THE GRANDDAUGHTER Launches!

The fifth book in the FLU SEASON series, THE GRANDDAUGHTER, launches today or tomorrow depending on the internet gods, while the ebook version for Kindle has already been available since September 10. Click here to get the ebook - the paperback link will be here as soon as I get it (should be September 15). 

UPDATE (9/15): Due to the vagaries of the internet the paperback version's availability will be delayed by 2-3 days.

UPDATE (9/16)! The book gods have ruled! The paperback link is here. Thanks for your patience.

You can get the entire series (five books) here.

Does that end the series? Hmmm. I thought I was writing a stand-alone novel when I wrote the first book, THE BOOK OF MOM, but I realized half way into it that the story would have to continue. Because I couldn't see a two-book series, I immediately went for a trilogy while writing Book 2 THE WAY OF THE SON. However, as I was concluding Book 3, DAWN OF THE DAUGHTERS, I had ideas for another book. Then, while writing Book 4, THE BOOK OF DAD (out this past June), I had ideas for Book 5 THE GRANDDAUGHTER. I began to wonder when the madness would end while hoping it never would. (I am currently well into the writing of Book 6, THE GRANDSON, which should be the final book in the series.)

FLU SEASON is a series. Each book follows after the previous book. Each book, however, is a stand-alone novel, complete in itself. A lot of series are set up this way: yes, you are meant to read them in order for the best experience but each volume can stand as its own story regardless of having read other volumes. A character may appear in more than one book and the timeline traverses the series, and in that way they are linked. But standing as individual novels, the characters do catch you up and give you what you need to know from earlier books so you're not left confused. (Note: I never make use of the infamous "As you know, Bob..." constructions.

Here is a look at what you can expect in each novel of the series, as tweeted previously.

FLU SEASON (Book 1): THE BOOK OF MOM

Everything was fine, just me and Mom. And her precious tuba. Then the pandemic came and everyone had to adapt to a new normal. Until the new normal became unbearable.

We awoke one morning and the news was worse than before. Food rationing, no power, gas lines. Mom decided we should leave, wait it out at my grandparents' farm, but danger followed us, all the way to the coast, trying to find safety with family members who instead needed our help more than we needed theirs.

I had to trust Mom to find a sanctuary - hopefully not an island where other survivors are trying to set up their own society with rules as strict as back in the city. And definitely not a place where our family secrets will be exposed. 

That's the last thing we need as we wait for this pandemic to end.

FLU SEASON 2: THE WAY OF THE SON

Everything changes when you lose your mother, even more if you lose her during a pandemic when everyone is fighting for survival and it is your responsibility to protect her and you fail. 

Now you have a wife and baby to protect in the savage outerlands - where danger lurks in every shadow, and it's every man for himself.

I call it the Way of the Son - definitely not the way Mom would've gone. 

The road is finite, and well-marked, so you only need to go along it, following the path that’s already set before you. Yet sometimes it will lead you in the wrong direction. Sometimes you will end up in the wrong place. You have to find your way back home again, wherever that may be - even through a deadly pandemic.

FLU SEASON 3: DAWN OF THE DAUGHTERS

It was hard enough trying to start from scratch after the pandemic destroyed half of everything. Best to settle far from anyone, hiding in the forest of a national park.

But with militia from the new government coming by, rebels still on the loose, and new neighbors settling nearby, the new normal was a mix of intense danger and surprising joy.

But which kind of life would win in the end?

How can you raise a bunch of daughters in this kind of world?

Hiding away in the forest of a national park, Sandy's family (from Books 1 & 2) waits for the world to return to normal.

But they soon discover other families have the same idea. As the survivalists of the national park work together, his family faces challenges and opportunities. They suffer through the vagaries of an on-going civil war between North and South territories. 

The conflict splits the family into convergent destinies, leaving Sandy's daughter, Isla, to carry the family into the future, living to witness the reconstruction of a new society.

Book 4: THE BOOK OF DAD

Fritz is sent for rehabilitation, then assigned a street cleaner job in the city, just for making a video exposing the true history of the ten-year pandemic and civil war that followed - based on everything his mother, Isla, has told him all his life - whether he wanted to hear it or not.

 

Now he finds himself in trouble again in the capital city as he tries to make sense of this Ideal Society. With weekly counseling and constant surveillance, Fritz is going crazy. Only getting back his family's tuba might save him.

That crime sets him up for a crucial act which lands him in the Department of Social Order. Only a reprieve by the Governor herself - the self-styled Big Sister - can save him this time. But it comes with a cost, one he may not be able to pay.  

The next chapter in the FLU SEASON saga follows Isla's youngest child, now grown and a husband and father, as he fights for truth, justice, and a way out.

FLU SEASON 5: THE GRANDDAUGHTER

Isla Baumann is born in the seventh year of the great pandemic (Books 1-3). Her last child, Fritz, goes to the capital (Books 3-4) and suffers under the restored government's oppression. His children escape to a small town in the western corner of the nation.

THE GRANDDAUGHTER (Book 5) follows Maggie's life as a young woman with ambition stuck in a dusty cowtown. She decides what this post-pandemic town needs is a children's band. But first she must return to the dirty capital to claim the family's tuba. 

Following in her great-great-grandmother's footsteps, she vows to play the tuba and gets a musical instrument salesman to help her start the band. But there are plenty of obstacles to achieving her goals, a struggle which brings her to the ultimate decision that will save the capital and the nation.

I hope you enjoy this pandemic/post-pandemic/dystopian family saga which, back in March 2020, I didn't intend to write. But I had some time on my hands while staying home the rest of the year. This is the result and I'm quite pleased with it. Even as I get older and other things work less well, my twisted mind can still dream up twisted stories to entertain myself - and you, if you so choose. Thanks as always for your support all of these years.

I expect FLU SEASON 6: THE GRANDSON to be finished sometime in 2025, likely toward autumn as I'm not in any hurry. 

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(C) Copyright 2010-2024 by Stephen M. Swartz. All Rights Reserved. No part of this blog, whether text or image, may be used without me giving you written permission, except for brief excerpts that are accompanied by a link to this entire blog. Violators shall be written into novels as characters who are killed off. Serious violators shall be identified and dealt with according to the laws of the United States of America.

FLU SEASON: The Book of Mom - cover reveal

This year has been full of stress. (That's 2022 for those who may read this in the future.) Of course it's stressful to write about the stress of surviving a pandemic in a novel while surviving a pandemic. 

However, even more stressful has been the revolving door of cover designs for my forthcoming pandemic novel FLU SEASON: The Book of Mom. 

(Note: FLU SEASON is the series title; The Book of Mom is the first book's title.) You may have read my rant in my previous blog post. If you haven't, don't worry; I'll be recalling some of it here. Covers revealed below!

In my previous 15 novels, the cover design was not too intricate. Yes, they could have been more detailed, more compelling, more artistic, but what I ended up with suited my tastes if not readers' tastes. For science fiction and fantasy, the genres demand artistic, fanciful, detailed art depicting some scene related to the story. I could not achieve that by myself with the skills I have. (My best artwork comes from my 7th grade art class: a portrait of a Neanderthal man in tempera paint. Be amazed below!)

So I went to my usual art friend who has managed to please me through several novel covers, hoping she could do some of that art stuff for me but more complex art. Unfortunately, she was not then available. My first thought was to do it myself. I have made a couple covers for my novels but the design was simple - some effective that way, some not so much. The main obstacle was gathering the images I needed and relearning Photoshop. I did create a decent cover but I didn't feel confident in it.

On Twitter (@StephenSwartz1) I'm following/followed-by other writers and - as they choose to connect with me - various cover designers and publicists looking for work. One fellow writer showed off her covers. I liked them, thought it was a good example of what I needed for my book. I asked who did them for her and she put me in contact with her cover designer.

This was an adventure. No offense intended, for he ultimately did good work, but the process of working with a one-man-band proved to be frustrating and dragged the project out longer than necessary. I should have used that time to go through my manuscript once more for any final tweaks, given the time it took, but I kept expecting the finished product any day. When I finally got the finished product (full covers for print and e-book plus assorted promotional images featuring the cover) I was delighted. But...not wowed.

He created a cover that exactly matched what I said I wanted. It was technically correct based on my description. A couple of friends had valid criticisms of the finished cover. One said the cover looked too much like a comic book rather than a more serious novel about a tuba-playing mom and her teen son escaping a city in chaos for what they hoped would be relative safety in the countryside. I fretted over whether to use this cover or not. As the first book of a trilogy I was also concerned with the subsequent covers based on the standards of this one. 

I submitted the files for the manuscript and the cover, got my proof copy, and saw it with fresh eyes. It did look a bit too comic - but that was what I had described unknowingly so I could only blame myself. Having the physical book in my hands also showed me how big it was. The font was needlessly large for one thing (looked fine on a computer screen), so the page count had expanded. Right away I reduced the font throughout by 1 point, which shaved 40 pages from the manuscript.

All right, I thought to myself. I was then half way through that final reading/tweaking of the manuscript as I waited for the finished product to arrive. That "final" read through allowed me to snip here and there to further reduce the size. I knew I would need to resubmit everything and I worried that the cover may not match because of the change of the spine width due to having fewer pages.

At about the same time, I was contacted by a short-term follower who happened to be a cover design artist. Actually, she represented a business that designed covers and promotional material. Feeling distraught at my situation, I inquired about their services and found it reasonable. I gave them less instruction for the cover, hoping the artist would use his/her imagination more. I received a good rendition of my earlier description, however; the only problem was switching out a French horn for a tuba (I did specify a tuba).

They sent the files two weeks ago but I was traveling and forgot or missed seeing the email with the link to the files. Once I'd caught up and gotten the files, I was pleased - though two weeks behind my own timeline. I did see an error to fix and as long as they were fixing that I might as well ask for a couple other minor changes - which they fixed in 24 hours and resent to me. 

I don't know which cover is the best. They are all similar and yet differ in some ways. You may comment on your favorite (or, more likely, the one you like more than the others) and I will wait until I get the consensus I want before sending that cover to the publisher. I will reveal (although you might guess in the meantime) which is done by which designer. You can click on the image to enlarge it.

Now that I have everything - the manuscript tweaking is finished - I will resubmit everything and hope the next proof copy will be perfect. If it is, you will soon have Book 1 of FLU SEASON The Book of Mom available in print and for Kindle before the holidays.

Book 2 (The Way of the Son) is finished and undergoing appropriate revision and editing. The cover design shall commence forthwith.

Book 3 (Dawn of the Daughters) has begun, with much note scribbling, and may be used in this year's National Novel Writing Competition in November (just have to write 50,000 more words than what I have now).

Thanks for your support!

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(C) Copyright 2010-2022 by Stephen M. Swartz. All Rights Reserved. No part of this blog, whether text or image, may be used without me giving you written permission, except for brief excerpts that are accompanied by a link to this entire blog. Violators shall be written into novels as characters who are killed off. Serious violators shall be identified and dealt with according to the laws of the United States of America.