Well, I’m now working on the next book in the Twilight Empress series, because the universe told me to. Well, YouTube. YouTube told me to write the next Twilight Empress book.
You see, I like music while I work. Some people find it distracting to read or write with music playing (especially music with lyrics), but I tend to work better when there’s noise. I have playlists for each book series which are supposed to be inspirational, but sometimes I want something purely random. Then I either just shuffle everything I have available, or I power up YouTube and listen to whatever comes up in my ‘mixtape’ list that day. I end up listening to some really weird stuff that way, but it works.
Recently, YouTube started throwing up a lot of AMVs based around Avatar: The Last Airbender and The Legend of Korra clips. It’s no secret that one of the inspirations for the Twilight Empress books is ATLA and TLOK, so I took this as a sign from on high that it was time for The Last Emperor to be written. (Another influence is the Matt Damon film The Great Wall, by the way, which I must get around to rewatching at some point soon.)
In season two of ATLA, we get introduced to Azula and her two friends Ty Lee and Mai. Azula recruits Ty Lee for her hunt for the Avatar from a circus where Ty Lee is the happiest she’s ever been. Azula basically threatens (non-verbally) to make Ty Lee’s life a misery unless she comes along. Ty Lee is later asked why she’s there since the universe told her to join the circus and she says that Azula spoke lounder. Whatever else I may have had planned right now, YouTube spoke louder.
Meanwhile, Blood Magic will be out next week. I have a few edits to do and a cover to come up with, but it’ll be out just after Easter.
Witches and Ray-Guns 
Really love TLOK. First watched it when my PC blew its PSU and I was down to watching stuff on Prime on a notebook while waiting for a replacement. It got me through the long lonely evening hours.
Well Korra and re-reading the Thaumatolgy series for the Nth time where N is a rather embarrassing integer.
I’d seen a few episodes of ATLA a while back An ex of mine was a fan) and then I saw something about Korra and thought I’d give that a go since it was on Prime. So, I watched the first season of Korra knowing next to nothing about ATLA. Then I had to go back and watch ATLA to figure out half of what was going on.
I like both series. Korra is obviously more adult, but ATLA has some really awesome characters in it. Azula is a masterpiece in villain design and Grey DeLisle almost manages to upstage Mark Hamill doing one of his OTT villain voices. And there’s Toph. Toph is awesome in both series.
Cool news about Blood Magic, but I’m at a loss to place the Twilight Empress series? (Old man syndrome, might enjoy reading all your titles, but knowing months later what I read… *sigh*) Could you point me to a title or two of the series (I’m assuming here {dangerous I know} that it is a continuation of an existing series? ^.*
Currently, there’s only one other book, ‘The Iron Princess.’
Ahh, I bought on May 16, 2018, so probably I had read it within a week of that. Will look at re-reading it just before the next in the series. ^.^
Avatar and Korra seem to influence quite alot of books. The number of authors I like who mention how good they are and have sparked ideas, plus the number of people whos opinion I trust say the same both would indicate I should probably like them, and yet whenever Ive tried watching I just cant get into it at all. Anime is just one of those really random hit or miss areas for me.
In a bit of a tangent subject, I noticed a couple days ago on Netflix that a live action adaptation of Wolf Brigade was made in South Korea and set in a future Korea about to be reunified instead of post war Japan. I tend to like Korean action films, and Asian action films in general, but anime adaptions are usually fairly weak since they cant really get the feeling of the animations style. Wolf Brigade is one whos tone just might lend itself to being done well, and I plan on watching it as soon. I have hope but expectations are being kept low.
Well, whether ATLA and TLOK are anime is one of those things that gets argued about. I’m not going to touch that argument, but anime and anime-like animation is hit and miss for me too. Most anime, tbh, I don’t like. Akira bored me to tears. I don’t dislike Ghost in the Shell (the anime movie), but I prefer both the manga and Standalone Complex series. I end up watching a lot of first episodes of anime on Netflix, and then discovering I can’t be bothered to watch more. Occasionally, I end up watching more of a series on Netflix, only to discover I should’ve given up while I was ahead. Once in a blue moon, I actually find one I really enjoy.
Thanks Dave Mac for asking the hard question, I can now look forward to reading the second book , now I will re-read the iron princess to get ready for next in series.
Loved The Iron Princess. Really looking forward to more 👍🏻
That makes two of us.
Aside from knowing where the story is supposed to end up, I don’t usually know how I’m going to get there until I’ve written it. 🙂
That’s the beauty of it. Not only for you, but us as well. I’ve read books in a series where the outcome was blatantly obvious. It the path the author chose to get there was utterly different from what I thought it might be.
I think I know what your end game is for the initial TE trilogy, at least partially. No clue as to how you’ll get there and I’m sure I’d be mostly wrong If I thought I did. Won’t enjoy the books any less either.
I get all of my ideas from the books I read and some from the movies I watch. But what sticks with me is the books I read, including the books that you write, while some ideas I can write about, others I can never write because they are your books already.
Oh excellent! I’ve just finished re-reading The Iron Princess and followed the link at the end of the book to here, to find that book 2 is on its way. Looking forward to reading it.