With chapter 10 complete and only another 25+ chapters to go until The Forgotten Empire is final, it’s time to start thinking about the next book. “Gods,” you might say,” you haven’t even finished one and you’re worrying about another already? Finish the first, then worry about the next one.”
Grand advice, if this was a standalone novel. It is not. As some people are already aware, the characters of Archer and Hieronymus came alive to fulfill a dream of mine to write a fantasy series. I can already envision a dozen novels concerning just these two characters alone, let alone other heroes of Bulinnarm, like Skar Doorishmurk.
This book is the first of a mini-trilogy within the Archer and Hieronymus series, tentatively called the Empire Trilogy. It concerns the discovery and eventual clearing of an ancient evil from a dwarfish fortress. The idea has been percolating in my imagination for 20+ years, so there is a lot of ground to cover, lots of interesting characters to meet, and a boatload or more of adventure to experience.
So, thinking more about what needs to be in the other two books of this trilogy allows me to plan for their eventual writing, enabling me to place small bits of information in the current narrative, and thus foreshadow future events and discoveries for you, the reader, to discover later. One of those “ah ha” moments.
Right now the overall title arc reads like this:
- An Empire Forgotten (in progress)
- An Empire Embattled (initial plotting)
- An Empire Reclaimed
An that, dear reader, is as much as you’re allowed to know at this time. Suffer!
