Third novel submitted to publisher! Now the wait to see if it’s accepted…

The submission window for Apprentice House Press is annually from Oct. 1st to Feb. 1st, and in that four-month period they get anywhere from 200 – 250 manuscripts to review. This year my third high fantasy novel will be there in the digital pile. When I pressed the “Submit” button earlier this month I did so with a mixture of hope and worry. The former because this submission was in fulfillment of the Option clause for my previous contract. Being a known author is an advantage, especially since I’ve had good working relationships with my previous editors. That being said, nothing is guaranteed, so to get one of the 20 publication slots this year means I need to be in the top 10% of manuscripts reviewed. Not great odds by any estimate. As with previous submissions, I’ll get a response in March or April. Any author will tell you that waiting for responses is hard, but thankfully it’s the time of year with a lot of non-writing things going on.

I’ve continued my reading streak (which makes it sound more impressive than it is) and finished a Conan the Cimmerian anthology (one of the Del Rey press versions). Before that I read Master of Doom, which was an early history of id Software. I really enjoyed both, and now I’m working my way through the Shapers of Worlds Volume V anthology that I was a part of earlier this year. There are over 20 authors in the anthology and I’m hoping to find something that excites me enough to pick up a novel from a fellow contributor. Not that I need another unread book on my shelf, I have plenty of those, but I think it’s important to keep an eye out for indie and small-press authors and support their work when possible.

For marketing and promotion, I'm excited that I'll be on the Quill & Query podcast in early January. Brandon and Ash have established what I think is an interesting long-form format to talk about all things fantasy writing and I'm thrilled that they are doing more author interviews. I'll have more information to share close to the recording date, but I think it will be a great way to get 2026 rolling in terms of sharing what I love about the fantasy genre and where I think my novels fit in the mix.

For my own writing, I’m still on a break at the moment. I’ve organized some notes for what will be the fourth and final book in the series that tells Thorne and Reihana’s story, but have not sat down to formally write the outline on a chapter-by-chapter basis. Having leap-frogged around in the order that I’ve written and published the books, what I’m doing now is trying to make sure that all the world-building, side character plot threads, and bread crumb trails of lore that I’ve put in the previous books all come together in this last one. I want to make sure I have as few loose ends as possible. Right now, I’m spending a lot of time thinking about the Void, the extra-planar space of raw mana where I left Thorne at the end of The Path From Regret. I have a feeling that in the new year I’ll finally get the itch to start the process of writing in earnest, but for right now I’m still enjoying the writing break.

Thanks for stopping by.