Y’all, THE SECOND EDITION OF MY YA FANTASY LAUNCHED YESTERDAY!!!
It’s an action-packed tale of a magical civil war, and I could not be more excited.
This was literally ten years in the making. (The first edition, which has been out of circulation for years, released ten years ago).
If you want to go back to the first draft, well, that started back in 2006.
The story of this book is a story of 17 years and 5 cities. It is the story of me discovering who I am, learning to put God first, and feeling my way to understanding the role my fiction should have in my life.
It started in:
City 1: Arlington, TX
I was staying for the summer with my parents between my junior and senior years of undergrad. I woke up one morning that summer (while at my aunt’s house in another Texas city) with the understanding of who my protagonist was for this story. I started writing.
I wrote a lot that summer before returning to school. Which takes us to:
City 2: Tuscaloosa, AL
I did undergrad (as well as my Master’s) at the University of Alabama.
That’s the real reason my resistance group is called “the Crimson League.” It’s a nod to the Crimson Tide.
I wrote when I could between my senior seminars, working the next couple of summers on campus, grad classes, and teaching undergrads Spanish.
When I graduated with my Master’s, I had plans to get my PhD in Spanish lit and be a professor. I went overseas for the summer to:
City 3: Madrid, Spain
I write as a “panster,” so I didn’t have an outline or a plan. When I flew out to Madrid, I was just preparing to write story’s grand finale. I believe I was in Madrid when I realized how things needed to end.
I hadn’t seen, at all, where the story was leading me. I’d been writing this adventure scene by scene, getting to know these characters, for three years at this point. I was stunned, in the best way possible.
This was a beautiful twist (in its way) that felt authentic, realistic, and utterly unforced. How could it have been forced? I hadn’t seen it until I ran smack into it. It was PERFECT.
I remember I went to a little park with a journal with a pink cover. There I wrote that ending that I never had seen coming, sitting on the grass.
CITY 4: Chicago, IL
I did my doctoral studies at the University of Chicago. While there, I made sure I spent two hours a day, at least, on my fiction.
I revised my draft numerous times, got beta readers, wrote the rest of the Herezoth trilogy. By 2013, when I left Chicago, I had put out the entire trilogy on Amazon.
Grad school depressed me, though. It was odd, because I was genuinely excelling in a professional sense. Still, I was miserable. I didn’t like the environment of academia. I didn’t like the egos. I lost all sense of meaning and purpose there.
I left my doctoral program before taking oral exams or writing a dissertation, though I finished my coursework. Leaving was one of the best decisions I ever made.
I moved back to where family was, my home town of:
City 5: New Orleans, LA
Within 6 months of moving back home, I had what I call my conversion experience.
I have always been a practicing Catholic, but my conversion experience brought my faith, and the love Jesus Christ has for me, down from my head to my heart.
I realized that my treasure was in the wrong place. I realized I was focused on the wrong things. That was why my heart had felt so restless in Chicago and had remained so after I moved back home.
I had never marketed my fiction beyond free promotions, but I stopped marketing it at that point completely. I stopped writing on my old blog. I focused on becoming an intentional disciple of Jesus Christ and learning what it meant to be His.
I ended up entering a religious community in 2019. Before then, I took my books off Amazon. (I hadn’t really sold any in 5 years anyway, at that point.)
Discerning religious life was another of the best decisions I ever made, even if I learned relatively quickly that I wasn’t built in such a way to really thrive there. It wasn’t for me. I left after nine months, grieved, heartbroken, and disoriented, but understanding that God had both led me in and led me out.
I returned once more to the New Orleans Area. During Covid, I opened up my manuscripts again. I started revising again. I got an editor.
I providentially was listening to a podcast when the host mentioned that he and his wife had used Archangel Ink to help put out her book. They sounded like a great company.
After my editor was done with the book, and I had fixed things up, I reached out to Archangel Ink for help with proofreading, formatting, cover design, marketing materials, and publication.
All throughout this process, the precious early morning hours that I used to devote to my fiction, I devoted to prayer instead. I put first things first.
It was as though my time apart from my fiction and my time in the monastery had cleansed my heart of idolizing my writing goals. I was now able to approach my writing in the proper way.
And now, if not the whole trilogy, at least the first installment is back out.
I am more confident in it, and more proud of it, than I ever have been before. I know I did it the right way this time. It wasn’t cheap, but I’m considering that a business investment.
I am praying that God will put it in the hands of the people he means it to touch, and that if He wills, it will do well enough to allow me to get the second installment out (which just may be my favorite of the three).
So please, if you feel so inclined, check out the book’s website here, www.crimsonleaguebooks.com. Archangel Ink made a great site with the blurb and fantastic graphics.
If it’s not for you, or you’re not in a position to buy a book right now, consider sharing the link and spreading the word.
You can read advance reviews and editorial reviews on the book’s Amazon page.
Creative Writing with the Crimson League 
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