I just signed the contract for the publication of Weekend Girl with Ninestar Press! This news comes just a week or so after I received word that one of the editors was also interested in Far Patrol.
I am really happy that this novel will get published because it’s my first novel with a trans protagonist. My main character Ash is genderfluid and uses they/their pronouns. I’ve been wanting to publish a full-length novel with a trans protagonist for a while now, so it’s finally happening!
This novel has a completely different feeling from Far Patrol. Weekend Girl is meant to be mostly light-hearted, a romantic comedy for the trans community. Ash is a student at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada. They meet their love interest Nolan in a rather unorthodox way, and the fun continues thereafter.
This is also one of the first characters I’ve developed who has a mental health diagnosis. Ash has anxiety, and sometimes some of the scenes will reflect that. Some of Ash’s decisions are also influenced by their anxiety as well.
I really enjoyed writing this story, and I’m actually writing a sequel to this one in the hopes that readers will continue to be interested! That sequel is called “Not Your Average Lady” and continues with Ash and Nolan on their journey of life.
So, my short ficlet “No Ordinary Gentleman” which was accepted as a “Hot Flash” submission has a cover and a release date! The release date is September 30, 2020. The cover is simply one of the premade “Hot Flash” covers as you can see below.
There’s also a short blurb for the story here:
“Arthur Watson is a sessional English instructor at Hudson College, and he barely has his foot in the door. He’s nothing at all like handsome and charismatic Matthew Parker, the star instructor of the department. That doesn’t stop Arthur from having an unfortunate crush on Matt, even if it’s unlikely Matt even notices him.
That changes when it’s time for Arthur’s teaching assessment. Arthur is already worried about not being good enough, but now he has to teach in front of the hottest instructor in the department? But as it turns out, maybe Matthew Parker noticed him after all.”
It’s a short 2500 word ficlet, but I hope everyone still enjoys it!
Recently got my sales report for this quarter. I’ve been keeping track of my most popular books, and it looks like All the King’s Men has come out on top!
Book cover
I think I’ve mentioned before, but this novel was originally published with Less Than Three Press and was republished with JMS Books in 2019.
I do wonder sometimes what makes a book popular, and what makes it less popular. I know one aspect is the pairing. All the King’s Men is a M/M pairing, and that type of pairing tends to sell more. I think genre probably also has something to do with it. All the King’s Men is a sci-fi/cyberpunk novel as well as a romance novel. I really enjoy writing sci-fi and fantasy, but I know contemporary genres also tend to sell more. Not that this fact will stop me from writing sci-fi and fantasy novels.
I wonder what about All the King’s Men has made it the most popular. It might be the cover, which is one of my favourites of all of them. It might also be the blurb is exciting, or maybe people have read some goodread reviews about it. Ultimately, I’m not really sure; all I can really say is why I liked writing it.
All the King’s Men is a cyberpunk novel heavily influenced by my love of the movie The Matrix. The Cerebrum in my novel functions a little differently than the matrix of the movie, but some of the aesthetics are similar, particularly some of the outfits that the characters wear. The titular King of the novel is a little bit similar to Morpheus as well.
I started writing this novel mostly because I was particularly interested in exploring the theme of identity when it comes to cyberspace. If any of you have read the novel, you know (SPOILER) that the agents of the Cerebrum are not programs, but actual humans who have been brainwashed into thinking they’re all the same, from appearance to purpose. (END SPOILER) There is also the fact that appearance varies in the Cerebrum, and that various governments have attempted to limit the ways in which people can appear in cyberspace, but no one really listens to the law, and it’s not really enforced. So can one really know who’s who in the Cerebrum?
I love chatting with people about themes in books, mostly because I have two degrees in English literature. I was honestly wondering if readers would be interested in hearing some of the themes that I purposefully put in my novels and novellas, or would that be going against Death of the Author too much? To be clear, I wouldn’t be adding post-canon material at all in a blog post.
On the other hand, if anyone is interested in more material from any of my novels, writing a short story to accompany the novel is always a possibility. However, I generally don’t do these types of things unless there’s genuine interest in it.
Anyway, let me know what you think, and as always, happy reading and writing!
First of all, I am excited to announce that I submitted a little ficlet titled “No Ordinary Gentleman” to JMS Books, and it was accepted as a Hot Flash submission and should be released sometime in September. It’s about 2500 words long (just a teensy one) and is about a young college instructor who’s been ogling one of his hot coworkers in the hallway.
I’ve been a little bit slow at getting Not Your Average Lady written, even though I’d hoped to get the writing finished by the end of the month. At least I’ve got it planned out and outlined by scene. I’ve been trying to write a little more descriptively when it comes to scenery, as it’s been a critique of my writing that some scenery tends to be a little bit lacking and therefore hard to visualize. I hope it’s been working!
I’ve been planning and outlining the yet nameless novel about the young Black protagonist Lionetta. I’m really excited about this one because I think it will be my first full-length novel with a female protagonist. This one will be a fantasy story with what I hope is a different type of magic system than some of the other kinds one often sees in fantasy novels.
I have put the sequel to Far Patrol on the back burner a bit. I haven’t felt motivated to finish that one yet. I’m hoping that by giving it a break the flow of ideas will return and I’ll be able to finish it a bit later.
That’s the news! Have a good rest of July everyone!
Happy to announce that I just submitted Weekend Girl to the same place I submitted Far Patrol. I haven’t heard back about Far Patrol yet because it takes up to 16 weeks for an answer.
I have several more projects to work on over the summer.
First of all, I just started the sequel to Weekend Girl, which I have tentatively titled “Not Your Average Lady.” I am really excited to have started this project and to continue to write about my protagonist Ash and their journey.
After I finish that, I have another project lined up. I have to finish writing the sequel to Far Patrol. I have half of it written so far, so I only have about another 30k words to go on that one. I’m hoping to make Far Patrol a trilogy in the future.
Lastly, I have a wild plot bunny project! I’m working on outlining it right now, but I can tell you that it has a Black woman protagonist and an Indigenous love interest. I’ve decided to call my protagonist Lionetta, which I hope is an okay fantasy project name.
Anyway, hope everyone is staying safe and well during this time.
I’m just tuning in to let you all know of the progress happening with my WIPs.
Unfortunately, a lot of stuff is being put on hold because I’ve been focused on the Black Lives Matters movement. I think this issue is of great importance. I’m so so worried about my Black siblings who have been put in the line of fire simply for asking people not to kill them. It’s devastating to me that their lives are not held as precious as any other. I will not be taking comments against this movement on my page. If you don’t agree, the unfollow button is right there.
I’ve submitted Far Patrol and am awaiting a response. I’m really excited to hear back. As I said before, a LBGTQ+ beta reader helped me with this work and does amazing work in the community. That is Siobhan Crosslin (@siobhancrosslin on Twitter) who made sure that all my plotholes were covered beforesubmitting.
I have finished and gotten feedback on Weekend Girl and am just giving it a little time before revising my draft. I’m really excited to also submit this work for publication. It will be my first novel-length story with a genderfluidprotagonist.
I will be starting to write on both the sequel for Far Patrol and the sequel for Weekend Girl in the coming months. I hope to be able to update you all with further progress on theseprojects.
I am currently writing during my time in isolation, and I hope I can finish something soon. I’ve had a tough time getting time to write up until now because I am a university lecturer and I’ve just had to switch all my face-to-face courses to online courses over the course of a week. It was not fun, let me tell you.
I have another chapter of Weekend Girl finished. I have only one chapter left to write, and I hope that I can get the last chapter done this weekend. As it is, I’ll soon need beta readers for Weekend Girl. I’m looking for genderfluid and Vancouver BC local LGBTQ peeps as readers, so if you know anyone, please let me know!
I’ve just got a professional beta reader to look at Far Patrol, which I’m really excited about. I also think I know where I will submit this one once it’s revised. This novel has taken me a long time to release to the beta reading world – almost 5 years, in fact. I hope that it goes well.
Once I finish writing Weekend Girl and revising Far Patrol, I will be writing my post-apocalyptic novella Surfacing. It’s been on the back burner for a bit, but I’m also excited about this one.
Anyway, just so you know what to look forward to in the future!
It’s a new month, a new year, and a new decade. I have several projects in the works for writing, and I’m really excited to share them with you!
The first thing is that my novella Yaliana is finally going to be published. It was originally going to be published with Less Than Three Press. When they shut down, JMS Books agreed to publish Yaliana and take on the editing job as well as creating it a new cover. So without further ado, I’d like to unveil the new cover for Yaliana and also announce that the official release date is January 18, 2020. This is my first new publication in years, which I am glad to say is finally here.
I also have some news on the development of my other stories.
Weekend Girl is shaping up to be about 60 000 words long. I am currently about 2/3 of the way finished writing this novel. After I finish it, the novel will go out for beta reading. I’m hoping to wrap it up before the beginning of April.
Secondly, Far Patrol, my epic fantasy with dragons is out for beta already. I’d like to finish editing it and get it out for submission somewhere soon. Also, I am halfway done writing the second novel in the trilogy.
Lastly, I have a novella of about 25 000 words that I want to finish writing. It’s currently at 5000 words, but it will be a nice addition to my current works.
Those are my current projects. I hope to keep everyone apprised of how all those projects are shaping up. Apart from the ones I’ve already started writing, I have several stories planned for the future, so hopefully my writing hiatus is officially over.
In the spirit of the holidays, I’m releasing a free self-published short story!
The story is called “Flying to Tomorrow,” and stars a shy trans man who wants to be a Swarm pilot. He is one step closer to achieving his dream, but will a handsome fellow trainee make his life more difficult?
Short story, 8000 words, m/m
The download link is not quite available, but when it is, you can find itHERE
Happy holidays to everyone reading this right now!
I know that it’s been a while since I said I would find a new home for some of my works, but it’s finally happened.
After a lot of careful shopping around for a new publisher, I have decided to rehouse my past publications with JMS Books! JMS Books is, as their logo says, “a queer small press.” They publish all sorts of different genres of LGBTQ+ romance. I am really excited to announce that they have picked up four of my previously published novels/novellas as well as my novella Yaliana, which was in the works to be published, but was never given a release date.
The titles for re-release are as follows:
All the King’s Men
Rangers Over Regulus
Hakusan Angel
Sky Knights
And Yaliana will also be published as a brand new publication.
As soon as I know the re-release dates, I will let you all know. The earliest you will see the first one out is November 2019, as I am getting a quick re-edit, plus brand new covers. Cover reveals will happen as I receive them.
Thanks everyone for sticking with me while I looked for a new home. I found what I was looking for with JMS Books, and I am happy to recommend them to any former LT3 author also looking to rehome their books.
alex powell 