THE WARRIORS BAUMANN & The Writing Life, part 2

What a happy holiday season it is whenever I have a new book out into the world!

This year that new book is THE WARRIORS BAUMANN (<click to get your copy), a ribald tale of two brothers on a mission in future-medieval Missouri. What is future-medieval? It is a genre in which the story is set in a medieval-level society but located in the future from our present day. How does that work? I'm glad you asked, because I've literally written six books to explain how a modern society can devolve into a less civilized society. I refer to the FLU SEASON Saga, a series of stand-alone novels with a shared timeline and crossover characters. Start anywhere; you get whatever info you need to understand that particular story. Hint: It begins with a 10-year pandemic, then gets worse (with some ups and downs while attempting to restore civilization), until there isn't much left but desperate people killing over food. Then, eventually, people start to rebuild, and after some time we are up to a medieval-level society.

States have turned into kingdoms and the capital cities have walls around them for protection. Kings rule. Warriors keep the roads clear. Traveling troupes of actors and minstrels ply their trade. One seeks to rise in status and join the Court crowd with all their frivolous finery and dour decadence. It is an ordered society. THE WARRIORS BAUMANN unfolds in such a setting as the clever older, shorter brother named Rory persuades his brawny younger brother Stank (Stanley K. Baumann) to join him on his plan to wed Princess Majory and thus become a duke. They are not prepared, however, for the trials of the Royal Road to the capital nor the plethora of schemes and gambits of the Court crowd. Success is fairly uncertain until the final scene.

Before even the FLU SEASON Saga, a small library of various stories was written, as shown in the graphic below. Once in college, the stories compiled, many based on the science fiction I had been reading in my youth. My first long work was a rip-off of Orwell's 1984; the difference in my take being that the protagonist turns out to be a plant who works from the inside to undo the tyrannical state. Titled In Pursuit of Freedom, I eventually wrote it as a screenplay and had it optioned by a Hollywood studio for a year before they dropped the project and all rights returned to me. It remains unfinished as a novel - only as the novella I typed up during high school days.

My next longform work was YEAR OF THE TIGER, which began as a sci-fi short story I wrote in college. I took the professor's advice to reset the story on Earth rather than an alien planet. So I chose a tiger as the counterpoint to a man driven insane by dreams of himself as a tiger. That story, too, became a screenplay - the easiest way to get the full story on paper back in typewriter days. I swore to turn it into a novel and I tried several times but the complicated story stood firm. Finally, after years of revision, I thought I'd gotten it just right, and published it only in 2020, when the world was in pandemic fever and nobody was buying books. A fellow author from India read it and pronounced it a fine book (her review here).

Back to the early days. I finally sat down and wrote the great masterpiece I'd envisioned based on some wildly ridiculous tales of adventure from my youth reset on an alien world. I called it THE DREAM LAND and included a version of myself and girlfriend of the time as protagonists exploring another world through an interdimensional doorway. While almost comic-bookish at first, the story through revisions got more serious, more scientific, and darker as these two Earth people learn to function in the new society and gradually rise in status - though not without considerable problems. All right, done. I'd set it down for the record.

But what happens next? I had lingering questions so I started in immediately on Book 2 of what would become a trilogy. The first book set up all the tropes of interdimensional fiction so the second book used them straightaway, focusing on the how and why - then using a time travel/change history theme (things don't go well in the end). Then I wrote Book 3 to solve the problems encountered in Book 2 (undoing the history that was changed because it made everything worse + an approaching comet). The end of a good trilogy.

In the middle of Book 2 (Dreams of Future's Past), however, I got stopped by a plot conundrum. For the next ten years I didn't write fiction. I wrote scholarly articles, grad school papers, a non-fiction thesis, and finally a Ph.D. dissertation. While teaching English after all my education, I read a student's sci-fi story which reminded me of my unfinished book. I returned to it, suddenly knowing how to get through the plot conundrum. It wasn't from anything in the student's story; rather the act of taking some fiction into my brain unlocked it and fresh ideas flowed. So I finished that book and went straight into Book 3 (Diaspora). 

Also while working on Book 1 of THE DREAM LAND Trilogy, I went to Japan to teach English. I used my experiences living there for five years and from earlier experiences living in Hawaii (thanks, Army!) to write a romance novel, AIKO. Then my subsequent Master of Fine Arts thesis was a novel titled A BEAUTIFUL CHILL, another kind of romance (what I dubbed an 'anti-romance') set on the same college campus (Ah ha! Take that, professors and colleagues!). Still another book came while I lived in South Texas and attended the university there for a Masters of Arts in English (thinking to return to Japan and teach again). Several courses in rhetoric inspired me to write a version of The Iliad and The Odyssey - putting a modern young man touring the ruins of Troy (Ilium) with an older woman named Helen. Awkward. That book, AFTER ILIUM, although not the first written, became my first book to be published as a longish novella. Next came The Dream Land trilogy, followed by A Beautiful Chill, and Aiko. I thought I was done.

How did this wave of publishing get started? I'm glad you asked because there is an answer. You see, being busy with grad school and then teaching (back in the US), I had little time to write new books. Meanwhile, the publishing world had moved on; the process changed. Instead of mailing a box of paper to an agent or publisher with a self-address stamped envelope for a reply (they didn't return to box of paper unless you included return postage), we now used this thing they were calling e-mail: you sent a message (cover letter) via this system and attached a sample manuscript file (1 to 3 chapters). Instead of waiting 6 months to a year for a reply, you could expect a reply in 3 to 8 weeks. I sent manuscripts around using both methods. Got some nibbles, no hooks. Did have a couple agents briefly. In the end it was neither method which got me published. It was the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award competition that first got my books noticed. I entered it three years in a row but did not win. However, through the ranking process I was noticed.

I am, if nothing else, a special case. While in a hospital one day, I acknowledged to myself that if I could do anything before saying goodbye, it would be to see one of my novels published - and praised, reviewed, with movie deals, etc. in some of the dreams. So I entered the ABNA competition on that whim, got some attention, and hooked up with some small press folks. I thought at the time "this is good, this is enough" and didn't pursue more lucrative avenues. I should have tossed my hat into a wider ring. But I also thought I had no more ideas and so there was little point in trying to go big or go home. I was already home, and that was fine. Thus, I've been in the same Myrddin Publishing Group sphere of influence ever since. 

As the next book is written and the next, and the next, I keep looking back and wondering what life might have been like if I had struck out for something more traditional. Going for a Big Five publisher. As it was, I believed I wouldn't write another book so the end of my writing career, such as it was, was fine. I had done enough to satisfy my desire to see my books in print (and on Kindle). I kept on teaching.

Then I got a new idea for a book: a vampire novel.  [TO BE CONTINUED]


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(C) Copyright 2010-2025 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.

The FLU SEASON SAGA ends!

Dear Friends and Followers,

Back in the ancient year of 2019 the beginning of the end began. That's a mouthful but not an incorrect tautology. Things happened, which prompted me to want to write something. I had trouble getting started. I spent the end of 2019 and the beginning of 2020 planning a story which I finally got started later that year. I imagined what was then our present situation - lockdowns, restrictions, shortages, desperation, fear - and took it six years into the future - a possible future, granted.

And so the FLU SEASON saga was born. At first intended to be a single novel, it expanded into a trilogy before the first book was completed. I had only a rough idea of what would happen in those next two books, yet I wasn't worried. The characters would tell me everything and I would just write about it. They had compelling stories full of heartache and heartbreak to share but also triumphs and joys. I cried and cheered along with them, I confess, unwilling to acknowledge my fingers were the cause of all their ups and downs. THE GRANDDAUGHTER, the fifth book in the saga (out in September 2024), was a particular pleasure to write, being lighter even amusing more than the other books.

After three books, I thought the series was finished at a trilogy. Yet a new idea kept pestering me so I started a fourth book, calling it a sequel. But the sequel led to an even newer idea, something lighter as I imagined it. As I concluded that fifth book, I had ideas for a sixth book, which I am working on now. I feel that I can end the series with this final book - but it will be a long one, covering a lot of territory as we venture further into the uncertain future. I may introduce zombie-like denizens of the desert at some point (medically accurate, of course).

THE GRANDSONS is the final volume of this saga, following the lives of two grandsons and introducing a third grandson. Life has gotten worse for the citizens of Skinner Canyon with a new menace from the destruction of the cities on the east coast coming for them and more criminality in their own locale. They don't know what has happened in the east, only that it can't be anything good. They are much too concerned with the big trial in town. The body of an infamous outlaw has turned up and everyone wants to know how he met his end - being related to a prominent citizen of the town. 

This final book is a frame story. We begin in their present day, set up the situation and get the trial started. Then we jump back fifteen years to see how we got to this present day situation. Classic framework. However, as I am literally (literally!) making it up as I go along, it is moving slowly. I have a roadmap but the curves are sharp, the hills steep, and there are plenty of chuck holes slowing me, but I know the way forward and will get to the destination eventually - likely late in 2025, possibly early 2026.

I frequently vowed to write a Western, a genre I never believed I was capable of, having little knowledge of that era in American history or the nomenclature of horses, etc. But like how it took some time to "find the way in" to the first book, THE BOOK OF MOM, the way in was a scene in a dream I didn't ask for. I wrote out that scene and the start could begin. Now there is a lot of webs to weave building the story, and then unweave them as the story unwinds to its shocking yet heartfelt conclusion. I have already written that final scene.

As I create this final volume of the saga, doing what I love to do, please enjoy reading the previously completed books in the saga. You can find them all in paperback or for Kindle at this universal link: https://mybook.to/PaxnhJD

Your support has been and always will be greatly appreciated! 

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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.

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.

Summer Update & Wine Tasting!

Here in these dog days of summer, we pause to reflect on what could've been but wasn't. A taste, yes, but not a full drunken orgy of disease and destruction. The 10-year FLU SEASON that was, in our reality, nipped in the bud. A six-book series (five thus far) that came from that momentary hiccup to our daily lives in the ripe old year of 2020. Drink up!

Last month Book 4 of the series launched. THE BOOK OF DAD was billed as a sequel to the trilogy and continues the saga of the Baumann family. The drama begins with the tuba saved after World War II (we learn that fact in Book 3) and it is subsequently passed down from generation to generation. Along the way, as family members struggle through the pandemic and the lawlessness that follows, we follow the emergence of a very different society. In the capital city of the restored nation, Fritz, the poor hero of Book 4, tries to sort out his miserable life after returning from mandatory rehabilitation, now estranged from his family, given a menial job and a tiny unit to sleep in, surveilled constantly with weekly counseling sessions to prevent backsliding. The city is run by Big Sister who models her efforts on the farm where she grew up - or is it just as much of a lie as what they claim he professes in that video he made of his elderly mother (Isla) telling the truth about everything that happened?

In that novel, we meet his 10-year old daughter Maggie in a few scenes. In the sequel to the sequel, Book 5: THE GRANDDAUGHTER (coming in fall 2024), we meet Maggie again but as a young woman living out west. We follow her through her efforts to start a kids' band in her small town with the help of a musical instrument salesman. There are many obstacles to overcome. But those efforts lead to bigger events in her life, including a major turn in society. Book 6: THE GRANDSON opens fifteen years after the end of Book 5, and is in the drafting stage (I know how it ends) and should be out in 2025.

I've been winging it from the start - a true "pantser" who writes by the seat of his pants - yet the story has been clear in my mind. I've played fast and loose with hard facts. I never name actual cities until Book 5. I never give precise dates so the series will not become "dated" years from now. I give a generic start as "the sixth year of the pandemic" when autistic teen Sandy and his single mother Polly, the tuba player, escape from a city in chaos for the hope of sanctuary on his grandparents' farm. Sandy's daughter, Isla, is born in the seventh year of the pandemic. In Book 3: DAWN OF THE DAUGHTERS, Isla narrates her life from 4 years to her final day at age 79.

Now I have to count back and forward to make a proper timeline as I work on Book 6. But I know the overall story. If the series begins in our actual year of 2020, and Isla is born in the seventh year of the pandemic, that would, mathematically speaking, be in 2027. A life lived up to 79 would bring us, as readers, to the year 2106. Now go back 10 years to when the heroine of Book 5 was born. Then add 50 years to the story covered in Book 5. And so on. It can be quite maddening - maddening, I tell you!

But that is half (or maybe closer to three-quarters) of the fun of crafting a multi-generation family saga. 

I awaken with the thought "Wonder what he/she/they are doing today? What trouble will they get into that I alone may save them from? or should I let them be, just watch and see what happens and then write about it?" That is often the writer's craft. It is also the chief hobby of the retired class: to sit back and observe the world going by. In Book 6: The Grandson, I'm still deciding who will tell the story. So far, a few different characters have shared what they know. I am merely collecting their stories for easy reading. The most important character in the book is the one who is dead.

Ensconced in my air-cooled abode, I type. And, having typed, I move on.

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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, a pandemic/post-pandemic series! Where are we now?

It has been a long time coming. I wasn't sure I could do it. But then there was the first book, coming when I was good and ready by 2022. And I knew by the middle of writing it that there would be a second book - and with a second book it had to be a trilogy. Then came the hard part: a fourth book. 

My first two trilogies (THE DREAM LAND TRILOGY and the STEFAN SZEKELY VAMPIRE TRILOGY) both lent themselves to a fourth book. However, while I started a fourth book for each trilogy, they went nowhere due to other things taking my time. This time, I have time and plenty of it, plus a multigenerational cast that loves to throw plots at me.

Now I'm thrilled to say that not only is Book 4: THE BOOK OF DAD launching this coming week, timed to Father's Day, but I have completed Book 5: The Granddaughter's Tale, coming later this year. And, if I dare suggest it, another book has been started. These three books would make a whole 'nother trilogy!

I know it can be confusing with news and updates on Books 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6 scattered around the platforms. Let me do a quick summary of each book and make clear the status of each without giving away too much of the story.

The initial idea came, obviously, from the very real pandemic we experienced early in 2020. I wanted to write such a story but it was too immediate for me to create fiction. A couple years later, with further thought and planning and the return to normal, I had a way to start it and knew how the story would proceed - without any consideration at the time of it being more than a one-off stand-alone novel. I would begin the story in a pandemic much like what we experienced, using references we can all identify, but start my novel after six years of it, now a lot worse and with a lot more collapsing of society.

Books 1, 2, and 3 are available now in paperback and for Kindle.

1 The Book of Mom

Autistic teen son Sandy narrates what he and his sassy single mother go through in deciding to flee the city and what they endure once they leave. Mom is a professional tuba player and music professor; Sandy just started virtual college. Heading for his grandparents' small farm, they discover that the ravages of the city have spread into the countryside. What was to be a safe place to wait out the rest of the pandemic becomes a dead end. Plan B goes into effect. They travel on to find other relatives and discover how they have been managing, with plenty of tales of horror and grief. Plan B becomes Plan C. A lot goes wrong as they continue seeking a sanctuary. Eventually, they return to the coastal island where they've vacationed during past summers, a place now with its own unsettling rules. (More here.)

[Note: Unlike a lot of pandemic/plague and apocalyptic stories, FLU SEASON doesn't rely on zombies or other tropes of science fiction but strives to present a realistic world not far from what we might actually experience in the immediate future.]

2 The Way of the Son

Sandy narrates the journey he and his teen cousin Hannah are forced to undergo through the savage 'outerlands', bearing Mom's tuba and Baby Isla. They seek sanctuary but find the land even more dangerous, lawlessness everywhere, and face dangers that make them tougher. They also encounter the start of fighting between factions of the remnant government and rebels while finding other friends and relatives. Sandy must quickly become a man, to make his mother proud and his wife confident of his ability to protect them. (More here.)

[Note: Although our pandemic began in late 2019, in order to keep the story from becoming dated, I do not give a specific year in the series. You can think of Book 1 as beginning in 2026, if you like; count up for the next 80 years to cover subsequent generations.]

3 Dawn of the Daughters

Narrated by Isla - at the beginning she is a child of four, old age by the final pages. She hides out with her parents in the forest of a national park. They soon meet other survivalists and agree to work together and protect each other. Believing they may be the last of humanity, they try to have more births. Adapting to the lawless post-pandemic world is difficult enough, but then Sandy is taken away to serve in a militia - escapes, captured by the other side to fight for them, then put in a POW camp. Later marauders come, taking the women away. Isla grows up in the idyllic forest as a child but she must become strong as a teen and as a young woman in order to survive the traumas of the newly reconstructed society. She only finds comfort and safety in her later years - as documented by her last child, Fritz, who becomes a video technician in the rebuilt society. (More here.)

4 The Book of Dad (available June 14)

Fritz returns to the capital from rehabilitation, bitter and disillusioned, unsure why he was sent there or who sent him. He knows it is because of the video he made of his elderly mother telling her stories of the pandemic years and the lawlessness that followed. Now the government says none of it happened and Fritz must learn the 'true' history. As he struggles to settle into his new life, miserable and paranoid, his neurotic behavior gets him into trouble again - until Big Sister herself confronts him and offers a hard bargain. (More here.)

5 The Granddaughter's Tale (complete; coming later in 2024)

Fritz's daughter Maggie moves out west to Skinner Canyon with her mother and brothers, a place where their cousin Faith fled from the national park years before. Now grown up, Maggie gains a sister in her cousin Eve, as she plans to start a town band, trying to follow the legacy of her great-great-grandmother Polly (Sandy's mother). First, she must return to the capital to reclaim the tuba. It seems an impossible task, especially when she makes a few missteps. But her staunch determination takes her into the post-pandemic music world.

6 A Grandson's Revenge (tentative title; drafting)

Leaving Skinner Canyon, Fritz's grandson goes with his uncle's posse in pursuit of a notorious outlaw, then gets separated, finds himself in trouble and suffers through dangerous situations which change him into an outlaw himself.

I'm certain that by the time I have finished Book 6 and launched it, I may be out of ideas. This plan also thwarts any attempt I have considered of finishing a few unfinished works sitting on my computer. For example, when I was 13, I mapped out a vast medieval epic - too large for me to start in those days of manual typewriters so I put it aside for my retirement years. Then I write this Flu Season series instead!

However, in Book 5, I manage to tie the story to the way things will be in the future that is that unfinished medieval epic (starts in the year 3000). I also let characters mention the way things are over in Europe during the Book 5 time period, thus linking Flu Season with the Stefan Szekely Vampire Trilogy (Book 2 starts in 2028, Book 3 starts in 2099). (More here.) 

Aren't words amazing?

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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.

It can now be revealed! (The Long Game Plot)

When I was thirteen, I imagined a grand epic with a medieval setting. (I had been an avid reader of Roger Zelazny's Amber Chronicles around that time, full disclosure.) The story I came up with involved twin brothers, princes of the realm, who grow apart and then are forced to battle each other, winner take all. I dabbled with starting the story as a novel (when I had barely written short stories by typewriter or by hand). I quickly realized it was too big a project for me to write at that time. Sadly, I set it aside with the intention of working on it when I retired and had lots of time. (Now retirement has come....)

One major feature of my medieval epic was that the setting was in the future, around the year 3000 AD, as I determined. And the place of the story was in a collection of city-states or kingdoms formerly known as the good ol' USA. So we have the Kingdom of Chicago at war with the Kingdom of Cincinnati as the main focus, with other kingdoms coming into play, as well. From the 1970s and 80s - when I got the idea and planned it out, through my effort to get the story down in some complete form by writing it as a screenplay - I believed that after some disastrous event it would take about a thousand years for civilization to devolve to something akin to a medieval society. (I would take no responsibility for said disaster....)

[This will have been well-documented soon after my demise, I shall presume.] 

Here is the revelation part of this blog post: I've been sneaky.

In 2015-2017, when I was dared by fellow authors to write an epic fantasy, which would have to include dragons, titled EPIC FANTASY *WITH DRAGONS, I conceived of a future world - again set in what characters called "the Americus", a collection of small realms. I set my epic fantasy tale there, basically a quest where an exiled dragonslayer seeks the dragons' nesting grounds so he can wipe them out all at once and win his return home. Along the way, as fantasies tend to go, he has various encounters and meets different people. However, it comes out in pieces what occurred in the era prior to his own. Reference is made by the characters of a great war between five brothers and how the result of that war shaped the era he now found himself in. Ah hah!

Yes, folks! That same story I invented in my youth reappears as a backstory in my epic fantasy novel. The five princes consist of the twin brothers who are at odds, their two younger brothers, and an older-&-wiser cousin who may be their illegitimate brother. I borrowed my original story and put it into my 2017 novel. Scandalous, I know. Apologies!

But guess what happened next. We experience a pandemic in real life, and we know what that did to society. Yet it ended fairly soon. After initial hesitancy, I started a new novel in which I imagined an extended pandemic which would bring a lot more trouble to society. What would that be like? The characters suffer through much worse situations than most of us did, to a desperate degree, enough to make them finally flee the chaotic city. (Main character kept thinking it was about to end only to find it continuing....)

And so the FLU SEASON trilogy was born, beginning with what was expected to be a single, stand-alone, one-off novel titled The Book of Mom. In what became Book 1 of the series, a teenage autistic boy narrates what he and his never-married mother, a tuba player and music professor, do in escaping a ravaged city for the hope of survival in the countryside. Plan A doesn't work out, of course, nor does Plan B, so they have to head to a coastal island where the family has a vacation home. They will wait out the pandemic there....

So far, so good, as disaster stories go. The first book birthed a second book, forcing me to plan a trilogy. I knew by the run up to the conclusion of Book 1 that a second novel would be necessary; I wanted to know what happens next. I knew what would happen in Book 2: The Way of the Son. The autistic son is on his own in the pandemic-stricken world, fighting for survival, on a harsh journey to sanctuary. As I closed in on the conclusion of that book, I knew what Book 3: Dawn of the Daughters would be about: the next generation's story. It became a tome in itself - my second longest novel after Epic Fantasy *With Dragons - covering the end of the pandemic, the decades of lawlessness, a civil war, and the rebuilding of society, plus the reinvention of "modern" gadgets and utilities. I felt it was a bit like Gone With the Wind but set in post-apocalyptic times.

However, that reconstruction period allowed those who were in position to grab power to build a new society in the mold of an authoritarian regime that worked to repress its citizens, forcing people to believe that the pandemic never happened, like a perverted mirror of Orwell's 1984 novel. In Book 4: The Book of Dad [coming June 2024], the youngest son of the Book 3 heroine tells how the next generation of their family struggles to endure the repressive city. But, as is the case each time, another story springs forth....

Book 5, which I'm calling The Granddaughter's Tale (with a wink at Chaucer), follows the daughter of Book 4's tragic hero as she attempts to start a children's band in a small western town called Skinner Canyon, set on the edge of the wilderness. As it nears completion, I'm pleased that I've managed to keep it significantly lighter than previous novels in the series. I've borrowed a plotline from the old musical The Music Man but flipped it on its side. Later in the story, when our heroine travels east, she learns of the advancement of armies from Quebec down across Ontario and over Michigan to claim the city of Chicago and rename it Chicageaux. What? Mon Dieu! Quelle folie! You see, in that story of the twin princes, the Quebecois have indeed conquered the northern tier in the future, requiring the combined armies of the Americus to push them back in the 2900s; however, the city of Chicageaux retains its by then centuries-old name.

Over the course of the whole FLU SEASON series, we have lived through more than 130 years since the pandemic started.

And now you know the rest of the story! I have tied in once again the vast timeline of the long-planned medieval epic of my youth. This is how that timeline begins. 

Back as a teenager, amidst the on-going oil crisis, I had imagined a lack of oil destroying civilization. The idea still works: the collapse of society because of the long pandemic shuts down all industries, including drilling and refining. There is no more fuel for vehicles, as we experience in FLU SEASON Books 1 & 2. In Book 3 everyone is using what horses remain yet uneaten. In Book 4, we have reinvented electricity but its use is limited to the major cities. In Book 5, moving out west, we have even more restriction on electricity - almost as though we had returned to the 1890s.

This is how my grand timeline begins. Although I avoid stating years in the FLU SEASON series, I measure the pandemic (real and in the series) as beginning from 2020 - and six years into the pandemic, it would be 2026 when Book 1 starts. Several generations tell their stories. It is therefore around 2150 when Book 5 ends. More happens, thus preventing civilization from truly returning to what it was before the pandemic, and by the years approaching 3000 we find the land divided into city-states that battle each other over resources. My vision is thus rewarded, rekindled, and fulfilled. Now (already into my retirement), I still have the opportunity to write that youth-created novel - if I am not seen as copying G.R.R. Martin's Song of Ice and Fire series, a worry which has put me off from digging into my epic. 

However, I will need something to work on in the final years lest the final years hasten to their end before I am ready.

There could be a Book 6. I have ideas - two, in fact. I might even merge them. That would take us further into the future, say another 50 years, to about 2200. That should be far enough ahead in time that I won't be tripped up by real events happening or not happening within the publication window of the book.

Anyway, happy reading and, for me, happy trail writing!

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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 2: THE WAY OF THE SON Launches!

Hurray! The Way of the Son, the second book in my pandemic trilogy, FLU SEASON, has launched! Paperback is available now and the ebook for Kindle will be delivered May 15 although you can pre-order it now. Click the links.

Sanctuary from a pandemic is only good if you can stay there. When Sandy and his young family are exiled from the island, he struggles to find a way to save them while they face the worsening situation. Without Mom to guide him, Sandy must now take on all the responsibilities of survival in the lawless Outerlands.

It's hard to believe that a couple years ago I was fumbling around for a way to write a novel based on the very same pandemic we were all going through and constantly getting to a dead end, no pun intended. Now I've achieved a miraculous goal of writing three novels in two years, with two of them published and the third book already completed.

Meanwhile, I've interacted with other writers on various social media platforms, and an interesting question keeps coming up about my pandemic trilogy. What's the genre? My immediate knee-jerk reply is "science fiction". But then I have to stop myself and wonder. I worry that many sci-fi readers might be confused by the story I've put together in this trilogy. 

In this on-going interaction with other writers I came upon the term "psychological sci-fi" which seemed to be used for stories like Orwell's 1984, in which the focus is on the psychological (and social/cultural) aspects of the setting and how characters face it. The term doesn't mean it is about the psychology of the characters, not their mental illnesses or such, but rather, how the story may influence the psychological aspects of the reader's experience. In this way, the story need not have a fantastical setting or be filled with wonderful new technology.

Psychological science fiction = involves a "complex theme, ethical dilemma, existential questions" and exists "beyond time and space", involving "what it means to be human"; it may "reflect on the influence of science and technology", focus on "reality and consciousness", and morality. (cobbled together from remarks spoken in a video, link lost)

This may be compared to "literary sci-fi" in that both sub-genre might have similar subject matter but "literary" - at least to my thinking - is more about the style and depth of the writing and not specifically the setting or subject of the story. Note that in all three books the narrator speaks in first-person so we get the style of that person's manner of speech, which grows more uneducated and uses more Southern dialect as the story unfolds.

The FLU SEASON trilogy is traditional sci-fi only in that the people in the story are in distress as a result of science (virus) and technology (electric grid down, fuel runs out, etc.), and the story shows how they find solutions to the problems or find other ways to get by. This is done in a world/setting that is realistic in today's terms rather than fantastic or only plausible in the future or in extreme circumstances. The closeness to the present moment and the lack of things more typical of post-apocalyptic fiction makes FLU SEASON psychological sci-fi. But it is also action and adventure fiction. It also has a teen romance story line. There is humor and dark humor. And...well, you get the idea: it's like life itself, full of everything.

The immediate cause of both my writing and the story's setting is the coronavirus outbreak of late 2019 through late 2022. I pondered, in the days when our society seemed most set upon, what people would do if it got even worse. Suppose this "present situation" (think summer and fall of 2020) lasted six years - four more years beyond our "present" experience. How much worse would everything get? How would, say, an autistic teen and his single mother cope? What would they do? What would be the results of their efforts? And that was my story. And what would become of Mom's *tuba?

I wasn't but a little past the half-way point when I knew this stand-alone novel had to be a trilogy, although I had no firm idea what would happen next. As I finished Book 1 The Book of Mom and waited through all the miscellaneous hassles (cover art, etc.), I started right in on Book 2 The Way of the Son. Here, that teenage boy is on his own, without Mom to guide him, and he learns an awful lot on his journey.

Book 3 Dawn of the Daughters (now in the 'tweaking, then tweaking back' stage) picks up the story from the end of Book 2 and takes readers through the lives of our hero's growing family, in epic multi-generational tradition, as they experience a bloody civil war and the painful reconstruction of society afterwards - much like Gone With the Wind but set in 2035 with a deadly virus.

*Mom (of The Book of Mom) is a professional tubist and music professor, who refuses to leave her instrument behind when they flee the chaos of the city. Her son dutifully takes care of the tuba (Book 2), and his daughter eventually learns the backstory of the instrument and why it is so precious (Book 3).

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(C) Copyright 2010-2023 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.

The Season of Reading

Small Business Saturday meets CyberMonday!

For end of year holiday shopping, no day is more celebrated than Black Friday and its opulent pre-dawn sales. Then comes Small Business Saturday when our shopping attention is supposed to go to the smaller mom-and-pop stores. Of course, nobody has a smaller business than an independent author who dreams, writes, researches, revises, edits and proofreads, and may get some help with editing and cover art. Finally on the weekend of retail madness comes CyberMonday, the day when everyone who didn't find what they were looking for goes online when they are back to work, more often than not searching for a good book to read or to give to the readers in their families.

This is where I come in. I've never been big on marketing, despite actually passing two courses in college. Granted, I mostly wrote advertising copy for those classes but it did help me get a job at a local TV station. People do not seem to like marketing - or promotion, as it is often referred to in the book world - beyond a few commercials during Super Bowl Sunday. A brief mention of the existence of a product or service is all many of us require. Social media platforms may be the worst. I often must sit through 6 ads to watch even a 3 minute video on YouTube. And scrolling down my Twitter feed is like leafing through a department store catalogue rather than my followers' clever posts.

I've written before on judging books by their covers but, for me, the cover draws me to the shelf, gets me to pick up the book, and then comes the real judging. I flip that book over and read what it is about - the blurb. I don't need to know what other authors thought of it, even famous authors. I don't need to know what awards it won. Just tell me what happens. I may open to the first page of the story and read a little to get a sense of the voice and the style. I may turn to a middle page (the Amazon "surprise me" feature) or skip to the end. If it is non-fiction, I study the table of contents, sometimes the index. If the story seems compelling, the narrator interesting (either it is the author or a character doing the telling), and the setting may be out of the ordinary or appropriate for the story, I'll take chance on it. 

So now we come to the holiday gift giving season and it is important to note that books are one of the easiest gifts to give - often a 1-click purchase and instant electronic delivery or on its way via a delivery service. A book is also one of the more valuable gifts anyone would be thrilled to receive. I know this from personal, first-hand experience. The only real issue is to match the genre to the reader. Therefore, it is my duty to inform you that I write in a variety of genre so there is a book for nearly everyone. And on that note, allow me to share my collection with you for your holiday reading and gift consideration.

First is my forthcoming pandemic novel, the first in a trilogy called FLU SEASON. Book 1 is titled THE BOOK OF MOM, a reference to the main character, as told by her teenage son, a kind of "mom"-memoir set in the near future - actually quite close to now. You can pre-order the ebook for Kindle now (click here) and it will be automatically delivered on November 29. The print version will follow about a week later. Note: Book 2 is finished (I know a lot of readers don't like to start a series if they have to wait for the next book), and Book 3 is started. UPDATE: both paperback and Kindle versions are  now available (click title link above).

Teaser:

A boy and his mom and her tuba try to flee the chaos of a world-wide pandemic.

Sound familiar? We've been there. But everything has returned to normal for most of us.

Yet what if it didn't? What if the worst of the past couple years is now in its sixth year... with no end in sight?

What would you do? How would you get by? Where would you go to survive?

No, wait! There are other books!
 
Scroll backward in time - by publication date - and check out the following novels with links to ebook and print versions.

THE MASTERS' RIDDLE (July 2021)
[sci-fi]

Toog is a simple gardener living with a full-mate and a springling on a planet called Sebbol. Until one night The Masters arrive and capture him, taking him back to their world.

Awaking in a cold, dark cell, Toog fears he will never see his family again. Communicating with other prisoners he learns that The Masters have visited many worlds and brought many different beings back for their laboratory or their work camps. But why? Toog wonders as he vows to escape.

But even if he can get out of the prison or escape a work camp how can he ever hope to return to his world - before his family is long gone and his planet ravaged by time.

Perhaps his hardship is his destiny and serves a bigger purpose. Is that the Masters' Riddle? Only if he can solve the riddle can he go home.

YEAR OF THE TIGER (November 2020)
[action/adventure]

Every night Karl Edwards has strange, violent dreams. He sees the world as though he's looking through the eyes of a Bengal tiger and it's driving him insane. Fortunately, his sexy wife knows a hunky doctor who can help her have Karl committed, that is.

Locked up, the nightmares worsen as the tiger hunts down the men who killed its mate. Karl has a plan, however. All he has to do is persuade Althea, a young nurse, to help him escape. Next, he must get to India. Then he must find that one tiger and kill it. Only then will he have the mind they seem to share all to himself.

But others are also interested in joining the hunt. The doctor who put Karl in the mental hospital, fearing Karl will reveal his crimes. And famous big game hunter Colonel John Barrington will come out of retirement, with worldwide media in tow, for one last chance at a man-eating tiger!

(You can read a lovely review here.)

EXCHANGE (May 2020)

[contemporary crime drama]

An Unspeakable Crime.

High school teacher Bill Masters and his family have a comfortable life in suburban Oklahoma City - until his wife and teen daughter are killed in a mass shooting.

Overwhelmed with grief, Bill struggles to put his life back

together - or construct a new life from what remains - even as he must combat continuing crime that threatens him and his home.

A Second Chance.

When exchange student Wu Ting "Wendy" Wang arrives from China for her year at an American high school, she has no idea what has just happened to her host family.

She's a constant reminder to Bill of why his family is gone. Yet he is determined to protect her at any cost - ready to use his father's gun. And he will not fail this time.

(You can read a lovely review here.)

SUNSET (February 2019)

Book III of the Stefan Szekely, Vampire trilogy

Midnight 31 December 2099.

As the Empire of Europa celebrates the new centennial with battle lines in Ukraine and preparations underway for invading England, the Emperor in His capital of Budapest welcomes His guests, the elite of vampire society.

Yet all is not well in the empire. Different factions agree the time has come for new leadership. As rabid mobs protest and attack palace guards, Emperor Stefan and his closest staff huddle in the imperial suite, awaiting rescue.

But how do you get away from the clutches of the supreme demon who lives forever and exists everywhere? If Stefan can free himself, the world may yet be saved. If he fails, the destruction will continue...until the Anglo-American Union falls and vampire society rules the world.

SUNRISE (April 2018)

Book II of the Stefan Szekely, Vampire trilogy

For Stefan Székely it is a fate worse than death: To be dead yet stuck with his dead parents. 

After 13 years Stefan can endure it no longer. He wants a castle of his own. But first he must visit his family’s bank in Budapest.

With endless strife rumbling across Europe, Stefan hardly recognizes Budapest, now capital of the Hungarian Federation. The world has changed. 

Nevertheless, he embarks on the reign of terror he always denied himself, living the vampire playboy lifestyle. Until he gets a stern warning from the local vampire gang. He is not welcome - unless he plays by their rules.

Should Stefan fight for his right to party like it's 2027? Or will an encounter with a dangerous stranger change everything about his new existence? As clashes between vampire gangs and State Security escalate, Stefan just might be the key to changing the fate of Europe forever!

. . . If he can survive three bloody nights in Budapest.

The sequel to A DRY PATCH of SKIN continues the trials and tribulations of Stefan Székely, Vampire.

EPIC FANTASY *WITH DRAGONS (March 2017)

[epic fantasy!]

CORLAN, MASTER DRAGONSLAYER, the best in the Guild, the best in the Burg!

And yet, returning from his latest expedition, Corlan discovers jealous rivals have conspired with the Prince to banish him from the city.

Sent into the Valley of Death, Corlan conjures a plan. He and his new sidekick, a runaway boy from the palace kitchen, will trek the thousand miles to the far end of the valley, where a vast marsh provides nesting grounds for the dragon horde. Once there, Corlan vows to smash dragon eggs and lance younglings, ending dragon terror once and for all time.

And yet, as dangers, distractions, and detours harry him along the way, Corlan learns ancient secrets that threaten to destroy everything in his world. Even with the aid of wizards and warriors, he must use all his guile, his bravado, and the force of his stubborn will just to survive - and perhaps return home - no matter how the gods challenge him with their harshest tests.

A GIRL CALLED WOLF  (December 2015)

[action/adventure]

Ice and snow are all 12 year old Anuka knows outside the hut in Greenland where she was born. 

When her mama dies, Anuka struggles to survive. The harsh winter forces her to finally journey across the frozen island to the village her mama always feared.

But the people of the village don’t know what to do with this girl. They try to educate and bring her into the modern world, but Anuka won't make it easy for them. She sees dangers at every turn and every day hears her fate echoing in her mama’s voice.

Her mama gave her that name for a reason. She is A GIRL CALLED WOLF who searches for the place where she belongs, a destination always just out of reach, on a path she will always make her own.

(You can read a lovely review here.)

AIKO (May 2015)

[mystery/romance]

When the handwritten letter from Japan arrives, Benjamin cannot help but flash back to when he lived in Hawaii and met Hanako, a Japanese stewardess. 

But Addy, Benjamin’s wife of three years, knows what the letter really means: a love child was born.

Now Benjamin must save a child he has never met, learn the truth behind Hanako’s death, and risk his marriage and his career to do the right thing. But venturing into the lonely woods of northern Ishikawa throws him into an ancient world of strict customs and tight-lipped villagers.

AIKO, a love story wrapped around a mystery, is a modern version of the Madame Butterfly story told from his side.

(You can read a review here.)

A DRY PATCH OF SKIN (October 2014)

(the only medically accurate vampire novel)

Book I of the Stefan Szekely, Vampire trilogy

The truth about being a vampire: It is not cool, not sexy. It’s a painful, miserable existence.

Good reason to avoid that situation, thinks medical technician Stefan Székely. He's too busy falling in love with TV reporter Penny Park, anyway. Until one day when she notices a dry patch of skin on his face.

At first it's just annoying, nothing to worry about, some weird skin disease he can treat with lotions. However, as his affliction worsens, Stefan fears that his unsightly problem will ruin his relationship with Penny.

If only that was all Stefan has to worry about! He soon realizes there is a lot more at stake than his handsome face. To save himself, Stefan must go in search of a cure for the disease which is literally destroying him inch by inch. If only his parents had told him of the family legacy.

A BEAUTIFUL CHILL (February 2014)

[campus anti-romance]

Opposites may attract... but can they stay together?

Íris is a refugee from an abusive youth in Iceland, further abused on the streets of Toronto - until she sees Art as an escape. With a scholarship, she drifts from depression to nightmare to Wiccan rituals to the next exhibit. There's a lot she must forget to succeed in a life she refuses to take responsibility for.

Eric is settling in at Fairmont College, starting a new life after betrayal and heartbreak. Divorced and hitting forty, he has a lot to prove - to his father, his colleagues, and mostly to himself. The last thing he needs is a distraction - and there's nothing more distracting than Íris.

A Beautiful Chill is a contemporary romance set in the duplicitous world of academic rules and artistic license - in a roundabout way a prequel to A Girl Called Wolf.

(You can read a review here.)

AFTER ILIUM (October 2012)

[action/adventure/age-gap romance]

Troy! Ilium! 3000 years ago Greeks and Trojans battled below the fortress city.

Now comes Alex Parris in 1993, freshly graduated and eager to tour the ancient site. On his cruise to Istanbul, however, he meets Eléna, a mysterious older woman who draws him into an affair.

When the two lovers challenge Fate by visiting the ruins of Ilium, they are rudely separated – forcing Alex to embark on his own Odyssey. His struggle to return to Eléna becomes a fight for survival on the wild Turkish coast.

THE DREAM LAND Trilogy (2012-2013)

[sci-fi, steampunk, interdimensional doorways, teenage know-it-alls, world-ruining, political intrigue, time travel, battle hamsters & magic potions]

Book I  Long Distance Voyager  (December 2012)

Book II  Dreams of Future's Past  (June 2013)

Book III  Diaspora  (December 2013)

How far would you go to save the love of your life? Through a portal to another world?

High school sweethearts Sebastian and Gina discover a doorway to a new world. Adventure-loving Gina falls in love with the world of Ghoupallesz and wants to stay, but studious Sebastian fears losing touch with Earth, so he returns alone.

Years later, working the night shift at the IRS, Sebastian feels the cosmic pull once more. Gina is in trouble. Again. Of course he must return and save her! Perhaps this time, he hopes, they can remain together. Returning through the interdimensional doorway, Sebastian must gather his old comrades from the war, cross the towering Zet mountains, and free Gina from the evil Zetin warlord’s castle. 

Unfortunately, there are more questions to answer. Is his adventure on the other side real? Or is it just the dream of a psychotic killer? That’s what the police want to know when his friends and co-workers go missing.

THE DREAM LAND Trilogy is a tour-de-force genre-mashing Epic of Interdimensional intrigue and alien romance, a psychological thriller marbled with twisted humor, steampunk pathos, and time/space conundra. 

NOTE: Check your local Amazon listings. You may be able to get these for free if you are a Kindle Unlimited or Amazon Prime member!

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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.