Updates: The Midnight Ground, Falls Audiobook, and Other Projects
photo credit: photosteve101 via photopin cc
Update time! Assuming all goes well, The Midnight Ground should be hitting digital shelves in the next couple of weeks. I don’t know yet if it will be available for pre-order or will simply go live. It probably depends on how long it takes to hammer out the last few details. When I know the official pre-order or live availability date, you’ll know. I’m pushing for it to go live early enough that you can get physical copies by Christmas.
I’m still waiting on a finalized version the cover art to share with everyone, but it will start appearing everywhere within about 5 minutes of me receiving it.
In other news, the long-awaited audiobook version of the first Sam Branch novel, Falls, is actually happening. Rather than making everyone wait until I could get myself organized for the project, I’ve secured the services of the very talented Paul Stefano for the project. Recording should start sometime later this month. If all goes as planned, it should debut on Audible sometime in early-mid February 2019. More updates will happen as the project progresses.
I’ve also started some early discussions with a producer about turning Contingency Jones: The Complete Season One into a fully-fledged audiodrama, complete with voice actors and original scoring. This one isn’t a done deal, but this is a dream project for me. So, I’m going to be working very hard to make it a reality.
The timeline is still a little hazy, but I’d ideally like to see production start on it sometime in April or May of next year. Assuming the dream does become a reality, most of the distribution would likely happen through Audible and other audiobook sellers. That being said, options do exist for making these kinds of projects available on CD.
A while back, I said I planned on putting out a novella based in the Branchverse around Christmas. Sadly, this won’t be happening for several reasons. Reason number one is that it’s not done. I could probably rush it to completion and get it out, but that’s always a good way to end up with lousy editing. I’m also not entirely happy with the idea/story. There is at least one substantial problem with the plotting that I haven’t solved yet.
It’s also foolhardy to have two new pieces of writing debut within a couple weeks of each other. Right now, my focus is on The Midnight Ground release. Once it’s out in the world and the flurry of activity has died down around it, I’ll start giving more thought to releasing the novella. That also gives me more time to figure out that annoying plotting problem.
Are you wondering, “What about all those books you have partially written?” Work has been happening on those sporadically, but I relocated from Memphis to Ohio a few months back. Acclimating to the new environment has taken more adjustment than I expected. However, things have started to settle down and I’ve got most of my ducks in a row now. You should start seeing word counts in the WIP bars off to the right of the screen start climbing toward the end of December.
