When I read about Hollywood film productions, I’m amazed at the number of years it takes for a production company to go from the purchase of the initial story to the completion of production. Some novelists are like that, moving at a snail’s pace–like Susanna Clarke and Donna Tartt. Others juggle multiple ideas at a time and are hard at work on the next novel before the last completed novel is even in print.

Fate’s Arrows hasn’t met its stride yet in terms of readers, editions (we’re working on the audiobook), or critical and reader reviews. So, I almost feel like I’m cheating on it to be starting a new novel already. Seriously, though, I need to start working on Aeon before I lose my nerved.

Aeon will be the third in my “Mountain Journeys Series” that includes The Sun Singer and Sarabande.  The Sun Singer had an avatar who is presumed dead. For years, I didn’t think I knew enough magic to write the third novel from his point of view. I still don’t, so I’ll have to fake it and proceed at a Donna Tartt rather than a James Paterson pace.

The name of the novel comes from the 20th major arcana card in the Thoth Tarot deck. According to Raven’s tarot site, a nice reference for those who use the Thoth deck,  “The Aeon is the symbol for the Rise of Phoenix, it stands for a time of insight, the true understanding of the circle of life, of growing and fading. The card tells us that we should leave our ‘frog perspective’ and watch the things from a higher level, that the time has come to face the new, that we need a good overview to build our ‘Utopia’.”

Fortunately, readers won’t need to know anything about the Tarot to understand the novel. Like the earlier novels in the series, Aeon will be contemporary fantasy, focussing primarily on a civil war in an alternate universe. Even though the avatar has grown too old for this sort of thing, he has to return to that universe because that’s where his daughter and his grandson live.

I’ve been reading through The Sun Singer and Sarabande to make sure I don’t get the continuity or the characters messed up. And, I’ve been updating my research notes about Glacier National Park where the novels are set. Okay, I guess I can’t delay writing the first chapter any longer.

I wonder if other writers who group their books into series go through all this hassle making sure they have everything right before they start the next book. I’m sure James Patterson has a team who keeps up with the continuity. Well, he can afford them. Here in my den, it’s just me, two cats, and a mess on my desk.

–Malcolm