I now know the direction that this book will take and am making progress; ideally, I’ll have a draft complete around Thanksgiving. Among other things:I had a change of heart with my Master’s program, choosing a history program at Arizona State University, and the government shutdown set me back months at work. These two things ate into my time for writing far more than I anticipated–but both are now beginning to normalize, and I don’t take any classes during the summer.

Moving forward, my goal is to have Book 3 out around Christmas 2019, and Book 4 completed about the same time I finish my M.A. in 2021. After that degree is done, I should return to my one book per year pace, hopefully indefinitely. If I still have fans out there that have stuck with me, I really do appreciate it. It’s been a long three and a half years since I launched Limits of Power. I miss the series greatly, and I’m not letting it go.

-Hugh

This has been a challenging year for me, both in ways good and bad. I got a little sidetracked, but I have been writing again and Book 3 is coming along. I don’t have a title for it yet, but I expect it to launch in Spring 2017. Since it’s been longer than I expected in between books, I decided to post a teaser, like I did with Limits of Power. I hope you enjoy it!

Some of you in the DC area, and elsewhere, have asked about the Capclave 2016 convention, which runs October 7 – 9 at the Hilton Washington DC North/Gaithersburg, 620 Perry Parkway, Gaithersburg, Maryland 20877. Right now, it looks like there will be 300 – 400 attendees, and I’ve been told that the focus is on reading and writing (so don’t expect people in costume). For admission at the door:

• Full Weekend $65 ($30 for Student and Active Military)
• Friday Only $25
• Saturday Only $45 ($20 for Student and Active Military)
• Sunday Only $20

The schedule can be found here: http://www.capclave.org/capclave/capclave16/programming.php. I’m flattered to inform you that I will be participating on three panels: 

• Friday at 5PM in the Rockville/Potomac room: War in Space – Space battles, rarely realistic in movies or TV, can be presented in detail in a book. Panelists will describe how they see war in space.
• Friday at 8PM in the Bethesda room: Who’s the Bad Guy in a World Without Absolutes? Heroes, villains, and moral relativism. Does speculative literature have any concept of Good or Evil anymore?
• Saturday at 2PM in the Frederick room: Military SF: More Than People With Guns – The panelists will delve into the many non-military elements that help flesh out military science fiction, discussing the complex nature of this genre.

There is also a mass autograph session in Salon A on Saturday at 7:30PM. The good news is that I’ll be participating. The bad news is that I forgot to order more physical copies of my books, and it’s too late for me to get them printed and shipped by then. I’ll only have a very, very small number of books with me, for which I sincerely apologize. For those who still want an autographed copy, I will do my best to ensure that one finds its way to you.

Anyway, there are a lot of great topics that will be discussed (take a peek at the programming) and I hope to see you there!

-Hugh

I’m about halfway done with a 30k- to 40k-word novella set in Evan Currie’s Odyssey One series, which I think will launch sometime in July. If you’re not familiar with this series, then you can start with the first book, Into the Black. I’ve enjoyed this series very much, so getting to write in it has been a blast. It’s a little outside of my comfort zone, but I think that’s what’s making it fun to write. Hopefully you enjoy the final product and it does the series justice!

Okay, so it’s sleeting in the DC area and going to be below freezing tonight, but winter is officially over and I realized I haven’t posted in a while and I have some good news. The short version: I’m writing again.

For those of you who want the more detailed version: I have two ongoing projects. The first is a novella, which will be between 30,000 and 40,000 words. It will be based in another author’s universe and launched via Kindle Worlds. I’m about 1/6th of the way done, with an expected launch in July of this year. I don’t want to give any more details yet, since I’m still in discussions with that author about the details and direction of the story. Regardless, I’m really excited about it!

The second project is Book 3, in which I’ve broken 10,000 words. Paradigm Lost and Limits of Power were both in the low- to mid-80,000 range, but I could see Book 3 approaching the 100,000 mark. Though, it’s hard to say this early into the story, based on the way I go about writing. In terms of a launch date, it should be ready around Thanksgiving, which is when I released LoP last year. Granted, PL got a much better reception and I released that in March 2015, but I have no idea how much that has to do with simply getting lucky with Amazon’s suggestion algorithms. Anyway, I want to launch it when it’s ready, and it should be ready by then. My day job has gotten very busy (I may be taking on a new mission), so I pulled out of my summer course to make sure that I have time to write.

I’m also looking for feedback on PL and LoP, since Book 3 is going to be extra-important to me and I want to get it just right. I read all of the reviews on Amazon, but I’m also available via e-mail (hughtaylorscifi@outlook.com).

-Hugh

I had re-started working on Book 3 in between the fall and spring semesters. Unfortunately, my car was struck by a reckless driver in DC who lost control of her SUV (sidebar: I highly recommend dash cams – I bought two for $80 each and they really paid off when the other driver made false statements) and my day-job got far more hectic than usual, but that was all pushed to the wayside when I got a call one Tuesday afternoon that my best friend was no more. Three days later, I got calls that two very close family members (one furry, one human), one of whom was in ICU, needed very serious surgeries.

Needless to say, especially combined with the blizzard that the East Coast received, I fell behind at both work and school. I’m catching up in both of those and will be back to writing soon, but I decided to take a slight detour. It’s not quite 100% yet, so I don’t want to post specifics, but it looks like I will be writing a 30k- to 40k-word story in a different universe, which might release around July. I still fully expect to release Book 3 in 2016, but this means it will definitely be in the fall. The good news is that I’m about 10,000 words into Book 3 and I have a pretty good idea of what is going to happen.

Part of the reason for the detour is that it’s something I really want to write, and the idea of trying something different has me chomping at the bit. But I’d be lying if I said part of it was that I needed to step away from the INIA series for just a short time. My friend Nick bounced the original idea around with me for quite some time before I ever started putting keystrokes to hard-drive. It was also conversations with him about his forays into music and theater that made me decide to actually start writing. He provided quite a bit of feedback on Paradigm Lost, too. I am fortunate to have been able to tell him this in person, but the INIA series is “part him.”

That being said, I’m definitely not abandoning the series. I love it, most of you have given very positive feedback, and he loved it. I’m very excited about Book 3; the ideas were coming out like crazy when I was writing Limits of Power, so I can’t wait to put the story together.

Thanks again for reading.

Limits of Power and Paradigm Lost will both be on sale for one week starting on Saturday, January 9th, for $1.99! Look for a reminder or updates on my Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/HughTaylorSciFi/ and Twitter: https://twitter.com/hughtaylorscifi/

Thanks again for reading!

Limits of Power, the second book in the Interstellar Navy Investigations Agency series and the sequel to Paradigm Lost, is now for sale on Amazon! The paperback version officially launched on November 11, 2015, and the e-book version is available for pre-sale until November 19, when it goes live. If you purchase the hard-copy, then the e-book can be ordered for an additional $0.99 via Amazon’s Matchbook program. Otherwise, the e-book is $4.99 or free to read with Kindle Unlimited. If you haven’t read Paradigm Lost yet, the deals are the same on Amazon!

Book 3, currently untitled, is under development. I don’t have a firm timeline for this one, though it will definitely launch in 2016. I also have vague frameworks for Books 4 & 5, so I should be able to provide a rough ETA on Book 4 once Book 3 gets into editing.

I hope you enjoy the books!