Working on the novel series Monarch was a life-changing experience. It consumed all my writing energies and I realized afterwards the value of shaking things up. Screenwriting is my original writing love, and after working on screenplays for nearly twenty years I have a comfortable familiarity with the screenwriting process. I am amazed at how energetic I still am about working on stories intended for the screen. Maybe it is just writing in general that gets me motivated. Screenwriting is different than working on a book in that it requires collaboration with others on some level, plus you can crank out a screenplay in no time if you have the right motivation.
My two writing partners, Charles Thomas, who I have worked with on multiple occasions for nearly a decade now, and Ryan Schube, a talented writer who Chuck and I had the pleasure to work with on several projects over the past year, did a hell of a job keeping this old idea machine motivated and cranking out new ideas. I'm pretty sure we broke some kind of speed record for a screenplay we cranked out last year. If all three of us had the time, we could undoubtedly write a dozen brilliant screenplays in a year. It's an exciting triumvirate. Each of us have our own wonderful set of individual skills that we bring to the table. The past eight months have been an intoxicating blur of new ideas intended for the screen. If we catch a break and actually sell one of these projects, I could see us churning out cool projects for years to come.
For me, there is an endless promise of hope with screenwriting. Is that because one can always just move on to the next one (story)? Not sure. I originally turned to literary pursuits because I was tired of things always jumping to the next story. The disappearing ink of screenwriting is the biggest negative. This impermanence is enough to drive the sanest of writers a little bonkers. For what is the point of working on a story for the screen if others will never see it? Almost every screenwriter has asked his or herself that question at some point or another.
Over the past eight months, this triumvirate has had its hands and minds involved to some degree or another in the screenwriting process of around ten different stories. I was surprised by the volume of work when I was recently reading through my notes for the first seven months of this year. At the outset each of those stories held a nascent belief that it might be destined for production. With people interested and attached to some of the projects the wheels are certainly turning.
This feels like the opportune time to change gears. I had been holding off on fully committing to a large scale literary project after the release of Psykosis. That story was originally written back in 2010 after a horrifying dream for which the rest of the story was written around. When I sat down to write that story it was intended to be a long short story, but in the end it turned into a novella. A turn towards shorter, one-off stories was preferred after the time-consuming work put in on the Monarch series. The work on novellas over the past year mixed with the recent work on screenplays has allowed me that much-needed separation from working on large scale literary work. I just may be ready to think big once again.
My current plan includes three novel series in a similar vein to Monarch. I don't broach that plan without some trepidation. The time it will take is massive. The amount of energy that will need to be expended is unimaginable at this point. The world will likely have changed in some way by the time I might release all three series. That is all a part of the writing process. After all, we can only control what we can control. And that ain't much. Though we can control what we put down on paper.
This new writing plan allows for some screenwriting time, but my focus will be primarily on these three literary series. One series involves the novella I had been leisurely working on since April Harold and the House Fly . Back in 2005 I wrote the favorite of all my screenplays thus far, a three-part, two hundred thirty-five page sci-fi, fantasy, alternate history epic that spans nearly a hundred years. It was the second multi-chapter screenplay I ever wrote and I envisioned that it might work like Kill Bill in two volumes. Since Lawrence Bender isn't funding my projects, the page count and budgetary concerns of this story kept me from seriously pushing the screen story. At the beginning of this year I considered rewriting the screenplay into a series before focusing just on the novella. It was a decision that was influenced by releasing a novella in February and the attention I was putting towards screenwriting.
Then I spoke with another writing friend a few weeks ago who had just gotten back from a writer's conference in New York. She spent some of her time there speaking with other self-publishers like ourselves, asking about how they had found success and readership. She said that they all seemed to be in agreement about the one thing that helped them generate sales and readership. They all wrote and released their work as a series. That was all I needed to hear. It was reinforcement of what I already practiced and believed and had begun to make plans for again. It was the push I needed to get me back into literary gear.
In addition to reworking that decade-old screenplay into shape and working House Fly into the series, I also have two other novel series that are demanding attention. I began work on one shortly after completion of the first draft of Monarch back in November of 2010. When I shifted into rewriting mode for Monarch in early 2011, I put that story to the side with all intention of returning to it. Every now and again I would think on that story, but some other story always seemed to take precedence. A part of me wants to tackle this first as there is so much new material still to tackle and I crave the writing of new material.
The third novel series is an idea I have been building upon for years. I used a sliver of that story's complex universe to write the pilot episode for a proposed tv series with Chuck. Jumping back into that world along with the other two series is something I would do tomorrow with a sudden injection of time and money. Juggling three series at one time would bring me so much joy you have no idea.
Is it wishful thinking to believe I could finish all three novel series over the span of twelve months? Absolutely. That doesn't mean I still can't get some serious work done on all three.
There are three positives as I set out on work on these three novel series. First, I have a massive screenplay to work off of for one of them. Second, the novella Harold and the House Fly is already in the rewrite process and would slip in nicely to that same series. These two positives lessen the planning and writing burden for one of the series and help expedite its release. The third positive is that I have already begun work on the second series. Granted, I didn't get very far and the story is now a three part series as opposed to a one off, but it is better than nothing. The mere prospect of finally working on the third series has me more than just a little excited. I can't wait to complicate my existence by merely working on it. The third series is massive, not only in scale but also in the big ideas it proposes. I have been fascinated with this story for nearly a decade and can not wait to share it with people.
Realistically, by next summer I would like to release the first book in one of these series. Ultimately, I would like to then be able to release other books in these three series in close proximity to each other. It would be foolish, however, to put a time frame on the release of any of the books in three series at this time. Especially when I anticipate working on screenplays during that time.
These are all good goals. My biggest challenge, as always, is managing my time, but I need also be focused yet malleable to change and be open to other possibilities should they present themselves. .
