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New serial news…

What’s Up?

Getting the newsletter off today, I had to fill in some background on the Among the Stars books. It’s five years since ‘A Name Among the Stars’ was written! Some of you may remember that it was written here on WordPress, a chapter or two every weekend. And I often left you on a cliffhanger, because I’m mean like that.

Okay, so that may be the way I progress on my side projects, as I said earlier this year.

My number 1 priority is Bite Back 8, which is proving very difficult to progress. I have written a lot, but it doesn’t hang together yet.

My side projects will be split between Science Fiction and Urban Fantasy. I’ll be going back to writing a chapter or two at a time, rather than complete episodes as I have done up to now on The Long Way Home. These will appear here. I’ll also do ‘catch-ups’/’story so far’ on BookFunnel. All of that, but slower. I can’t put out the equivalent of a short story in a side project every month.

I’ll flit between one story and another.

First up…
Most of you will have read my Among the Stars series. There are only two books at the moment, ‘A Name Among the Stars’ and ‘A Threat Among the Stars’, both of which were written as serials. Book number 3, ‘A Ship Among the Stars’, will be next. It will have mutiple points of view, like book 2, and you can only get the first full episode in an anthology which is due out on Monday 19th.

The anthology is called The Expanding Universe #8, and my story in it is called ‘To Catch a Thief’.

“Stranded on an icy moon in the remote and lawless Frontier, merchanter Sam must sup with the devil to get her spaceship repaired, and she’s all out of long spoons.”

Here are the links
US: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0B9SW1X7S/
UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0B9SW1X7S/

As in ‘A Threat Among the Stars’, the opening chapters are seen from alternate points of view, not the main character Zara’s PoV. In ‘To Catch a Thief’, you’ll meet Sam, solo merchanter and sometime conwoman, in a deadly dangerous situation. This is the serial I’ll be releasing a chapter at a time, starting next month. It will concentrate on Sam and will only make sense if you read the first episode from the anthology.

In the same way, although ‘To Catch a Thief’ stands alone, book 3 as a whole will only make sense if you’ve read books 1 and 2. If you haven’t read the Among the Stars series, and want to see if you’d like it, I’m dropping the price of ‘A Name Among the Stars’ to 99p this week only (19th-25th September).

US: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B076WZBFVJ/
UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B076WZBFVJ/

Second up…
I’ll be producing book 4 for The Long Way Home in the same chapter by chapter format. For those of you that find this is torture, all I can say is that I’ll probably finish the book and release it well before the completion of the serial installments! If you want to read it in sections, sign up for the newsletter and watch out for the link to BookFunnel.

Book 4 should get Jan and Bjorn to Earth.

Third up…
I will return to Stand Up. It needs a thorough rework, and again will be released a chapter or so at a time. For those who didn’t catch the earlier version, this is an Athanate romance set in New York shortly after the events of ‘Change of Regime’. It’s stand alone, but it would undoubtedly help if you read ‘Change of Regime’ first.

US: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0711ML84S/
UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0711ML84S/

What do I have in my to-do list?

Bite Back 8 & 9 (and possibly 10)
Bian’s Tale 2-6
Among the Stars 3 & 4
The Long Way Home 4, 5 & 6.

And a host of others! Some of the other projects I’ve mentioned before, like a Steampunk Fantasy set in South Africa, the dragon rider after the age of dragons has passed, the space marine recruit escaping ‘justice’ on her terrible homeworld, the monster that walks the Canadian highways, the college wizard just trying to get his degree, the rogue detective and the serial killer, an Amber novella of a daring rescue, Heartbeat (SF), Marionette (thriller set in France)…

What dictates the priorities?

Success, basically. A book in the Bite Back series is pretty much guaranteed to make twice what a book in the Among The Stars series makes. It’s too early to tell where The Long Way Home will come in overall. I can say the launch of books 1-3 was successful, without it being the sort of response that would change my priorities.

Other news

I’m having the Bite Back series translated into Spanish. I’ll report how that goes. It’s a bit of a gamble, but the Spanish-speaking market is growing, and I feel lucky.

July 4, 2022

in News, Promotion, Serials, The Long Way Home
2 Comments

TLWH books on Amazon

I have loaded onto Amazon: The Dark Takes Fools (available now), Out of the Dark (pre-order now, release on Aug 1st), Born in Fire (pre-order now, release on Sep 1st).

LINKS FOR THE LONG WAY HOME:
Book 1, The Dark Takes Fools : http://mybook.to/TLWH1-TDTF
Book 2, Out of the Dark : http://mybook.to/TLWH2-OOTD
Book 3, Born in Fire : http://mybook.to/TLWH3-BIF

I’m writing Bite Back 8 at the moment.

July 11, 2020

in Amber, Audiobook, Promotion, Reviews, Serials
5 Comments

Newsletter news and brief update

Hello! Long time, no post!

My efforts these days are going more toward writing the books and newsletters. Today’s blog post is mainly about newsletters.

First off, where am I with writing? I’m 20 chapters into Bite Back 7, Queen of Diamonds, and I was expecting this to be about 70 chapters. Having said that, I’m spending a lot more chapters on the early part of the book, without actually seeing any of the later chapters reduced. Maybe this will be one of the longer books. Hopefully I should finish the draft by the end of summer.

Concentrating on Bite Back 7 means that Bian’s Tale 2 and Among the Stars 3 are both started but on hold.

That’s my weekday writing. As many of you will know, I try and do something very different at weekends (no, I don’t write every day, but most days). I’m back doing something that I did on this blog site a couple of years ago, when I write Among the Stars books 1 and 2 – I’m writing a serial.

It’s another Science Fiction, in the same universe as Among the Stars, but centuries earlier. It’s called The Long Way Home. I will be publishing it in episodes of about 10k words on a monthly basis. I’ll be publishing it as a newsletter.

Episode 1 is available as the opening story in an anthology called The Great Beyond, available for 99c/99p at the moment. To continue reading The Long Way Home, you’ll need to join my newsletter, and new episodes will be released each month, starting with July (this one!). Episodes will be free.

Links below.

What’s it about?

“Their war has just ended. Their struggles have just begun.“

Janice Skelling and Bjorn Thorsson are desperate to get back from the war with the technology that will mean the difference between life and death for their remote home planet, out in Frontier space. But nothing is easy. They have to overcome betrayals, corruption, greed… and pirates, on The Long Way Home.

Two easy steps to get on board:

1. Buy The Great Beyond anthology ($0.99/£0.99) to get episode 1.

smarturl.it/greatbeyond

2. Sign up for the newsletter and get free monthly episodes.

https://mailchi.mp/27afed3e7c0c/mark-henwick-scifi-newsletter-signup

BONUS STEP! Get a free 1 hr audio. Jessica Henwick, star of Iron Fist & Matrix 4, narrates The Long Way Home, Episode 1!

bit.ly/thelongwayhomeaudio

I hope you enjoy it!

And reviews. Reviews on any of my books. Reviews are lifeblood for writers. Reviews please, readers. 🙂

Thank you!

October 26, 2018