It has been about three-and-a-half years since my book Bargaining Power was published, and not only is the sequel not out, it is not written; and I have in the meantime published The Land of the Purple Ring and a season and a half of The Midnight Files. So what gives?
You see, due to a number of factors, I strongly associate Bargaining Power with severe disappointment, despair, and betrayal from three separate sources. Worse, two of those betrayals were predicted almost verbatim (seriously almost verbatim, without exaggeration: the people used almost identical phrases and fundamental outlooks, though the setups were different. They were similar to the extent that I suspect my subconscious was preparing me for the inevitable) in Power Trips, one in Bargaining Power and one in the sequel.
The betrayal I inadvertently predicted in book 1 was bad; the one I predicted in book 2 was much, much worse, and I refuse to tell the story of it. The person in question doesn’t deserve the attention. Besides, I’m the sort of writer who writes out of love for a story, not one who throws all her dirty laundry at it, and I never write real people.** Most importantly, I refuse to let the filth of ugly behavior influence the books I write to bring joy to others! That was the heart of The Land of the Purple Ring and one of my greatest victories. Not one of the painful, ugly, traumatizing things that happened to me in the months leading up to and overlapping the writing of it touched that book. It remains unsullied. Triumph!
Anyway, this philosophy of not writing real people and not bathing in filth leaves a problem, which is that the story of that second betrayal was fundamental to the structure of book 2. That means that when I write book 2, I will have to start from scratch (other than the first two chapters, which will remain intact. You can find them here).
Now, don’t get me wrong: it wasn’t
like book 2 was finished; at most, it was a third done. I had severe writer’s block and structural issues, which the intervening years have helped clear up. I will definitely finish writing Power
Trips eventually, probably as a duology. But I cannot face it yet. Even writing this brief post was painful. And I know it is a mess, but I also figure
that anyone reading it deserves an explanation for what is sure to be a long
delay between books.
**Note: I never, ever base any characters
off real people. It is only afterwards
that I sometimes notice the similarities of certain characters to certain people in my
life. But isn’t how that always is? We none of us write in a void.
Second Note: ugly, traumatizing things are rare in my life, and betrayal rarer still. I have many wonderful people in my life and am generally very happy. It was just that for about two years there, things kept going horribly wrong. But I got The Land of the Purple Ring out of it, so it was worth it in the end!
