Galaxy Series Status

It has been ages since I last posted to this blog.  Many of my fans--perhaps as many as six of them--wonder when book 3 of the Galaxy Series will be available.  I can say that I'm still devoted to completing the series, but life gets in the way of writing.  I am currently around half-way finished with the first draft, and have a strong idea about where the story is going.  I am truly excited about this book, as I think it will continue to add depth to the story and perhaps reveal some answer to questions about where the series is headed.  

The story will continue to develop the adventure of astronauts Paol and Blade and will certainly expand on our favorite astrophysicists as they try to save Earth1 from the effects of the superluminal comet.  The comet itself will continue to evolve in the story as well.  In fact, I am starting to see the comet as a character in and of itself, and that will certainly take it in unexpected directions in books 3 and 4. 

Finally, book 3 will introduce new characters that will continue to add to the storyline and become important fixtures in bring the story to resolution.

So, for those who enjoyed The Orthogonal Galaxy and The Twisted Galaxy, stay tuned for another story that I think will take you even deeper into the galaxy. 

My Novel Beginning

Several years ago, I woke up from a very simple dream.  An astronomy professor at the California Institute of Technology had just returned from a summer research appointment in Chile, where he has been working at an observatory high in the Andes looking for a parallel Earth in the Milky Way galaxy.  He was having a brief conversation with an administrative assistant at the university, who had asked him how the summer research went....

.... and that was it.  Nothing more, no additional details, no understanding on why I would have a dream like this.  The simplicity of it, along with the setting was so starkly unremarkable, that I couldn't help but ask myself "why did that just happen in my head?!"  The fact that it was so simple and so disconnected with anyone or anything in my life, made the whole thing seem so strange. 

For the rest of the week, all of my free thinking time was consumed in the silliness of the dream.  Ideas flooded into my head that continued to develop, until I recognized that a clear Science Fiction plot was forming.  From the one simple seed I began writing an outline for a novel.  But, wait... I don't write novels.  I'm an engineer, not a writer!  And while I love to read, I have no experience or training in writing novels.  Nevertheless, I knew that this thing that was growing inside of my head just had to find its way onto paper.  

As I began writing, more thoughts came to me, and I realized that I wasn't just writing a novel... I was writing the first book in a five-book series!  After a few years, that first book was complete.  I decided to self-publish, but as I started researching the process, I took a closer look at my book, and realized that I had over 800 pages (250,000 words!) of material.  There was no way I was going to publish such a beast as a first novel.  I mean, not even my family would read something that verbose.  So, I spent the next couple of years reworking that one book into two, and reworked the first one even more after some feedback from my wife, Suzanne.  After a final personal edit, I am now back to doing the research on self-publishing, and hope to publish "The Orthogonal Galaxy" soon, but there is still some work to do. 

If you'd like to follow this journey with me, be sure to click the subscribe link below.