Category: Updates

Posted on

July Check-In – Before I Forget

Howdy folks!

Still alive, still kicking. It’s been kind of a rough month as far as having time to do things goes so this check-in is probably going to look similar to last month’s update. I have been doing a bit of writing, but it’s mostly background work and worldbuilding (yes I know – I’m trying to avoid worldbuilder’s disease but there are some things I need to get a handle on sooner rather than later) which I will link to in the appropriate locations.

What Am I Working On?

Hostage – Manuscript is still with the other Lowell and I’ve gotten an okay on the cover, but because of aforementioned roughness I had to take a detour for my own sanity. So! Instead of the cover I’ve been working on a topographic map of Sudenlan, the continent upon which Hostage takes place. (It’s south of Korlay for those familiar with the other Lowell’s Tanyth Fairport trilogy – which, yes, is one of my favorites and the other reason Esper’s last name is Ravenwood – I truly didn’t expect to be sitting at the same table as my own father at writing cons, let alone doing a collaboration!)

Music – I added a new tab to the Table of Contents, which I don’t think I mentioned in my last update, and will be adding to it as I make compilations. I’ve been working on an OST for a campaign run by my friend David, and he’s given me permission to put the suite on YouTube, so that should be up soon!

The Dawnbreakers’ Saga – I’ve been picking away at what needs to happen next since I’m officially in terra nova as far as planning goes. I know the next Big Thing and what that will entail but I’ve got kind of a chill and possibly boring period between then and now and there may be more cinematic episodes in my future. Before I start doing the next phase though, I also have a recap to compile and new card art to finish. There’s a lot of work that needs to get done before the end of August.

The Dragon King’s Council – This is in the worldbuilding and initial noodling phase. It’s got a little over 200 pages of comic/graphic novel script which is really intimidating and I probably shouldn’t have gone whole hog with this thing, but I want to give it a shot anyway. I’ve also been considering ways to change the beginning and write it for novel so that less comic-inclined people can also enjoy the story. This is the story that I’ve been incessantly worldbuilding, and am in the process of compiling a World Anvil codex for it, so if you want to see what kind of weirdness is brewing, go check that out. I’m staying pretty far away from any story-related information, so it’s very spoiler-free thus far. My immediate next step will be working out the differences between cultural groups so that I know what it actually means to say, “Cason MacRaed is a second-generation Iznili immigrant to Wynecrag.” I’m very excited about this project, but at the same time trying not to burn myself out on it. It’s very much being written by the seat of my pants along a meandering trail where I know the major events that need to happen and where it’s going roughly, but the between bits are a mystery until they land on the page.

Other – Charge and anything Five Realms related have officially been shelved, and I’m considering taking the series number off the cover of Oisinson. I do want to look back at Charge and see if there’s anything in it I could use in the next Asgard book, which I think I know a good premise for, but it still needs noodles and the state of the world is not helping me think about writing modern fantasy. Things I do know: there will be more Loki, there might be more Rig, we may actually interact with Thor a bit more, potentially see some interaction with folks from other pantheons entirely, and I’m considering Vanaheim. We’ll see. I definitely want to go to Vanaheim sometime in the future but I don’t know when. The Asgard series has the potential to be nicely episodic, but I’m aware of the risk of going a bit too formulaic with each book, especially since I tend to think in patterns. I may have to re-read All’s Well and see if there are any threads I left hanging in the breeze.

That’s all from me this month. My brain feels like it’s gone through a blender but we’re still trucking along. I think I’m also going to be a little less rigid about when I post updates going forward, as long as I post them once a month. With that said, hopefully I’ll see you next month! Stay safe out there.

Posted on

June Check-In – The Late Bus!

Howdy folks! Life sandbagged me once again, but that’s alright.

It’s been a bit since last I wrote an update – usually I post these in the middle of the month but it’s currently *checks watch* June 30th, so I’m a little late. The past few months have been kind of a roller coaster, so I don’t have much in the way of writing going on, but I do have plans? I think? Maybe?

What Am I Working On?

Hostage – The manuscript is back with the other Lowell and I’m now working on the cover for it. So far it’s still in the thumbnail stage while we figure out what looks good, where titles are going, and what style we could possibly use to continue out the series if we write a sequel.

Music – Somehow I’ve learned the basics of how to play guitar over the course of May and June, and have been working on incorporating it into my music. It has opened up a lot of new composition directions since I now also kind of know how to write for string instruments better than I did. I will always be a Brass person (can’t go wrong with Mordor Horns) but guitar is very relaxing… once you get past the hand-cramp stage.

The Dawnbreakers’ Saga – I’ve recorded and edited everything up until the video that will go up at the end of August, which will mark the official 3rd anniversary of the series! Everything after that point is currently in the planning phase, since I also caught up to all the stuff I had planned from the beginning three years ago. Thankfully I’ve got plenty of time between now and then to figure it out, and I can also take a month or so off if I need. Give people a chance to catch up, maybe make some silly videos like a Zaytest “okee” counter. 😀

The Asgard Series – Sequel is still in the noodling phase. The whole state of the world threw a massive wrench at my face in terms of, “Oh hey, I’m writing urban mythological fantasy set in the modern day how do I incorporate THIS mess?” I’m on the fence about whether or not to just ignore it completely and call it an AU where 2020 was a normal year. I’ve been given the advice to pick an arbitrary date five-ish years into the future but… bruh. I don’t even know what things will be like five weeks in the future. So I’m stuck-ish on that one for the moment.

Charge – Charge continues to be cursed. I got a fair ways into the story and realized it was kind of complicated for what I was trying to do with it. Sometimes stories just don’t work and that’s okay. I did learn some stuff and do some worldbuilding that I may be able to use in the Asgard series, when I come back to it, but for the moment, Charge will stay archived. It may come back into the light in novel form later on, but for sure it’s not going to work as a comic.

The Five Realms – I’ll be honest… I’ve learned a lot about myself, storytelling, and the kinds of stories I want to tell over the past year or so, and I think I’ve fallen out of love with this universe a little bit, which is something I never thought I’d ever say. Esper will always have a special place in my heart, but now, some roughly seven years after I sat down to write Revenant, I feel like I can do better. Which leads me to…

The Dragon King’s Council – I haven’t wanted to say much about this one because I kept working on it a little bit, then backing off again, then working on it, then backing off again, but I think this is actually going to happen. I know enough about the world, the magic system, and most of the characters that I can kind of wing it (heh – dragon puns) until I figure out what’s going on and where the end of this thing is going to be. Right at the moment it exists as a “noodle bin” where I keep all of my ideas for it, and as 220 pages of comic scripts. I’m considering trying to transfer that over into novel form (because it’s a Good Dang Story so far – lots of fun but with a serious side, it kind of hearkens back to the “bunch of D&D adventures” feeling that Revenant had) but I keep running into an issue with the first chapter – that is, since I wrote it for a comic originally, the beginning makes sense for a comic or graphic novel, but not necessarily a novel novel. Whatever I do with it, this one is going to be kind of on the back burner, simmering away, getting stirred every once in a while.

That’s all for this month! With any luck it won’t take me half a year to respond again. 😀 See you next time!

Posted on

March Check-In – The Ides of March

Howdy folks! The spring equinox is almost upon us and I am bracing for impact.

Because it’s allergy season. [dramatic music]

Actually, I’m bracing for impact for all sorts of reasons, not the least of which being that I work in retail as a day job. With everything going on right now in the world I’ve just kinda made my peace with the fact that I’ll probably be sick sometime in the next month or so. I’ve been trying to get as much voice-based stuff done as possible so that I don’t fall behind as badly. As such I haven’t done a whole lot of writing in the past month or so, as most of my efforts have been concentrated on The Dawnbreaker’s Saga.

What Am I Working On?

Hostage: I have the whole story! It melded together better than I expected it would, and I’m excited to see where the story takes them if we continue it. (We’re Lowells – we can’t not write trilogies.) I’ve got the full manuscript now and have been slowly plucking away at my own mistakes whilst also trying to find places with extraneous wordage on both ends. It’s a BIG book. With any luck I’ll have that back to the other Lowell by the end of March. (Along with, perhaps, a cover sketch. I have a few ideas.)

Charge: Hit a wall with this one wherein I realized just how much work it was going to be to catch up with my writing in the form of artwork to go along with it. I still think I can do it, but since I’ve got Hostage to work on, it’s on pause. When I hit the last “okay, now what?” section my wordcount for the manuscript was at 29k – and having planned the first chapter out in comic form… it’s going to be a while before I catch up with myself.

Scripting: Most of what I’ve been writing lately have been scripts for the Dawnbreakers’ Saga. The plots are starting to converge in a big way so I’ve had to get my ducks in a row as far as first meetings are concerned. I have a few big production episodes coming up, but I also have some ideas for silly things to do in the meantime if I do fall behind and end up unable to record for some length of time. 😀

The Asgard Series: I have been told in no uncertain terms that Raylene and Dublin need a sequel. I’ll be honest, I expected this to be a one-off and then I’d go back to the Five Realms, but I’ve honestly had more fun writing Loki alone than most of what I was working on before. So, a sequel is in the veeerry early, babiest planning stages. What I like to call, “percolation time.” Hopefully it doesn’t take me as long to come up with a decent conflict as it did for the first one – seriously, Utgard took me a year and a half. All I know about the next installment is that I want more Loki, more of the kids (obviously), and possibly more Heimdall shenanigans – he did, after all, come up with the, “Let’s dress Thor as Freya to get his hammer back,” idea.

That’s about it for this month! With any luck, April will be a little more peaceful. See you again soon!

Posted on

February Check-In – Clunking Right Along

Howdy, Folks!

I’m actually getting into the habit of this monthly post thing – although next time I’ll mark my calendar so I don’t almost forget. Habits are hard to form, but I’ll get there!

Many thanks are in order this month, some to say goodbye, some to say hello. First, I want to express my deepest gratitude to Stu King (aka CouchwarriorTV and fearless leader of the Character Crusade) for seven years of amazing storytelling, voice acting, and audio-visual production over on YouTube. He recently announced that he was moving on to other things, but he was the reason I started the Dawnbreakers’ Saga in the first place, which gave me the confidence to do things like speak at panels and keep writing novels. Stu is, if anyone is, my voice acting and character building sensei, and to him I give a hearty thanks, raise a mug (of coffee), and wish the very best on his upcoming adventures! SkÃ¥l!

Second, a big thank you to my dad – Nathan Lowell, the man, the myth, the Captain of the Golden Age of the Solar Clipper – for boosting All’s Well in Asgard. He didn’t have to, but he did. And because he did, I feel like I have even more reason to be present. So, hello! All you Asgard fans who crossed over from the Deep Dark now know why I keep calling Pip “Space Loki.” 😀

What Am I Doing?

Hostage: The full draft is currently with the other Lowell. He’s working on meshing the two stories together and getting the manuscript formatted so that we can scrape it into shape a bit more. I haven’t seen the other half of the story yet – aside from the very end of it – so I’m quite interested to see what they look like side by side.

Charge: Surprise Project! I intended to pick Gate Strider back up when I was done with Hostage but I had so much fun writing Loki for All’s Well that I had to dip my toe back into Norse Mythology land for a while… and fell all the way in, as one does. I’m not sure what I’m going to do with Charge – it’s a story set mostly in Vanaheim but dips into 9th century Norway for a little while. It’s been coming together in bits and chunks for the last like eight years or so, but may not lend itself well to novelization. It’s a very visual story, and significantly more adult than All’s Well, so I may be producing it as a comic or graphic novel. Which would be a Challenge, since I’ve never been able to keep focused on the same thing long enough to make a go of sequential art. (Though, I do have a couple of unfinished animations under my belt now. Shhh, secrets.) I’m about 13k words into a rough draft if 4theWords is correct, which I will likely be using as a base for comic scripts later on. Character design is underway, and I’m enjoying the process a great deal!

That’s about all for this month! With any luck I’ll be seeing you again soon!

Posted on

Slowly but Surely (Don’t Call Me Shirley)

Howdy, folks!

Been a while – again – but this time it was primarily because my day job is in retail and 2019 was the first holiday season I’ve had to deal with in a Big Store rather than a little one. Boy howdy did it ever beat my stamina to a pulp and leave it for undead. All kinds of things fell by the wayside – art, writing, social media presence, heck even Dawnbreakers had to go on hiatus for about a month. The plus side is that in trying to get my feet back under me I’ve been able to suss out some things that I Really Want To Do, some things that I Really Don’t, and a few test-strategies to get things going and/or situated.

CoSine 2020 was an awesome time, and I learned a lot there that I didn’t know but should have. You’d think someone whose dad has a doctorate in social media would know how it actually works but Nope! So I’m adjusting due to new information and fresh motivation: This year I was actually on panels for the first time ever and it was so much fun! I stepped out from behind my dad’s shadow a little bit, so now I’m not as scared about sticking a flag down on the internet. It wasn’t even something I was really aware of, but now that I am, I can deal with it.

Plans:

With any luck I’ll be doing a “Story So Far” recap for the Dawnbreakers’ Saga at the end of the month, and from there out do shorter “what happened this month” recaps. I plan for mid-month “what am I working on that isn’t Skyrim” updates so that we’re all on the same page, and both of those will be cross-posted to my new Facebook Group! (Which is one of the things I learned at CoSine – I had a Page but they don’t work they way I think they do.) And hey! Since it’s slightly after the middle of the month…

What Am I Doing?

Barbarian, Book One: Hostage – Cowriting this one. I’m in charge of the steppe nomads, and the other writer has been waiting on my half of the story since the middle of November. I’m at 41k for word count on the first draft and my “protagonist” is fighting me. (He’s not exactly a Good Person.) With any luck I’ll have the first draft done before the end of the month.

All’s Well in Asgard – First draft done! My plan was to sit on it and let the words fade while I work on Hostage, and then do a first pass while it was with my cowriter’s editor. Obviously that has taken a lot longer than I expected, so the Gray Horse crew will just have to be patient. (Loki is getting antsy, I can feel it.)

The Raven-Friend’s Saga – Gate Strider got stuck while I finished All’s Well, and Blackbird is in a similar situation. They’re still on the list, and I suspect I’ll pick Gate Strider back up when I’m done with Hostage. It’ll be a long while before we get back to Esper’s story but we will get there eventually. At a stretch, I think I’ll end up alternating Esper’s books with other things, depending on how said other things go. No promises.

Paperbacks – I’ve currently got a proof copy of Redgate: Old World waiting to be covered in red ink. (I kid, mostly.) I’m going to paper those ones before the Tales from Liserna, because they need significant work, and if I remember correctly, the Redgate Chronicles are pretty clean. I can even keep the covers!

So there’s an example of what’s on the way in the future. My next step is to set up an e-mail list (like, a real one this time) and actually finish my half of Hostage so that we can whip that one into shape. I may also see about getting my genre looked at – I met a guy at CoSine who was doing really well promoting his books as YA despite being a little more mature. I know the guy who pushed him in that direction, and that may be worthwhile for at very least the Redgate Chronicles and All’s Well in Asgard, should I ever get that one out. Just thinking out loud here.

Alright, shocker, I made a long-winded post. See ya’ll next time!

Posted on

Unlimited!

Hello, my friends!

I’m typing this in the middle of a rather severe thunderstorm but I’m very pleased to announce that all of my books are now available to read for free on Kindle Unlimited! The Tales from Liserna trilogy has been updated, finally, which means all of the dialogue tags and bugs have been fixed (the ones I had knowledge of anyway) and I can get on to other things.  Namely, finishing the second Redgate book.

I’ll let you all know when next I have stuff.  Slowly whittling down the pile of projects. Slowly.

See you when I see you,
-Ej