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Lightbringer 3 Writing Update, Title, etc.

I know I promised you a writing update in September, and I hate to break my word, but here’s a quick update early. I have finished writing the first draft of Lightbringer 3 and we now have a title!

Lightbringer 3 will be called The Broken Eye.

The coming months will be full of editing for me. First, large-scale revisions on my own, then it goes to my editor and we begin the many rounds of work there. As I said before, barring any changes and subject to the almighty publishing schedule, publication will most likely be summer 2014.

Last, as some of you have noticed, I’ve not been posting my monthly writing advice column as I’ve been  spending all my time trying to finish Lightbringer 3. This will probably continue for a month or two, but after I’ve been doing edits for a few months, I’m sure I’ll have lots to say, so it will return sometime this summer. (Thanks for your patience on this. I’m just trying to prioritize what’s most important to most of you.)

When I’ve finished all the substantive edits and/or we have a firm release date for The Broken Eye, I will post another  update on that.

 

 

Brent’s New Children’s Book!

UPDATE: As most of you have already guessed, this post was an April Fools’ Day announcement. We’ve just posted the alternate masthead (above) and here’s another book cover (below left) that we thought about using. Big thanks to Lauren Panepinto for her genius cover designs for the prank!

book-wayofkitten

book-ninjakitten

I’m delighted to finally be able to announce why my forthcoming Lightbringer novels have been delayed, perhaps indefinitely. I’ve been working on a delightful new series for children, called Ninja Kitty. I’ve already signed on with Rover, a new imprint of Orbit, for six books. While I understand that some fans will be disappointed to hear that it will be 6-7 years until the next Lightbringer book comes out, I’ve always felt that it’s important for an artist to be brave enough to go in new directions, even if he is, unfortunately, in the middle of another series. I believe that the Ninja Kitty series will also be a great way to introduce young children to my work, so that by the time they’re 10 or 11, they’ll be ready to be introduced to the themes of cannibalism, prostitution, and murder that are so central to the Night Angel books. In addition, kitties give me a great way to tie my work to existing memes. Think of any kitten pic you’ve ever seen on the internet. Now think, NINJA KITTY printed over that. Great, huh? That’s actually how my agent pitched it. Being an artist is great, but at the end of the day I’m here to make money. Lots of it. And I’m not supposed to say this, but there have been some really exciting preliminary talks with a certain director who brought the much-beloved movie about bending air *cough cough* to the big screen.

I’ve answered some questions about the book below:

Why did you decide to write a children’s book?

Well, six books, and that’s just to start. 1) Children’s books are easy. 2) Have you seen the crap parents will buy for their kids? Why not get in on that? 3) Market synergies. I’m not going to leave a dollar on the table.

What’s it been like to write in an entirely new genre?

Easy, and my assistant fixes all the minor details, like when I forget the kitties names and or the plot. I find I can write one of these in a couple days, max.

When will the book be published? 

As soon as we can get all the media tie-ins organized.

Oh, and I suppose that I should post the official press release from Orbit:

“Orbit is pleased to announce their new children’s imprint, Rover. The launch title, by New York Times Bestselling Author Brent Weeks, will be One Kitten, Two Kitten… Ninja Kitten! and leverage synergies with Orbit’s many corporate partners to create a multilateral bifurcated print/digital/collectible platform. Senior Editor Devi Pillai says, ‘Rover seemed like a natural next step fr us. As a part of a corporate mega-conglomerate, Orbit feels a duty to monetize as much of its customers’ lives as possible. We realized we’d been shamefully neglecting early childhood thus far. Plus, kitties.'”

Sombra Perfecta: Now Available!

I’m excited to announce that the Spanish-language Perfect Shadow is being published as an e-book on November 22nd!

To read an excerpt and find details on how to download it, go to my Spanish-language website HERE. And to enter to win 1 of 10 free downloads of Perfect Shadow, “like” the Perfect Shadow Facebook page HERE.

Here’s a look at the cover:

 

Launch Day!

Although The Night Angel Trilogy Omnibus has been on shelves for a week or two, today is our official launch date. For all sorts of details and even one of the extras for free, look at the posts below. Also, there’s a new poll up to the right!

Character List for the Night Angel Trilogy

The Night Angel Trilogy Omnibus will be officially released on Tuesday (though some of you may find it at your bookseller early). In order to give you more reasons to think about clearing some space on your shelf for this, than simply fantastic new cover art and a reworked map, I wanted to give you extra.  Specifically, Extras: things that I either didn’t have time to include when I was editing three books at once in the run-up to the rapid publication of the trilogy a few years ago, or things that I had cut, but with the benefit of hindsight have reconsidered.

There’s a rumor that when production heard that I wanted to add 62 pages of extras to a book that was already more than 1,200 pages long that the echoes of the wailing resounded through the 14 floors of the Hachette building for two weeks. Reports that an intern burned through two pairs of Manolo Blahniks in her marathons back and forth to Starbucks are, however, completely unsubstantiated. For one thing, I hear the interns at Hachette wear Christian Louboutin.

However, I prevailed. Not only did I get permission to add that new content, I also got permission to share two parts of it with you for free! You know, just in case you’re a poor, poor student or something, but a big, big fan, I want to do all I can to help you out. You will buy lots of my books when you make your millions, right? Right? Bueller? Anyway, today, I’m happy to share the NAT Character List HERE. It will also live under the “Extras” tab, and you can also find the link on the “Night Angel- The Complete Trilogy” page.

Because things like Character Lists and Glossaries tend to be really boring — most of the reason that I didn’t include them in The Night Angel Trilogy originally was because I never read them myself — I thought I would do something to spice this up. There’s a little meta-fiction happening here that is best understood if you read both the Glossary and the Character List together, but… well, I’ve got to leave some tricks up my sleeve.

Hope you enjoy it!