However, I took it upon myself to digitise them (photographing them on my bed, if that even counts) .. and promptly forgot about those, just as I did the original dead tree format.

Well, I’ve decided to share those ancient scrawls and scribbles on DeviantArt, for your visual delectation / amusement.

By skirting some of the more obvious themes of science fiction, the idea appears to be “Oh, and by the way, there are aliens, too.” or “Uh yeah, this is twenty-five years into the future.” but without the heavier details that would betray a movie as being science fiction.

When trying to explain Ascending Angels, an in-development (written, but awaiting chronological tweaks) novel of mine, I am often inclined not to mention science fiction at all, since it falls into this hinterland of incidental science fiction layered just beneath the core action thriller threads with elements of fantasy. In essence, Ascending Angels is a heist, interwoven with abrupt action sequences and elements of sheer fantasia, but the feel isn’t that of science fiction at all.

So for me personally, this creeping motion of science fiction into mainstream is welcomed by me, as this will inevitably spill over into literary escapism, too.

Everything’s connected

What does that mean for projects moving forward? I have to create a several things:

1. Firstly, a time line into which each and every novel I write from now on will have to fit within.
2. Secondly, decide what technologies, scientific developments and social changes I intend dealing with, as continuous themes, interweaving and spanning the various novels.
3. Thirdly, which characters or families bestride these novels, why, and how they interact and intersect with the aforementioned.

Now, I know none of this is entirely new, but it’s something I feel needs to be done, rather than writing one-off, disparate and disconnected stories.

Aim high and be bold!

Instead, I want a narrative that spans decades, and towards the end, centuries:

• Earth Day, the first novel (or novella, if you like) is more of a fable than science fiction.
• Stunned (presently on pause), is a comedy thriller with a political slant.
• Wraith (also on pause and presently only provisionally titled), is a superhero story with a difference.
• Perditions End is a time travel saga, where our protagonist is attempting to solve a series of murders that implicate him as the aggressor.
• Ascending Angels (written but pending a complete re-write of Perditions End, the first, or “prequel”) is a very ambitious novel with several very well-defined threads, the first of which is a complex heist thriller, the second is a metaphysical exploration, including a search and rescue, while the third is a race against time scenario, to avert a global catastrophe, invoked by the a conflict between two alien races.
• An as-yet untitled and only provisionally understood novel, tying together Ascending Angels and Aeon, which will, amongst other things, provide the story behind Bingley and Forsyth.
• Aeon is something quite different and a departure from the usual science fiction subtleties, this time, we’re deep into the realms of science fiction proper.

Aim high and be bold! That is my mantra, and I shall not shy away from this agenda.

“That is the great question of this age, and, like it or not, its resolution, when it comes, will restate the meaning of man in the universe, and inevitably lead to the collapse of the forces that now oppress and insult the human spirit with their obfuscations and lies.”

Whitely Strieber, like myself, has pondered the imponderable and emerged the other side with a healthy skepticism, but more importantly, perhaps, a wider pair of eyes.

While we’re all so keen and eager to look outwards and beyond, staring wide-eyed across the cosmos, let us not divest ourselves the responsibility of an insular gaze, delegating such tasks to the religious alone and neglect an inward inspection of ourselves.

In the end, life itself, found wherever or whenever, is the ultimate phenomena.

“As part of this initiative, Lulu has secured partnerships with Apple and Barnes and Noble so you can sell your works to millions of readers on devices like the iPad® and NOOK™, not to mention in print on Amazon.com and the Lulu Marketplace.  We’ve even added a new Manage Distribution page that lets you opt-in and opt-out of retail channels for all your titles with the click of a button.”

While this is obviously good news, for those like myself who have already published an ebook, we’re kind of dangling out in fresh air here, wondering what to do next.

I published Earth Day directly as an ebook, with no intention of running a print format version. I’ve had a quick poke around and I just cannot find anything related to their opt-in option.

So maybe I have to re-submit my book and publish again? Again, no guidance. I can only image this “Manage Distribution” option relates to their ISBN product, but again, I’m guessing because there’s just no guidance.

I posted a comment in their release, so hopefully, they will respond and clarify just what the hell is going on.

Few of you will know about the tetralogy I have lined up, or that I’ve written I first (and very rough) draft of Perditions End, the first of the four, and a more advanced first draft of Ascending Angels, the second in the series.

As a businessman, I’ve learned some of the constants of my trade over the past twelve years, and realise they apply elsewhere in life, too. For instance, people won’t buy from person until they’ve bought into that person. Which is to say: until someone trusts you, they probably won’t buy from you.

The audience can only suspend their disbelief a finite number of times, as their sense of incredulity is itself drawn from a finite source. So the role of the author is to create plausible impossibilities. And if I, as the author, expect you to believe my stories, then you must first believe the characters that populate the imaginary spaces I populate with them.

In the beginning, we broke our word, and then came the lights

“How might our quarrelsome and wasteful ways be seen through the gaze of more distant, different and dispassionate eyes? And how might a promise once made by the leaders of the world be re-paid having been broken by their successors?

30 years later, on a night whose dark skies were filled with a magical light show the world over, countless towns and cities, entire transport networks as well as billions of people begin to vanish without a trace. But out in the remote rural areas of the world, life goes on unaffected by the invasion, or the enigmatic “lights” that continue to appear out of nowhere, surveying the mundane routines of the survivors.

In the aftermath of this unstoppable invasion by an invincible alien force, one survivor wants more than mere survival; Leonora “Lenny” Dixon wants answers. Why are the invaders here, and what do they want of us?

In search of answers, Lenny and her boyfriend Jay leave the relative safety of Cumbria, a mountainous and rugged region of north-west England, and begin a journey south, through the ruined and abandoned urban sprawl of the great northern city of Manchester. On their way they discover the true and terrifying purpose of the invaders, finally revealing the horrifying truth behind the disappearing industry and civilization of man, and of mankind itself.”

Earth Day is available NOW on Amazon

Earth Day is available to buy right now for Amazon Kindle, as well as other formats on Lulu.