Do I have writer’s block? No. Once I decide to write a novel, it takes me nearly forever to get started. I’m jealous of those writers who turn out 10000000 books a year. I need time to think, to gather facts about the location, to make sure the magic within the main character is based on relevant tradition.

So yes, I am working on Aeon, a novel to be set in Glacier National Park that will serve as the third novel in the “Mountain Journeys Series”–following The Sun Singer and Sarabande. And finally, with the help of the Glacier National Park Library, I have the last piece of information I need to start writing.

After writing four novels–the “Florida Folk Magic Series”–set in the Florida Panhandle in the 1950s, I’m experiencing a bit of culture and location shock returning to northwestern Montana where my first novels were set. I haven’t visited Glacier National Park for a few years, so I find myself having to look up facts I used to know.

If you plan to write novels, here’s a tip: you’ll spend more time studying and researching characters and locations than you will be writing about them.

I sort of know how Aeon will end. That’s unusual for me because I usually start writing after the research is done with no idea how things will end up. As for what happens between the first and the last page, I don’t have a clue. I prefer that. I want the story to evolve as it will rather than from an outline. This novel will be a contemporary fantasy.

The time has come to type and hope for the best.

—Malcolm

The Sun Singer is the first novel in the “Mountain Journeys Series.