You may already know that I went through a period of burnout from around 2019 to 2023. You may also know the backstory of my Storms in Amethir series. Today I want to revisit that a little as prelude to explaining how and why things are changing with the Storms in Amethir series.
My blog post Writing an E-Book in 8 Hours has a lengthy explanation of how I wrote Stormsinger in, you guessed it, eight hours. It was a good story for having been written so quickly, but it was also short. Less than 10,000 words.
A lot of people don’t want to start a series when the first book is really just a very long short story.
THANK YOU for being one of the people who WERE willing to take a chance on me!
That said, because I want my stories to reach more readers, I decided this summer to take action on an idea I’ve been kicking around since 2015, just 2 years after I released Stormsinger.
Rewriting the first two books
Thanks to some fabulous guidance from Sarra Cannon in her Publish & Thrive online course, I decided to combine Stormsinger and Stormshadow and write another 12,000 words, as well as adding in several scenes that have only ever been included in the first omnibus.
You’ll get to see more of Vistaren’s point of view during the action of Stormshadow, which wasn’t something included in the first edition. Lozarr and Arama’s romance gets a little more page time, for those of you who thought they deserved more attention.
I think it flows a lot better, and response from my beta-readers and critique partners has been very encouraging.
Introducing A Song of Storm and Shadow!
Princess Azmei of Tamnen doesn’t like the decision she’s facing: marry Vistaren of Amethir or let her kingdom’s war go on with no end in sight. How much of herself must she sacrifice to keep her people safe?
Crown Prince Vistaren Doth’Mara isn’t exactly thrilled about their upcoming marriage either, particularly since he likes boys instead of girls. Torn between duty and desire, he doesn’t know what to do.
Privateer Arama Dzornaea’s mission is simple: she must transport the prince to meet his contracted bride. As captain of the Dawn Star, she thinks she can handle anything—even her unwelcome attraction to the prince’s personal bodyguard, General Lozarr Algot.
Princess, pirate, and prince are sailing to meet on neutral territory, but all is not as it seems. Azmei’s new friend, Orya, is more dangerous than she looks. Prince Vistaren has secrets of his own. Arama’s unruly stormwitch might bring the whole ship down. And there are those who will stop at nothing to prevent the alliance between Tamnen and Amethir.
There’s a storm on the horizon, and its shadow is growing to cover the whole world.
What does this mean for the series?
Stormsinger, Stormshadow, and the Storms in Amethir Omnibus 1 have been unpublished on all platforms. If you have ebook copies, they shouldn’t disappear, but as far as Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, and all the others know, those books no longer exist.
When I publish the final book in the series, I will be creating a single box set that will include the updated book series.
What does this mean for me as a reader?
If you’ve already purchased and read Stormsinger and Stormshadow, I definitely don’t expect you to go out and pay for yet another book that tells a story you’re mostly familiar with.
If you email me a receipt for your purchase of Stormshadow, I’ll send you a free epub of A Song of Storm and Shadow!
How can I help as a reader?
The biggest obstacle I’m going to face in the next few weeks is that I’m unpublishing two books that had a lot of pretty good reviews. Reviews are SUPER important in convincing people to part with some of their hard-earned money and take a chance on a new author.
If you have read Stormsinger and Stormshadow already, please request your free copy and then leave a review of A Song of Storm and Shadow!
More than anything, that will help me out, and if you’re willing to leave an honest review, I will be incredibly grateful.
