RELEASE DAY! And a bunch of other stuff!!
IT LIVES!!!!! IT’S ALIVE!!!!
MUAHAHAHAAH!
That’s right! Today, September 9th, 2022 sees the launch (re-launch?) of An Endless Darkness: The Novellas. Cover art and wrap done by the phenomenal Greg Chapman. I’m a huge fan of his artwork and his writing and he’s honestly one of the nicest guys out there. Super excited that he crafted this beauty.
For those unaware – this collects four of my novellas and two novelettes/short stories and packages them together in one grubby little price. Today (and depending on Amazon maybe this weekend) is the last day you can get the ebook for 99 cents. It’ll return to non-preorder price of $2.99 shortly. I tried my best to keep the paperback as cheap as I could, but two things blocked that number being under $10. The first is this behemoth is almost 500 pages. The second is – printing costs have gone up.
As for the content – three of the stories within here are being released in physical form for the first time – Wound Upon Wound, Daisy’s House and Seth, and all have been re-edited/re-vamped. The other three – YURI, The One That Knows No Fear and Jane: the 816 Chronicles all sparkle and shine now as well!
If you want to grab it;
Writing:
It’s been a while since I did a ‘what’s up’ with me type post. I don’t have a real newsletter per se, just this website/blog. If you’ve signed up for updates, thanks! If not, no worries, if you come across this and read it, cheers. I appreciate that.
So, I’ll dive into a number of things on the go – be prepared, this won’t be short lol!
Next novel – So, An Endless Darkness comes out today. My next release is already in the works. I’m not prepared to share the title or the cover just yet. What I can say, is that I am over the moon for this one to land. It does feature artwork from Greg Chapman again – and the few I’ve shared it with have raved about it. I reached out to esteemed reviewer (and awesome friend) Tony Jones, as well as awesome writer and great guy C.J. Bow to beta-read my first draft and give me some critical feedback. What I got back was some truly solid feedback and I’ve been using that to improve upon this latest draft, before it goes to David Sodergren for fine tuning. Tony has said this is my best thing yet – even in it’s early stages – and I’d have to agree. More will be revealed soon, but I’m thinking a February 2023 release for this one.
456 Blatchford Drive – if you’ve followed me for any time, you’ll have seen this novel mentioned a number of times. Well, guess what – while this isn’t some Book Three of The Kingkiller Chronicles level wait – this one will be coming to you next summer. I have to go through it again, clean it up and convince David to do his due diligence on it like he usually does – but it is done and I’m excited for this one. Cover art has been done by A.A. Medina which I’ll share at some point.
Cathedral – for those who like my dark fantasy leanings, the sequel to ‘Piece of Me’ has been “completed.” Much in the same stage as 456 Blatchford Drive, I need to clean it up. Cover art is done, this time by Christy Aldridge, aka Grim Poppy Designs. Expect this one to arrive end of next year.
The Empyrean Saga – for the few of you who dig my sci-fi literary series, books 1, 2 and 3 are currently out. The final two novellas are mapped out, but on the back burner until most likely 2024. This always depends on my writing time/schedule and it may be something I’m able to pop in and get done and released. I don’t know how to say this properly – so apologies – but I do know not many folks ‘care’ about these books as much as they do my other work. Totally fine. I love these characters, but I also don’t make a huge deal out of the series haha! Something I need to write and release and express and for those who have discovered Lizzie and they journey, I thank you.
Mastodon sequel – Mastodon has been the biggest thing I’ve ever created. Easily. I’m super proud of it and honestly, I never expected it to take off like it did. I said early on in a few interviews that I would be open to a sequel if/when something came to me. It did and I’ve mapped it out completely. It will be the finale. Two books – purely on this aspect. Of course my other works (a few short stories, The Stranger and Jane: the 816 Chronicles) outline a fair bit of the land and the mysterious aspects, but this one will definitively answer the why’s while also focusing on a few key ideas. I’ve ran the outline/synopsis by a few close friends and they loved it. Fingers crossed I stick the landing.
Wagon Buddy Trilogy – book three is loosely mapped out. I have the ideas, just not the ‘how.’ Hopefully it comes together soon.
I have a number of other works in various stages, but nothing far enough along to really ramble about them.
Collaborations:
I’ve got a few collaborations in various stages. It’s been great working with others and we’ll see what comes of them.
Novella – Simon Paul Wilson and myself are in the early stages of a novella. It’s a merging of two of our existing pieces we each had but somehow worked well to update and collaborate. Really excited for this and Simon’s a top notch guy and a stellar writer. More when I can share.
Novella Collection – Myself, Brian Fatah Steele and Joseph Sale have begun the initial work on creating three novellas that are interconnected. I can’t share much more, we’ve had extensive email convos and even the beginnings of a map (which means you know this will be EPIC), but once more comes along that I can share, I will. These two guys are such phenomenally gifted writers with huge imaginations, I’m desperately trying to keep up and not make it obvious I’m the weak link!
Second Sodergren Collaboration – when David and I wrote ‘The Navajo Nightmare,’ it was a blast and resulted in my first gold banner on Amazon when it was released. We’ve got the idea in place and I’ve actually written a draft of my portion. So, we’re making progress! Stay tuned.
Lastly, I’m putting this out there – Sonora Taylor and myself have previously discussed working together a number of times. Timing just hasn’t been there, but I’m hopeful we can finally figure this out and we can work officially together. She is a stunningly talented author and I’d be so honored if I can get my act together and get this done!
Audiobooks:
This year I finally got over my fear and dove into getting some of my books into Audio format. So far Mastodon, Incarnate and The Window in the Ground have been completed and I’m currently waiting for Wagon Buddy to be approved for sale. Scott: A Wagon Buddy Tale, the sequel has begun production. I’ll be looking at getting Piece of Me and An Endless Darkness done as well. So far, the talented Shep Pryor has narrated everything. For Piece of Me I’ll be looking for a female narrator to bring Kari’s journey to life.
3Q’s:
Earlier this summer, I launched my author interview series called 3Q’s. It has been a blast and I’m truly shocked to see so many people mention it and share how much they’ve loved it. Truth be told – I did this purely for me haha! These were some serious and silly questions I’ve always wanted to know, so the easiest way to ask is to do an official series! They’ve been great and the variety of answers has been staggering! I’ll be keeping these going for a bit, so if you’d like to find out who has done them so far, here is the link to the archives on my site;
Real life:
When we had our son, who just turned six! SIX! WTF!, one of the things we immediately decided was that we would do as much fun stuff as we could and give him a ton of cool experiences. Myself and my wife both grew up in very small towns. Even though she was born here, in Edmonton, she moved away when she was still very little, so neither of us ever had the benefit of all that was available living in a city. Auryn has that fortune and we knew we wanted to make sure we took advantage of it.
We’re always planning things and doing stuff and while at times it can be exhausting, it is always rewarding.
This summer, we went to Jurassic Forest; a fave spot for us, travelled out to see my sister in Trail and my mom out in Nakusp. We visited our Zoo a million times. We hit up Taste of Edmonton, which is a fun food truck event, attended Monster Jam and of course the Telus World of Science. For Auryn’s birthday, we went out to Discovery Wildlife Centre, then onto Drumheller. Drumheller is such a cool town and the Royal Tyrell Museum is stunning. We carried on to Calgary where we went to the zoo there and finished off with a trip out to Cochrane and their amazing Wolfdog Sanctuary. I had a wolfdog many years ago, so it was amazing to see them in such a phenomenal location.
Throughout this, we hit up spray parks, took our pup Cocoa for walks and spent some time camping up at the In-Laws seasonal lot. All in all it’s been a blast.
When August ended – it was time for Auryn to return to school and I gotta say – him going into Grade One was a huge emotionally gut punch. I wish he never had to grow up, just stay my little bubs forever. But here we are. Definitely not something I was prepared for.
Coming up – at the end of September I’m heading to Toronto for a professional event. Two days at Sunnybrook Hospital, which will be really interesting. I’ll try and connect with a few of you out there, but no promises!
Movies:
As Auryn has gotten older, we’ve had the chance to watch more movies as a family. When he was born, I essentially gave up watching TV and Movies and focused my time on reading. It may be odd to some of you, but I still co-sleep with him, which I think has been instrumental in him feeling safe and secure and after the difficulties of his arrival, helped eliminate my own fears and some of the PTSD I suffered. With co-sleeping, I read while he settled and we’ve just stuck with that. Some day here, we’ll transition, but for now, it works for us.
Going back around to what I began to say – so, now we’ve begun to watch more movies and even went to the theatre recently. We went and saw DC League of Super Pets which was a lot of fun. We recently watched Jurassic World: Dominion which was a blast (if not ridiculous in parts) and enjoyed The Sea Beast and Lightyear. It’s been awesome watching Auryn grow from someone who kind of paid attention to someone who’ll sit and watch the entire thing.
On the TV front, we’ve been enjoying Amazing Race Canada and will most likely dive into the new season of Survivor when it starts!
Tik Tok:
Lastly, I’ll finish with a bit of social media stuff. I’m actually a big fan of social media. I love seeing what everyone’s up to and I’ve curated my feeds to remain mostly positive which really helps. At the start of Summer, I finally took the plunge and created a Tik Tok account. My wife had been telling me for some time to create one, so I finally did. You can find me at stevestredauthor. I’m not using it to get a million followers or rake in cash, it’s more of a spot for me to share some fun stuff and some book love. I’m also using it to do a series discussing the four years I joined a cult on the dark web when researching my Father of Lies Trilogy. Sacrament, the third novella in the series, was most-recently nominated for a Splatterpunk Award, and while it didn’t win, it was still very exciting to see.
So, if you want to give me a follow or even drop by – I just posted Part 7 in the series yesterday. Be warned – not for the squimish.
Alright, I’ll end it here. Thanks to all of you who’ve read this.
Cheers,
Steve
