The One Where I Talk About Remanence, Confluence Book 2 (THE SEQUEL TO FLUENCY)

I get asked a lot when the sequel to Fluency is going to come out. I'm here to tell you today when that will be.

But before I do, allow me say:

1.) I'm relatively new to noveling. (READ: new=takes longer.)
2.) I've had a lot on my plate over the last year (those are personal details that I won't be sharing).
3.) Writing a sequel that lives up to a very successful first book is a lot of pressure.
4.) I've got two kids (anyone who has lived with children knows what this means.)

That said, I've been working hard on this book for about a year. Considering that it took me two years to write and revise Fluency, I think I'm gaining some speed here. I'm not interested in churning out books. I want them to be the best I can make them.

Remanence is near completion. I'll be finishing it up and doing my own revision through the end of the year.

I've commissioned the same cover artist to create the cover artwork that did the cover for Fluency and he's already turned it over to me. Stephan Martiniere works as a concept artist for film (Guardians of the Galaxy was one of his projects) and he had to finish work on a Spielberg film before he could work on this cover. It's SPECTACULAR. You won't be disappointed in this cover art.

I've hired a professional editor and scheduled him to work on the manuscript in early January. This will be a developmental edit. Story level--looking at story arc/character arcs/searching for plot holes. In general, this guy makes me look good. He's edited several of my short stories. We work well together. He'll turn the manuscript around in about a week and I'll take the rest of the month to complete that revision. Assuming there won't be a ton of rewriting to do, that should be just enough.

(Authors--if you want to know who I use for editing, please take a look at my author resources page.)

Also in January I'll be sending the manuscript to a few select expert beta readers--fans of Fluency who happen to be aeronautic engineers, physicists and so on. People who are essentially going to tell me if I've misunderstood or misrepresented the science in some way. There are a lot of technical details in this book. While they are a backdrop, they add a layer of realism that my readers enjoy. This is a step I can't skip. 

In February I've got an editor lined up to do a line edit. This level of editing looks for grammar errors and typos. Some editors at this level also fact check. This is a time consuming process and will likely take all of February. My prose is pretty clean, but everyone makes typos or uses homophones on occasion.

In February, after looking at where I'm at, I will put the book up on pre-order for a March 2016 release. I won't name the date of the release until I'm sure I can do it. There are penalties associated with not making a pre-order happen on time. Remanence will be exclusive to Amazon for a while because Amazon has been very good to me.

More exciting news? As soon as the Remanence final manuscript is out of my hands, I'm planning to finish a partially completed novel that I started right after I finished Fluency (before I knew Fluency was going to sell the way it did.) That book is 50% complete and I'm planning to finish and release it in 2016 as well. 

Druid (working title) is set in the same universe as Fluency with a new cast of characters and a different set of problems. It's a sort of superhero origin story. 

​ Then I will return to Confluence series to complete that trilogy. (My plan has always been to go back and forth between the two series until both were complete.)

I'm sorry I couldn't bring you the book sooner. But I hope you enjoy it when it's ready. (And I'm really hoping the zombie apocalypse doesn't happen between now and then. What can I say? I'm a worrier.)

EDITED TO ADD: If you want to be the very first to know when I release ANYTHING, sign up for my newsletter. You'll find boxes to sign up all over this site. Notably, in the top menu bar, under the word: subscribe.

***Additional edit: The clock starts ticking on the audio book AFTER the book is complete and ready for sale. Production takes a few months. So I'm guessing we'll be looking at June or July for an audio version.