E.S. Raye

I’m a day late with this week’s blog due to some household hectic-ness over the first half of the week, but this are slowly returning to normal. A lot has happened in the last little while, so I thought I’d share some general updates.

Buckle up!

Gas Giant Gambit

Let’s start off with the big one. Over the last six-ish weeks, I’ve been working with the editors at Alex Parker Publishing on developmental edits and then copy/line edits. We did two rounds of each (although, it was more like 1.25 rounds of the dev edits simply because there wasn’t a ton to do) and are now completely finished!

We’ve been working on an accelerated schedule–aiming for twelve month between me signing the contract and the book releasing (it’s usually eighteen months to two years)–and I am happy to report that we are on pace for our September release date!

The editing process, though fast, never felt rushed. Moreover, I feel the book’s language has improved greatly. I learned some of my bad habits as a writer, and gained a stronger understanding of the difference between “showing” and “telling” when it comes to writing. I’ve tried to internalize as much as I could, and hopefully Shallow Trenched, Open Skies will benefit from it.

I’m not totally sure what the next step in the process is, but I think it has to do with formatting the book and marketing!

Rare: A Dark Anthology of Unusual Secrets

Rare: A Dark Anthology of Unusual Secrets, featuring my sci-fi/noir short story “The Stuff Legends are Made Of” officially released yesterday!

I’m really proud of my contribution to this anthology, as “The Stuff…” was the first short story I ever wrote! It, of course, has gone through several rounds of editing since that first draft, including the most recent round for Rare that involved cutting nearly 25% of the original word count.

But, again, I believe the story is stronger for it.

“The Stuff…” was heavily influenced by the film The Maltese Falcon, complete with a mysterious object, several parties all lying and vying for the same goal, and a final, unexpected twist right at the end.

All that, and set in a city at the bottom of a methane sea at the far reaches of the galaxy. You can find a list of places to get your own copy of Rare here.

And to celebrate this milestone, I have an appointment on Friday for a new tattoo! I’m getting a film noir inspired “silhouette in the P.I.’s window” in greyscale on my right inner forearm. This will be the first in a new sticker sleeve inspired by my published/filmed work. I already have one planned for Gas Giant Gambit when it earns out its contract.

Web Series

I also got a bit of bad writing news recently: the web series I was working on has been effectively cancelled. We did not get the funding we were hoping for, nor does TV1 wish to proceed.

This is a little heartbreaking because I was under the impression funding was all but assured. I thought we would definitely be filming in September.

But alas, it’s not meant to be.

That being said, as tempted as I am to now spill the beans on the project and reveal what it was, I probably shouldn’t just yet.

And that’s because, even though we’re not moving forward with TV1, the project isn’t quite dead yet. More like treading water. My producer/director/co-writer has some other options he’d like to explore, and he has a few other, more influential people than yours truly, involved that want to see this get made.

All that is to say, keep your fingers crossed. This may still happen in some form.

Short Story Submission

I’m going to end on some news I’ve been sitting on for about six weeks now, mostly because it’s really only half-news.

Back in mid-March, I heard from a publication I had submitted a short story to. They were informing me that the story in question had made it through the reader portion of their process, and was now on the desk of the editors-in-chief.

I’ve been holding out on this news because, as nice as it is to know it’s moved forward, it can still be rejected and this will be moot.

But, I also expected to hear one way or the other by now, and since this is a writing update, I figured I may as well share what I’ve got!

And that is all that I’ve got for now! See you next week!