Backlist Publishing

As Homecoming nears official release, I’m pretty much finished publishing off of what I call my “backlist.”  Some authors have this for published work, but it has a different meaning for me.  You see, I first started truly writing in 2008 while deployed overseas, and the five novels that resulted – Akeldama, Salvation Day, WrongfulDeath, Schism, and Homecoming – were all novels that I completed during my military service(or at least the main draft…editing always remains).  What lies ahead is a bit more unknown.

Yes, there are four other novels I’ve written, but all four need extensive re-writes.  None will be published in anything close to what they are now…if at all.  That basically means they’ll be new novels.  The sequel to Akeldama is the closest, but even that’ll be at least 75% rewritten before seeing the light of day.

And then there are new novels.  I am currently writing a sci-fi/fantasy mashup about a group of explorers from Earth who find a world where magic is real, but I’ve only done three chapters so far.  I have the sequel to Salvation Day in my head, but I have yet to sit down in any serious way with that one.  So how to proceed from here.

Admittedly, it is a bit scary.  I haven’t written a novel from scratch in a long time, so I need to get back into the process.  For example, while I’ve finished chapter three in my new novel, I haven’t outlined beyond that.  I know generally what’s going to happen next, but I haven’t fleshed that out, and I have to resist the urge to just start writing, because I know that if I do, I’ll hit that wall and have to re-write over the top of a bunch of garbage.

The best thing I have going for me is that my livelihood, so far, isn’t dependent on my writing, so I can have fun and move at my own pace.  Lack of dependence on financial success as an author means less stress.  That doesn’t mean I want to poop out crappy writing, only that I can enjoy it because I know where my next meal is coming from.  Hopefully I can get there sooner than I think.