needed.
The post New cover for India Bones and the Ship of the Dead! first appeared on Set Sytes.
December 29, 2021
India Bones and the Pirate Blood is here!
I know, I know – it’s been a long time with no news. This is because I haven’t had any of interest to give. I’ve been focused on two things: 1) The fourth book of India Bones, and 2) Picking with a fine-tooth comb through the whole of that pirate fantasy series with my excellent new editor, Rebecca, and polishing all the books up till they gleam.
The main news here is of course that India Bones and the Pirate Blood is finally published! Growing up alongside our now 17 year old protagonist, this is a more mature book again from those that preceded it (to the point that I wouldn’t really recommend the book to young readers). More violence, unflinching depictions of slavery, alongside Aztec mythology, beautiful new islands, and the most indigenous Caribbean influence so far. Anything else you’ll have to discover for yourself.
As for the retroactive new editing of already published books, if you’re grouchy about this because you bought the previous books already, drop me a message, either by email, through my website or through one of my social media channels, and I’ll see what I can do for you. If you haven’t read any, this is the best time to start!
You can find the series to date, including the new book, here.
The post India Bones and the Pirate Blood is here! first appeared on Set Sytes.
August 4, 2021
Spotify book soundtracks
Alright, so this might be considered a bit of an odd blog post. But music has always been a big influence on my books. Especially for The Fifth Place. So as I was/am writing them, I’m at the same time making accompanying playlists (that occasionally get added to even years later). These are where inspiration meets officially unofficial soundtrack. I often listen to them when writing or just thinking about the books, and visualising it all playing out cinematically.
I don’t know if anyone will be interested in the music behind/alongside all this, but figure I’d share them anyway, especially if you’re the type to enjoy discovering music.
Spotify won’t let me set a song order for everyone to see (probably for the best, as that would drive me crazy trying to get it “right”) so best put it on shuffle.
Also, I recommend not listening to The Fifth Place playlists before you have read the book, as there could be considered to be mild spoilers in the lyrics and song titles.
Here’s the links:
The Fifth Place
India Bones (much less cultivated; basically just a load of pirate music)
And, because I’m mad for playlists (these only being a fraction of all the ones I’ve made) if you want to explore some other themed playlists of mine…
The post Spotify book soundtracks first appeared on Set Sytes.July 12, 2021
Review of The Underground Railroad (Prime)
N.B. I have not read the book by Colson Whitehead; this is about the Amazon Prime show.
I’ve gone through it slowly, with breaks, on account of its nature.
It’s not an ordinary slave narrative – it has significant elements of magical realism, not to mention alt-history and retrofuturism (reminding you of things like the medical experimentation on black bodies of the 19th century, the American eugenics movement, the Tuskegee experiments of the 1930s, the 1921 Tulsa massacre, and even the Charleston massacre of 2015). Its main point of magical realism is that the Underground Railroad is a literal thing. I actually, to my slight shame (although I will say that I’m not American), grew up with an unquestioning belief (not really thinking about it) that the Railroad was an actual railroad. I simply took the term at face value, and was sort-of disappointed when I realised this was nonsense. In recent years I thought I’d include the conceit in a story. After seeing this show, I think that might have to be abandoned! Still, it is presented beautifully here, full of mystery and meaning.
This is not fantasy though, not at least as I am used to it, but magical realism – do not expect answers, the Railroad here simply exists, and is neither understood nor questioned. It simply is. You need to be able to accept that from the start. It is both a literary device, and also something of understated yet powerful beauty, love, and drive. And magic, of course. It is a wonderful thing – yet the kind of wonder that is entirely without whimsy or quaintness. It carries with it the force of history, the baggage train of irremovable trauma, the weight of suffering and of hope. There is no joyful ride through America. You get on it because you have to. You are taken because that is their role in this world – to help you, but only as much as they can, for the train is not an escape except in the most temporary way. They cannot take your trauma, they cannot drop you off in a place without racism or white supremacy or suffering. And to travel the train, you must tell your story.
You should not watch this show if you can’t watch the likes of 12 Years A Slave. If anything, this is more grim – or at least more unrelenting for a while. I thought it was going to be unrelentingly grim and bleak the whole way through, but this turned out not to be true. There is black joy and black love. There is laughter. There is hope, even if only in cruel snatches.
What this isn’t, unlike a few other things about, is exploitative black trauma porn. It is immensely expressive and personal, it is not a way to satiate yourself on their suffering, but to portray experience, not just of suffering but of all of it. Countless times in the show you are invited to directly look into these people’s lives. They stare at you through the screen, their eyes windows to their souls, wordlessly telling you their story. This is no more true than with the lead, Cora. Played by Thuso Mbedu, it is one of the most emotionally expressive performances I’ve ever seen. She deserves all the awards and accolades due her. And I hope a lot of Oscar bait comes her way.
The main antagonist is not some one-note villain. He’s humanised, in fact given an entire episode devoted to his backstory – but the show doesn’t fall into the trap of making you feel sorry for him. You understand his torment, the context to his awfulness, yet you know he is still despicable. The “sympathetic antagonist” without actually gaining your sympathy. The characterisation – and acting of it – is wonderfully subtle and restrained, and eminently watchable. I found myself in the curious position of both wanting to see more of him, and also wishing he’d go on and die.
The episodes. I don’t like to talk in terms of “I love this” and “I love that”, given its nature. But I was wholly impressed and absorbed by the uniquely episodic nature of especially the first half of the show. For a while, each episode was a whole new experience. In a way, and without seeming as superficial as this implies, it was a dark theme park ride of an alt-history vision of the USA. One early episode reminded me of Bioshock Infinite (well, minus all the sci-fi trappings and twists) – my second favourite game of all time (with caveats). And each time I started watching an episode, thinking “this is good, but I’m not as enraptured as with the previous one”, I was presented with new scenes of unrivalled power.
The show truly is a high benchmark of television, and I wish more people were watching it and talking about it. The direction is masterful. The cinematography is masterful, I mean truly top tier. Do not expect action and a fast pace. It deliberately takes its time to deliver on the intensity and emotion of the scenes. And the soundtrack, such an important part, stands alongside that of Dark as one of the most atmospheric pieces I’ve experienced on television.
Criticisms?
Precious little. Someone I thought was a joint lead is benched fairly early on and stays that way. The viewer is denied any closure on that score. It’s not much of a criticism, though. It doesn’t only allow for greater narrative freedom, but struck me too that it carried deliberate meaning. A slave would be separated all the time from those they cared about, friends and family and lovers, and they would never know what became of them. That was a fundamental aspect of that life. The show determines to present the viewer with the cinematic sketch of that loss, of that not knowing.
The last episode is great, but more of an epilogue, and doesn’t try and match to what came before. I might consider it the weakest of the episodes, yet it is still 5 star material.
The only thing that I would actually rank as a negative is that some of the dialogue I found indistinct and hard to understand. The sound design is so encompassing that sometimes people mumble and it’s lost to me. Yet it isn’t a big issue. It works in that Interstellar way, that you know even if you don’t hear clearly or miss things, it hasn’t robbed you of any plot, the individual words weren’t all that vital in the moment, not more than the general atmosphere and emotion of the scene, which you still feel.
Anyway, there’s my thoughts. Have anyone else watched this? What are your thoughts?
The post Review of The Underground Railroad (Prime) first appeared on Set Sytes.June 30, 2021
Writing update – The Pirate Blood
A quick but overdue update, as it’s been a while since the last one.
I have been burying myself down rabbit holes researching and coming up with ideas for the next India Bones book, until finally forcing myself to stop and crack on with it properly. So I’ve been writing it and enjoying it – it’s always good to get back to the world of Dunia/Maji and write some scurvy tropical tales. If all goes well I might even be done by the end of summer (I’m not sure how optimistic that is; time isn’t my strong point).
What can you expect from India Bones and the Pirate Blood? Well, India is 17 now (how quickly it seems he’s grown!), and so the book is that bit more mature again, with darker themes still, specifically a focus on slavery, which I don’t really intend to pull my punches with. But if that sounds all too grim, don’t worry, there’ll still be high-seas and jungle adventure, mythological dangers, temple ruins, scurvy pirate action and tropical islands galore. J’maika will see more depth to it than the snapshot I provided in the first book, and we’ll also be visiting the island of Borikén… There will also be more Taino and Kalinago influence than ever before (courtesy of my rabbit hole research).
Anyway, back to the writing…
The post Writing update – The Pirate Blood first appeared on Set Sytes.April 19, 2021
DANCER: Book 5 of The Fifth Place is here!
It’s my pleasure to say I’ve finally finished Book 5 of The Fifth Place series, called DANCER.
It’s been a bit gruelling and draining at times, and I reckon I need a break now, to concentrate on other things (like India Bones). DANCER is the darkest book of the series. I hope you fans of the series enjoy it regardless (or because of this!). It’s also the most main plot movement since SLADE.
I don’t really wanna say more about the book in case it spoils anything for anyone who isn’t up to date with the series. If you’re not, I recommend not checking out the blurb.
You can find the whole series to date, including the new book, with their new covers, here.
The post DANCER: Book 5 of The Fifth Place is here! first appeared on Set Sytes.
