by Sean Platt
During that time, I also realized that Every Day isn’t the first story of its kind. One could make the argument that it is similar to the TV show Quantum Leap, minus time travel. There’s also Anne Rice’s The Body Thief, part of The Vampire Chronicles (which I’ve not yet read), and a recent author friend of ours, John L. Monk’s The Jenkins Cycle. I’m sure there’s probably also many more out there I haven’t heard of.
Even though there were now a few more examples of body swapping in media, I was still reluctant to write our as-yet-untitled story.
In fact, it was John who convinced me that we ought to write our series. John was also the one that told me about some other books in the genre, which, incidentally, he found out about only after he’d released Kick, the first book in his The Jenkins Cycle series. His argument, same as Sean’s, was that there are no original never-done-before genres, but every author brings something different to the genre, whether it be vampire, zombie, or body swapping.
So I felt a bit more motivated, but I still needed to make our story different from the others.
That’s when I thought about two other stories we’ve written: the short story, The Watcher, and our stand-alone (non-supernatural) suspense thriller, 12. Both of these involve serious subject matters: the dark lives of everyday people around us, fate versus chaos, revenge, and redemption.
These are topics we’ve been writing about in some form or another since Day One. Even our bestselling Yesterday’s Gone series involves these elements.
But a body-jumping series — this could allow us to explore these themes in an even better way, with a rich tapestry of characters.
Soon, Sean and I developed a rich mythology to serve as a background for our story. A story that started with me wanting to write something like Every Day, and evolved into something that we feel is completely different, something uniquely Collective Inkwell.
While we came up with our concept and parts of the back story early on, we had yet to decide what would be the best way to tell the story.
Another serial?
No. We’ve already got four (down from six), which we need to close out before starting another one.
A stand-alone novel?
No, there’s too much we want to do with this world and its characters.
A series?
Yes. But not just a series, but rather a series of shorter books that we could release in relatively quick succession: one every month for three months, and then three more later in the year. We really enjoyed the weekly releases we did back in 2012, as it truly built a rapport with our audience where they’d read our latest episode, then review or email us about it within days of its release.
It was an immediacy of art and connection I’ve missed since we’ve moved from the episode model we pioneered in 2011.
While we’re releasing these back-to-back-to-back, these won’t have the limitations that our serials had.
Karma Police (yes, I’m a HUGE Radiohead fan!) books will be standalone experiences. You can read them in any order (though I’m not sure that will always be the case later in the series?). They’ll all have beginnings, middles, and ends. No cliff-hangers for the contained story, though we may open up a new element at the end of the book for the overarching mystery, which will unfold over the series of books.
And while I enjoy big epic books, there’s something about the immediacy of a novella that, as a reader, I’ve always loved. A shorter book isn’t nearly as intimidating or require nearly the same time commitment. In a busy world, there’s something almost cozy about smaller novels and novellas.
We are more excited about Karma Police than anything we’ve written in quite some time. Excited to be in this world, and even more importantly, to share that world with you.
Welcome to a new Collective Inkwell adventure.
Thank you for joining us.
Dave (and Sean)
February 2016
GET THE FIRST TWO SEASONS of YESTERDAY’S GONE FOR FREE
Sign up for the FREE Goners newsletter and get the epic first and second seasons of Yesterday’s Gone for FREE! Yes, absolutely free!
Join the Goners and be the FIRST to get the latest Collective Inkwell news, sneak peeks at what’s coming next, and free books and short stories. Our Goners make our careers possible, and we’ll never spam you.
Get your free books now.
http://sterlingandstone.net/ygfb/
THANK YOU FOR READING!
Sean Platt & David W. Wright
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Sean Platt is co-founder of the Collective Inkwell and Realm & Sands imprints, children’s author under the pen name “Guy Incognito,” speaker, and author, with breakout indie hits such as Yesterday’s Gone, WhiteSpace, The Beam, and Unicorn Western, as well as traditionally published titles such as Z 2134 and Monstrous, published by 47North.
Sean is one-third of The Self Publishing and Better Off Undead Podcasts with co-hosts Johnny B. Truant and David Wright. He currently lives in Austin, Texas with his wife, daughter, and son.
Follow Sean on Twitter: http://twitter.com/seanplatt
* * * *
David W. Wright is the co-author of the Yesterday’s Gone, WhiteSpace, ForNevermore, Available Darkness, Z 2134, and Monstrous series as well as the Dark Crossings collections of short stories. He’s also a cartoonist.
He talks about creativity and his attempt to lose weight on The Walking Dave podcast twice a week.
David lives on the east coast with his wife, his 8-year old son, and just the right amount of paranoia.
He writes about Collective Inkwell stuff at:
http://CollectiveInkwell.com
He blogs about himself, creativity, pop culture, and other stuff at:
http://DavidwWright.com
Connect with David at:
[email protected]
http://twitter.com/thedavidwwright
http://facebook.com/CollectiveInkwellPublishing
* * * *
::OUR OTHER BOOKS::
//SERIES//
Yesterday’s Gone: Seasons One - Six
Karma Police
WhiteSpace: Seasons One & Two
(Season Three coming soon)
ForNevermore: Season One
(Season Two coming soon)
Available Darkness: Season One & Two
(Season Three Coming Soon)
Z 2134 - Z 2136
Monstrous
//STANDALONE BOOKS//
12
Crash
Threshold
::OUR SHORT STORIES::
Dark Crossings: The Collection
Dark Crossings Double Feature: Rites of Passage
Visit our website to find all these books, and more!
Visit www.CollectiveInkwell.com/our-books
* * * *
