Taking A Deep Breath Before Finishing Broadcast 12

This is a spoiler-free blog post, so go ahead and read it if you haven't been reading along with the serialized version of Broadcast 12, it's safe. Oh, and the art at the top of this post has nothing to do with the books. I just really liked it and it was in my licensing pile.

Over the last few books, I've ignored entire planets, but I won't ignore this. Let me unpack that.

There are planets in the Haven System that are very interesting, with new terrain, secrets, and stories waiting for our characters, but the story of quick settlement, advancement, and personal discovery and invasion haven't left much, if any room for that. Tamber is huge, almost as large as Earth, and even though it has far fewer people, only about a hundred million now, our characters would find several stories while exploring that planetary body alone. Then there's the larger, more prominent and much less populated planet of Lonos not far from it that is fully terraformed and overgrown that has only been mentioned two or three times and not by name.

The focus of the story, and of the characters we're following is on Tamber because it's all they and the books can handle. It's also where they landed, so it became the centre of the story.

A number of stories that weren't central to the plot were put aside for the time being as well,  and some of them will take centre stage again, like the one coming up at the end of this book. I wish I could be more specific, but I'm trying to avoid spoilers.

The meeting of Alice and Noah (Carnie) was one such story, and it was put off for an entire novel. They were supposed to meet in Broadcast 11, but it was pushed to 12 because there was only so much room in Broadcast 11 and Alice had some other things to do.

If I could afford to work on a Spinward Fringe book that was 1,000 pages, I would, but I have to tell this story in smaller pieces, so some stories get pushed to the side. Even still, I think it's time to start telling the story I've wanted to bring in since Broadcast 8, and it all begins with Alice and Carnie really meeting. I'll ignore an entire planet, and take a momentary break from telling the story of the barbarians at the gate to show you something that's been in my head for years now.

Even this close to the end, we're taking a look back to Broadcast 0: Origins as a story takes a nice step forward. I'll get around to exploring Planet Lonos and the other planet sized ideas.

[A quick reminder: Google+ is going away soon, so if you want to keep getting notifications from this blog, you'll have to subscribe. There's a wigit to the right that will allow you to do that by adding your email address.]

[Spinward Fringe Broadcast 12: Invasion is serializing on Patreon now, and will be available in full EBook form on May 11, 2019 with preorders available now]

Spinward Fringe Broadcast 0: Origins Updates!

After working with Amazon for the better part of two weeks, they have agreed to offer everyone who owns Spinward Fringe Broadcast 0: Origins to update their version of the book for free.

There are some improvements to the book, but no story changes. A new table of contents and a cleaner EBook conversion have also been done.

Amazon does not push updates to their customers' devices automatically because that would result in the removal of notes and highlighted sections. They give you the choice instead - you can stick with the old version, or update to the new and lose your notes.

Here's what they said today in an email:

"We won’t notify customers of the updates, but they can now update the content on their “Manage Your Content and Devices” page (www.amazon.com/gp/digital/fiona/manage)"

So, if you'd like the update, please feel free!

The new updated version should be available on all other platforms within a week unless you got it at Smashwords, in which case it should be available in 2-4 hours from the time of this post. 

Thank you very much for your patience on this!

RL

Origins - The Final Edit

At long last and great expense, Spinward Fringe Broadcast 0: Origins has finished undergoing an extensive edit. The purpose of the work was to bring the book up to par with most conventionally published material, and to make the whole thing easier to read.

The plot and characters remain the same, but I did take the opportunity to make some scientific tweaks partially thanks to the editor that was hired on to the project: Jason Black. This has been in the works for months, and now that it's been done once, Broadcasts 1-6 will eventually get the same treatment.

Regardless of how much time and money was invested, Spinward Fringe Broadcast 0: Origins is, and will remain free wherever vendors allow free eBooks to be offered. Amazon does not allow authors to offer their eBooks for free, sadly, so I'm charging as little as they will allow: 99 cents. This new version of Origins should appear on Amazon.com in the next few days (It just appeared here!), and the current edition of The First Light Chronicles Omnibus is being updated at the same time.

You can get the final version of this book for free at Smashwords right now. They have versions for every type of eBook reader. If there was ever a time to tell your friends about Spinward Fringe, this is it. Broadcast 0: Origins is in fine shape, and there's more news but the timetable is still uncertain, so I can't talk about those upcoming events just yet.

RL

[Questions? Concerns?]

My Spinward Fringe Career At The Moment

In an earlier post I wrote about editing the First Light Chronicles Omnibus from start to finish.

Since then I've had a few emails come my way voicing the general sentiment of "It's finished! Leave it alone and move on!"

Well, this is a brave new world, where a book or any other electronic media can be improved or changed and in some cases should be improved. I'm afraid that the First Light Chronicles needed more attention. There were some omissions, errors and I had a need to look the book over sentence by sentence so I could improve the narrative overall.

My readers (past, present and future), deserve it. After looking the First Light Chronicles over I had two choices: edit it carefully from beginning to end or rewrite it completely. After speaking to my editor and a couple of proofers I decided to edit. They're working on it with me, making sure I didn't miss anything and giving me their opinions on loose ends as well as characterization. They were dead set against the First Light Chronicles being rewritten. General consensus was that yes, the style needed a little work, but the series was fantastic.

When this is finished in a month or so every version of the First Light Omnibus will be updated with the new edition. A free re-download wherever you purchased it will update you to the newest version. The First Light Chronicles trilogy will also be re-released as Spinward Fringe Origins (Broadcast 0).

The reason for this re-release is pretty simple really. There's a crowd of people who don't understand that what begins in the First Light Chronicles series continues in the Spinward Fringe series no matter what I do on the cover, inside the book or where it's listed for sale. As it turns out I have to make this change so the new market these books are reaching accept them more easily.

One more word on the editing of the First Light Chronicles / Spinward Fringe Origins Trilogy. I'm enjoying it. It's a lot of hard work an long hours, but there's something about going back and reflecting, examining where the story began that is really helping me direct the future of the Spinward Fringe series. This is a labor of love, and knowing that these books will never be edited again drives me to do the best job I can. The proofers feel the same way, I've been told.

What's going on creatively?

I'm still working on the latest book in the Spinward Fringe series (to be named next week on this site), and I'm having a blast with the characters and story. I'm also getting things together for another book trailer which will look vastly different from the last one.

Things are looking good for the Spinward Fringe series, and I couldn't be happier to work on it. There's more news coming, so keep checking back!

RL