Ten years ago I started my writing career (or vocation, to be more true to my mindset and way of thinking). The same amount of time – more or less if you ignore the Swift Escape excursion – it took to write the Descendants of Earth trilogy. I knew from the start that it would need three books, as the story couldn’t have been told in one.
Except that it could.
But this in turn would mean that I would be writing complete story behind the closed doors, for ten years, and then published it in one large book of some hypothetical 850 pages.
But I didn’t have patience for this.
As soon as my first book was out, I wanted to share it with the world.
I wanted to share it with you!
So this hypothetical “all in one” book, that should hypothetically have 850 pages, is not so hypothetical any longer.
It is time to celebrate. Not only is one book out, but the whole “Descendants of Earth” trilogy is finally complete. Yeey! I am so happy to have it finished. Clearly, the story was roughly there from the start. Those of you who finished the trilogy will know that I sprinkled clues from the beginning on, and they all, hopefully very rewardingly, wrap up in the end.
Considering that “The Senthien” took 6 years to write and “The Mind” 2, “The Vision” was surprisingly faster, only one and a half years from start to finish. (I have author friends who publish 3 books per year, I know, but this is my best timing!) Knowing my pace, I anticipated the book will be out February or March 2022, but I am really happy that the first draft was done pretty quickly and also that the post-production eg, editing process, was done within the “usual” 6 months I had anticipated. No bad surprises there 😉 Which means that “The Vision” came out before Christmas!
I wish I could celebrate this with you, my readers. Especially those of you who read “The Senthien” when it came out, 6 years ago (Ouch! So sorry for the delay). I really do appreciate your patience and your determination to stay with the story and find out what will happen to Dora and J. And not only that, but what will happen to the whole Uni galaxy!
To tell you the truth, when I was writing the first book, I didn’t know this myself. I had a very clear picture of what will happen to Dora and J, including the whole Monica trajectory. And I was so thrilled with the plot line there! I can even tell you that this particular story bit happened while I was driving, with a snowstorm racking the windows of our car, as we were going to see friends in France, some three hours away. I consciously wasn’t thinking about the plot line at all at this moment, but somehow my subconscious did, because all of sudden I had an ending for them.
At any rate, while I knew exactly the story lines for my characters, the whole social and political ending, with millions of Descendants and Humans in Uni galaxy, didn’t have a clear future until only a few months before the first draft of “The Vision” was done. I had various possible futures for it, just like with Dora when the current situation is not clear, many future scenarios are possible as well. I didn’t want to do a book-genocide, but I also didn’t want to let them off the hook either. In the end, with many extremely useful discussions, probing questions and intriguing feedbacks, mainly from the two people, I found my ending. So, to Tom Brown and Jade Phipps, thank you for helping me find the future for Uni 🙂
The trilogy is done.
And as for me? It is time to say goodbye to “Descendants of Earth”, to all my lovely imaginary characters I spend 12 years with, and it’s time to move on. Time to start writing another book, setting up another adventure, getting to know my new characters.
I am so looking forward to my new adventure! I’m sure you will love it too 🙂
The last few months of finishing the first draft of the novel, I focus so much on the writing that I almost completely disappear from the social media world. The good news is that the draft for final sequel of “Descendants of Earth” trilogy is finished and I am super happy about that. Still some work ahead before it´s ready for publishing but the ending is near and within a few months, I´m happy to tell you that the book will be available.
There are 48 million books on Amazon. Let me repeat that. There are 48 million books on Amazon.
So as you can very well imagine, it is difficult for a not-well-known author to be discovered. Sometimes, a promotion helps. And every now and then, my free kindle deal for “The Senthien” helped me found some new readers.
This time, however, when I did my free-promo, something quite amazing happened!
“The Senthien” climbed up to a number 1 spot on Amazon USA, UK, Japan, Brazil, Canada, Australia, France, India and Germany in sub-genres of hard science fiction, genetic engineering science fiction, space opera, sci-fi romance, sci-fi adventure and dystopian science fiction.
Which was just WOW! I couldn’t believe it. And needless to say, it made me so incredibly happy.
12 years since I first started writing “The Senthien”, it is now a bestseller.
The adventure, of course, continues. “The Mind” sequel to “The Senthien” was published in April 2020, and the final sequel wont take too long either. The first draft is finished, and is now in the process of post-production, which means edits and re-writes until I finally have it in the form I want.
For all who are curios as to when the final sequel will be out, please join my newsletter and I will keep you in the loop.
For many life changes, one can point to a specific event that was pivotal for that change in life’s direction. In my case, it was a book I read more than ten years ago, and also something that the author mentioned in one of her interviews.
Today, I am playing a scene from Chapter 5 where readers find out that a premise of the story – is a lie. So if you haven’t read “The Senthien” yet (and want to), and you like twists and surprises, please skip this Vlog post 😉
For all others, I like this scene a lot, firstly because this is also the moment when my protagonist, Dora Dana Dasnan, finds out the truth as well (and I like how she reacts ;-)), and secondly, here you can really enjoy the narration. Voice acted by Corinne Davies, the story becomes alive: the different colors of her voice, variety of accents she can do, and distinct personalities she is able to act is simply amazing.
For me, having Corinne narrate my stories, is a real treat 🙂
Today I am playing a scene that I find super cute.
A group of Old Earth people and Dora are about to cross the rushing river using zip-lining. Dora is getting ready and J is adjusting straps, when at one moment, they realise they are too close to each other. Dora´s Descendant upbringing urges her to move away but her inner emotions glue her to the ground.
When I find an idea for a book, it is unmistakably because of the handful of scenes that keep churning in my mind, that I can´t get rid off and that move me so much I wished there was a book or a movie already done and I could read/watch it again and again.
Since this is not the case, the only solution is to write the story myself. Here I will play the first of several scenes in “The Senthien” that were “memorable” scenes for me, and also the scenes I wrote first.
A few weeks ago, I promised I will tell you about three stages of book production. This was related to my “silence” before I had published “The Mind”, and for all of you who wondered why this was, here is the answer 🙂
Check out my new Vlog to find out what the phases are and which one I prefer the most!
For every author it is extremely rewarding and gratifying holding your own book in your hands. And so it is with me as well 🙂
Today, I am unboxing two of my books, The Senthien and The Mind. Also, I am giving away four copies of each book – signed by me – anywhere in the world, for free.
Check out my newest YouTube video to find out how to get your freebies.
