We're coming, Lupe

As I mentioned last year, today is (or will be) Lupe Bierak's birthday. To remind you how The Milk Run starts out, here is the beginning:

     “AASON!” Lupe shrieked. The teenage girl’s bloodcurdling scream shattered the previously peaceful calm of the spacious starship cabin.
     21-year-old Aason Bierak was caught by surprise. The handsome young man with the tousled brown hair had been staring straight ahead, lost in the mesmerizing blackness of null fold space just beyond the cockpit’s windshield. It was a mind-trap and Aason knew it but it was one in which he allowed himself a few minutes of entanglement. That ended abruptly with Lupe’s howl. With a titanic effort, Aason tore his piercing blue eyes away from the lush void to face his sister. He was horrified to see a waving set of translucent tentacles that had emerged from nowhere, enveloping Lupe, constricting her in their grasp.

So as the story starts out, Lupe disappears, kidnapped by parties unknown. Where is she? Aason has to find her. He goes to a planet called Hades (Hell) then to an invisible world called Ay'den (Eden) where he meets God. Actually, it isn't "God" so much as a god. Aason then travels in the largest starship in the universe through Limbo to end up in a place that the residents call Purgatory. From there, he has to make his way to Heaven and duke it out with the other gods.

Will Aason find his sister? Is she already dead? Will he be able to save her?

Here's the good news: I have finally finished the first draft of The Milk Run and even this rough draft is sitting at 65,000 words. There are two parts that need a vast amount of improvement so I expect it to be around 75,000 words when I hand it out to readers. It usually grows around 10,000 words from there so I'd say it'll top out around 85,000 words, just a little more than Rome's Evolution.

Stay tuned!