Oh my God–it’s like I’m finally coming up for air.
I’ve been telling people that I wrote an amazing number of words in six months– 450,000. I sort of made up for that by taking an entire two months to write Fall Through Spring, and now I’m super under the gun writing Silent Heart.
But, back to the beginning. String Boys has done great–better than I could have hoped, and I’d like to thank ALL the people who reviewed it in ALL the places as part of that. You really made a difference and I appreciate it so much. But now that it’s out, people want to know what comes next.
So I’ll start with what’s got a solid due date (and, in some cases, a cover) and move on to what’s been turned in, and then talk about what I’m working on and scheduled to work on next. If it’s not coming soon, I’ll talk about if it’s coming at all (usually it’s just in a refractory period) and tell you what the hold up is.
Are we ready?
Let’s go!
Okay– starting with Warm Heart which is my next Dreamspun Desire, and is out on July 16. This is the first of three books, and they’re sort of action packed and have simpler casts than I usually write, but hopefully memorable casts as well.
Warm Heart
Search and Rescue: Book One
Survive the adventure. Live to love.
Following a family emergency, snowboarder Tevyn Moore and financier Mallory Armstrong leave Donner Pass in a blizzard… and barely survive the helicopter crash that follows. Stranded with few supplies and no shelter, Tevyn and Mallory—and their injured pilot—are forced to rely on each other.
The mountain leaves no room for evasion, and Tevyn and Mal must confront the feelings that have been brewing between them for the past five years. Mallory has seen Tevyn through injury and victory. Can Tevyn see that Mallory’s love is real?
Mallory’s job is risk assessment. Tevyn’s job is full-on risk. But to stay alive, Mallory needs to take some gambles and Tevyn needs to have faith in someone besides himself. Can the bond they discover on the mountain see them to rescue and beyond?
Paint it Black
Everybody thinks Mackey Sanders and Outbreak Monkey is the last coming of Rock’n’Roll Jesus, but Cheever Sanders can’t wait to get out of his home town and make a name for himself where nobody expects him to fill his famous brothers’ shoes. He’s tired of living in their shadow.
Blake Manning knows the feeling. He’s been Outbreak Monkey’s second lead guitarist for ten years. He’s come to terms with the fact that he’ll never be Grant Adams, the guy he replaced, and that Kell Sanders will never love him like Mackey loved Grant. He got this gig on luck and love, not talent. So watching Cheever blow through Outbreak Monkey’s hard-earned money in an epic stretch of partying pisses him off.
Blake shows up at Cheever’s nonstop orgy to enforce some rules, but instead of a jaded punk, he finds a lost boy as talented at painting as Mackey is at song-making, and terrified to let anybody see the real him. It’s something he and Blake have in common.
Both men have to make peace with being second banana in the public eye. Can they find the magic of coming absolute first with each other?
Now, after Paint it Black, we have the the next Fish book–Fish on a Bicycle–which, a little bit like Fish 3 has some crossover elements. 
A. I had some very serious editorial help shaping this one up so it could be read independently. Will it help to have read the other books first? Yes. Of course. But is it necessary? I think these last two years I’ve been working super hard on how to make books standalone. Hiding the Moon was a training exercise for this one, and I think I did a good job. 
Now, after Fish on a Bicycle, which is in editing and should be out in October, we have another long awaited sequel, and one that will come with a makeover for the whole three book series. 
I know that with titles like Winter Ball and Summer Lessons, you sort of expect a fourth, but the fact was, Dane and Carpenter were really the only other characters any of us were interested in by the end of Summer Lessons, and I just didn’t want to force things. So expect Fall Through Spring in December, and while it’s not Christmas themed, it’s snarky and hopefully charming, in spite of the fact that Dane and Carpenter had some serious issues to work through. I tried (oh my God did I try) to keep the tone of “it’s all gonna be okay” even throughout the books. We know they go to some dark places–I mean, we saw Dane’s nervous breakdown in Summer Lessons, right? But this is through their POV, and I hope that alone makes it worth it. 
And what comes next depends on when I finish.
After Flophouse 1, I’m going to do a standalone titled Slow Pitch, and after that, I’m starting a series called The Hedge Witches Lonely Hearts Club. It will be in the Dreamspun Beyond line, and, again, so looking forward to short and fun and sweet! And sometime in the next year, I’m starting a series based on grifters, that is really turning my key.
This doesn’t mean I won’t finish the series. It just means that I’ll have to lengthen the timeline a little. I mean, I LOVE the Familiar series, but Angels and Demons ain’t selling, which is a shame. I really want to see Larx and Aaron get married–but I may need to wait a little while before I get to write that book. I’m going to be doing more standalone volumes, shorter books, trilogies instead of sagas. It’s taking a change in the way I think of plotting and a change in the way I write–and change is always hard. If you grow disheartened, though, remember.
