That’s right! It’s coming out in August. Here is the cover:
Beneath the Deep Wave is available for preorder from some vendors as an eBook, but not yet in Kindle, Nook, or print. More sales links will be posted when available. In the meantime, here’s a synopsis, and be sure to read and review Mystical Greenwood before Beneath the Deep Wave comes out. That way you’ll be caught up and won’t have to deal with spoilers!
And would you believe it, this is my 100th blog post! That’s a milestone. Many thanks to Sally Cronin, also, for sharing one of my previous posts in her Posts from Your Archives series. It’s been a good start, I think, to the year. I’ve taken further steps to balance the scales beyond social media. For this year’s Lent, I’ve given up watching videos on the computer, so my only YouTube usage has been on the TV. I’ve also been trying to limit my email logins to three per day.
I hope to see you next month at my presentation on word and page counts. See my events page for more details! I’m also hoping to be on panels at this year’s Balticon. I’ll post more details when I have them.
With the new year coming, we always think about what we’re going to do differently. I’ve discussed resolutions before, but now I’ll speculate on where things may be going next for me as a writer.
Presently, the sequel to Mystical Greenwood is is in the hand of beta readers, and Fae Corps is aiming to release it in late August, just as the second edition of Mystical Greenwood was. Editing it had been my focus at the end of last year, and since I have always intended for the One with Nature series to be a trilogy, that means there will be one more book about Dermot and his fellow sorcerers.
But as I’ve said so many times, I don’t want to be confined to just one or two genres, so I do hope to venture out into all the others. I’ve had, over the years, different ideas for each, but I have discovered that I can only work on really one or sometimes two at a time. Many of them have really never come to fruition and remained solely based on themes or interests of mine that I’d like to pursue. Now, they could be late bloomers, but an episode of the Merry Writer Podcast from last year encouraged me to consider that I ought to be willing to let go of ideas that don’t grow. That could be.
True, I may not totally give up on all bits of them, but perhaps letting go can lead me to discovering new, better ones instead. Outside of One with Nature, that one mystery story involving abused pets has had the most attention, mainly because of how it had once been a college assignment. Still, I hope to finish it. Some of those themes previously mentioned are in mystery and horror, and I would like to do something in science fiction. I also hope to find some ways to dust off stories from history that, to me, aren’t as well known, but I admit that some of my favorite historical periods have been popular in fiction and film. I would also like to explore science fiction, but nothing concrete has formed in my head.
I won’t go into too many details, but just know that other ideas are there. Plus, they may not all be unique, something discussed in another good Merry Writer Podcast episode, but as long as I have some that I feel are unique, I’ll be content. Case in point, some reviewers of Mystical Greenwood described it as a typical fantasy hero’s journey, which it is, but that the focus on Nature made it stand out. Well, we’ll see where this year goes. Last year I resolved to be more positive and less worried about being perfect. I don’t believe I kept that. All I can do is try again and keep trying.
Many thanks to Sally Cronin for featuring Mystical Greenwood in her Christmas Book Fair. Enjoy this reading from earlier this week of a sneak peek from my next book. Happy Holidays to all!
With the holidays approaching, I hope you’ll consider buying either Mystical Greenwood (remember, the second One with Nature novel is being edited!) or one of the anthologies that features my work, such as the Christmas anthology I mentioned that features one of my short stories, “The Red House.”
It’s on Goodreads too! This was a short story written during my high school years that I’d thought lost, along with “Crossing the Estuary” in Fae Dreams. But I rediscovered both, thankfully, and here they are.
I’m continuing to edit the sequel to Mystical Greenwood. Remember, the holidays will be coming, and books make great gifts! Be sure to browse my publications. Happy reading!
Many thanks to Craig and Roland of The Hidden Gems Author Podcast for featuring me in their 89th episode! I discuss with them the challenges I’ve had to face as an author due to my Asperger syndrome.
You can also listen to the episode on Podbean! If you’re an author with a writing-related subject you want to discuss, be sure to check them out!
And many thanks also to Sally Cronin for featuring an excerpt from Mystical Greenwood on her blog! Maybe that’ll entice you buy it! If you’re an author looking for more promotional opportunities, be sure to check out Sally’s site!
Plus, I have more great news! A few weeks ago, after so much time, I finally completed a draft for the next book in the One with Nature series! Not only that, but Fae Corps is also aiming to publish it next August!
If you’re planning to attend the Maryland Writers’ Conference, I hope to see you there. I am also giving a presentation on manuscript and book formatting later this month. You can attend in person or via Zoom. You can promote it on Facebook too!
Last week, on Independence Day, I appeared on the podcast The Chapter Goddess Chat, hosted by author and editor Madilynn Dale. If you didn’t get to watch it, here it is:
You can also listen to it on Spotify and read an interview I did with Madilynn on her blog. I had a wonderful time, and if you are a writer looking for a podcast to appear on, I highly recommend you check out this one!
And yes, like I said on the podcast, I’m no longer on Twitter and Tumblr, and I’ve chosen not to feature links to my LinkedIn profile on this site anymore.
I’m happy to announce to you all that a short story of mine is appearing in an upcoming Christmas anthology by Mystic Publishers, Inc. this year!
The story is called “The Red House,” and has its origins in my high school years of writing. Like pretty much all of my writing attempts from back then, I’d thought it lost, until one day when I discovered a printed copy of it along with some other pieces (including what would become “Crossing the Estuary” in the Fae Corps anthology Fae Dreams).
For this month, here’s a double feature! Many thanks to Sally Cronin for promoting my published work, and to Robbie Cheadle for allowing me to discuss how poetry has impacted my life. Check out both!
It’s almost here! Yes, I’m talking about the new edition of Mystical Greenwood from Fae Corps! Don’t forget! There is a launch party on August 26th on Facebook in the Fae Corps Inc Party Room group.
You can still pre-order eBooks! The paperback through Barnes & Noble can be pre-ordered now, too! It seems that B&N and Amazon issue separate ISBNs now (paperback via Amazon should be ready around the release day).
It’s hard to believe that it’s happening. This book has been on quite a journey, and with this new edition I took the opportunity to make many grammatical corrections.
In fact, I learned this month that in a contest I submitted the original edition to in Top Shelf Magazine, which I’d forgotten about, the book was an honorable mention. It was a nice little surprise, and it can only make me wonder what’s in store for the new edition!
Over the past several weeks, I’ve been trying to reestablish a morning writing routine, as I’d mentioned previously. I have found that two things have contributed to making it successful:
Sitting at a table as opposed to on the couch. When it comes to writing rather than editing, posture matters, it seems.
Not logging onto the internet until after I’m done.
Basically, the writing time (as of now) lasts as long as my two morning cups of coffee with Coffee Mate French Vanilla cream, so I guess I now have a writing beverage. But more than anything else, the discipline of doing it, even when barely a few words barely make it out (which has happened a few times), is what is making it work. Here’s hoping it continues and gets more productive. Maybe it’ll progress to a weekly word count, like I had to do in a novella class taught by Professor Jerry Gabriel back at St. Mary’s College. We’ll see.
For those who haven’t seen last month’s post, my fantasy novel Mystical Greenwood is having a new edition coming out next month courtesy of Fae Corps, with whom I have been in four anthologies (you can find these on my poetry and short stories pages).
Looking back on when it was first published and the road towards getting the new one ready, some of it was familiar territory, while in other cases, things have changed when it comes to technology, which has been more helpful in proofreading and correcting grammatical errors, which is definitely not an opportunity to pass up when releasing a new edition.
But through all of it, I am reminded perhaps more so than before that I need to be patient (one of those four P’s of getting published) and trust that everything will be okay.
I’m very grateful to Fae Corps for taking my book on, and they have done a fantastic job with promotional images:
And don’t forget that you can preorder eBook editions! Print copies will be available on or around the release date.
And there is going to be a launch party on August 26th on Facebook in the Fae Corps Inc Party Room group. I hope to see you there!
In the meantime, I hope to continue to try to find a better balance between writing and marketing, which I’ve started on by trying to cut back on social media promotion that I got heavily into during the COVID pandemic and focus a little more on quality rather than quantity.
I also want to try to reestablish a writing routine again, perhaps at a different time of day so that I can make headway on the sequel. Fingers crossed.
Andrew McDowell 