Bloods Burden was the book manuscript that had always intended to write.
Short stories that finally formed into a
cohesive whole. Admittedly, I’ve already submitted these to BL as separate short
stories in the blind hope that quantity over quality would grant me a greater chance
of consideration.
A bolter on burst-fire instead of a lascannon so
to speak.
The three shorts were independent from one
another, always with a link in mind. Rather than worrying about an overreaching
story that needed to be padded with descriptive verse or uncharacteristic emotion
it was instead liberally quick and racy to just get them OUT. I could describe the individual trajectory
of each bullet or blade descent but the sheer block of text that such writing creates
is laborious and looks far too heavy for a readers eyes. At best, combat is
long when it itself is looooong. A Space Marine doesn’t fight or train or live slow
so for the moment I kept things short and hopefully sweet.
One of those three submitted short stories
simply didn’t fit, it didn’t even fit into the canon of Forty-Fighty-k itself
so it was culled, yoinked gracefully from its sandwiched position to sit back
in my ‘Harvest for ideas’ section of my Google drive. The other two meshed
nicely, with the final manuscript clocking in at around 15k words in total and I
was pleased with their bedding, the proposed arc of the book also looking far
more epic than I’d initially thought.
Synopses though, less said the better. The
summary to ‘Bloods Burden’ is after the break.
A teenage
underhiver is born anew as a demi-god of myth when he is recruited by the
Angels Vermillion Chapter of the Imperial Astartes. He must earn his place
inside the Chapters shadowed Scout core whilst learning to control the dark
burden that they as Sanguinius’ distant sons collectively bear. As
blood-drenched fingerprints begin to stain the worlds under his Chapters
protection he and his squad must fight to defend their homeworld from predation
at the tendrilous touch of Chaos. The Angels new and Angels true must trust in
their newest recruit as he fights to save their Fortress monastery and home
planet from utter destruction.
(Big thanks to my friend Ben who pointed out
that removing the worlds and names in question make it more dramatic, I tried both
with and without and have to agree)
I’d love for this to get published, hell
noticed even! I’m also jonesing to get on and submit the damn thing but for
some reason I’m writing thi- Ok done, sent. I’m not sure why I procrastinated
over sending that in, possibly because that closes my own personal submission
window for 2012? A shame but I’ll still keep trucking onwards.
I’m glad as I do worry whenever BL publish something
that even slightly matches a submissions subject matter. This I think stems
back to school days when plagiarism was a terrible offence
‘Oh no! That means they might think I’m copying
them!’
I worry about this to a degree where plagiarism
concerns become ever-greater than is possible.
‘Oh no, Emperors Gift has a moment similar to
my own regarding the process of the Hypnomat! Oh no the Blood Angels Black rage
has been written about before! Oh no there are Space Marines in this book! Oh
no…’
Rather extreme as you can imagine.
I’ve also been working nicely on the fantasy
section of my repertoire, Robbers Ruin
is the most exciting of my Warhammer prospects that meshed with my imagination.
That particular manuscript being lavished with some attention recently.
From there I might dabble in completely non-BL
fluff. I tinkered recently with some open sci-fi, plucked from my surface thought
to see what would organically happen. Despite being extremely short (i.e. 2
pages!) it looks pretty fun and the possibilities are interesting. Golem’s God it was called, and I do love
said title.
For now, a toilet break is needed
whilst I hold my breath, waiting for BL. Hah, that'll do as a title.
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