Ianus Bifrons
Two-faced Janus
January is named after the Roman god Janus, the two-faced god of (amongst other things) beginnings, gates, time, and endings. Time to look back on a year that, to be honest, wasn’t the best for many people. No, not 1348 when the Black Death ravaged the land. 2020 part 2, or 2021 as it more commonly known as.
One thing that takes a lot of my time is pondering over past events. Again, not historical occurrences such as Pompeii or WW2 but the more mundane events that bother introverts:
“Should I have really said that?”
“Would they have thought differently if only I had . . . ?”
To stop doing that is going to be one of my big resolutions for the year ahead. Hard, I know, when you have had so many summers before hand worrying about minutiae. But let’s see. To try to train me out of it, I’m only looking at some of the good parts of 2021:
- Made it. 365/365. All challenges negotiated, some more successfully than others. All saving throws made and save point reached
- Two more Grandkids. Woot! 4 in total now, so not enough for a 5-a-side team, but a decent, balanced D&D party.
- Book 1 published. The Maingard Chronicles, Book 1: The Darkness Rising was released in July and it’s slowly climbing the US Bestseller list – only about 2million places to go before hitting the Number 1 spot.
- Managed to get out and about – London for the International Horse Show (Olympia), and HRH Vikings 3 (a folk metal festival in Sheffield)
- Puppies! 2 more additions to our own household.
Looking Forward to 2022.
What to expect going forward? Well, exciting prospects ahead. Book 2 of the Maingard Chronicles is planned for release in February. Titled ‘The Demons Within’, it carries on where The Darkness Rising left of. Maingard is still imperiled by the enemy host, and – no spoilers – Bex and co are all that stand between survival or death.
Editing is in progress and the cover is being worked on at the moment. Expect a reveal towards the end of the month!
The as yet untitled third book will be released later in the year. The first draft is complete and (I am hoping) won’t take too much alteration. But, a title needs to be found – sometimes the hardest part.
In between all this, I’ll be working on book 4 which should bring this epic story to a conclusion of sorts. Will Maingard stand, or will it fall to a fate of slavery and destruction.
Finally, I’ll look to release a book comprising of short stories and novellas in a separate Gaslamp-slash-Steampunk fantasy series – The Journal of Abelard Grey. The highly fantastic and magical setting of the series adds an edge to a normal Steampunk world. Ever since reading the works of Robert E Howard and Fritz Leiber, where the stories are collected from magazine or periodical publications and reissued in book form, I have loved this style of storytelling. Hopefully you will too.
As a teaser, the introduction to Abelard’s world is available here – The Isle of Kola Tui. Get set for a world of Airships and Steampower, Aliens and Undead, Magicians and Villains.