I’m not ready for winter. Despite the fact fall (or autumn for those who prefer the possibly more proper term) has to arrive first, this year has gone by fast enough that it honestly feels like I just left winter. And now it’s right around the corner again. Fun times. Fifteen years of outdoor employment has me hardwired to think of snow as less-than-fun. Because it was soooo less than fun to work through.
Random rant over. Anyways, I’ve been continuing the reread through of the draft I had of the still nameless book 4. The fact that it is still nameless is driving me insane, but The Dangers with Allies eventually offered me a title I didn’t despise so in theory one will eventually make itself known with this one.
I’ll be honest: I forgot how much I liked this edition to the series. This is the novel with the Dragons. Now, of course, all the books have some brief mention of the Dragon Council, and at least 1-3 Dragons mentioned or present at some point. But this book has Dragons shown a little more in-depth and as they are one of my favorites, I recall how excited I was when they finally showed up.
Friendly reminder I have very little control over my characters. I have rough guesses on occasion, but even those are rarely accurate as things take a steep left and possible a long dive or climb and angle off in some random something while I (at this point in our “relationship”) just nod or sigh and go with it. I tried to include the Dragons more in When the Kingdom Falls during the first draft when Veilantras first mentioned the Council, but that didn’t go as planned. I even tried to include a hair more when Wyenrtros added himself into the picture for the Alliance meeting…obviously I failed there as well.
The first draft of The Price of Survival hinted at so many possibilities for Nivaradros to get summoned to the Isle and I was certain Z would insist on attending as well…but, well, no dice on my end. And if you’ve read that novel, you know how certain things turned out.
The Danger with Allies I had little hope for. Especially with how things ended in The Price of Survival. Even in the early stages when I worked on it originally, there was too much already going on and too much that was changing every time I tried to even tweak the story a hair from where it was going, that I surrendered to the inevitable quickly.
I recall now, when I started book 4, I decided I wasn’t even going to try. The Dragons, with all their politics and mystery and pain-in-the-neck going ons would show up when it was time (I hoped).
But, either my decision to surrender tempted things in my direction or it was always going to be book 4. So, for anyone who has also been curious about the Dragons…book 4 will hopefully satisfy some of that curiosity 🙂 No ETA on a release date though, I still have a lot of work ahead.
In other news, the sale on all three of the e-novels in the wild has ended and their price is back to their regular. Likewise, the very large SPFBO sale has also ended, so I hope some you managed to snatch up one, a couple, or several new reads.
I hope someone out there is enjoying the change of seasons (whichever change is approaching for you.)
Meagan Hurst 