Up Next on WAYBOUND #1

NEWS- Housekeeping and Updates/An Open Invitation to Conversation

Hi there Waybound readers! I figured I should probably reach out to all of you— it's been a bit, and I wanted to give everybody a bit of a look behind the curtain, and let you know what

Kirkkerman

and my goals are for this anthology and where things stand. I'd like to encourage all you subscribers (or readers, too— I'm not picky) to leave your thoughts on what you've seen so far and on today's discussion both in the comments here and on the Waybound Discord server. (Check out the buttons below.)

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Personal Log, Supplemental

So this has been an exceptionally busy time in my life. I just moved back home from college, and… I'm done. I graduated. It feels a little weird and it's still setting in— and weirdly, graduating made me less productive at writing short stories than taking my final exams did. Funny how that worked out. I've finally settled back into some degree of normalcy, but this could end at any time; though it's probably pretty reasonable to expect a short story sometime in late June or early July. On that note, I should probably get to what I'm aiming at for release schedules:

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Release Authorization

The goal for Waybound, ideally, (and this is likely to be an elusive target) is one short story and one lore drop roughly every month. That's incredibly optimistic, and I’ve already broken it (and will likely continue to); but I’ll try my best to keep it close or at least vaguely related to that. I'm not a slow writer, but I'm not a fast one either, and if anything, I write in bursts of inspiration that are variable in length. Blood in the Snow probably represents something on the longer side of what to expect, and A Connecticut Yankee in SecGen Liu’s Court probably represents the shorter end. Expect a wide range of topics, perspectives, and genres to be explored; I've got horror, sports, courtroom drama, more military/political scifi, first person history, and tons of other stuff cooking. I've even had some ideas I want to develop about channel surfing for something to watch on TV, and using that to explore the media landscape of the 26th century. Nothing is off limits, no topic too mundane or too grandiose.

I also intend to feature the work of trusted friends as Guest Stories, which will release on an independent timeline from my own works. The first of these will be coming Soon™ and is already a work in progress. If you've read Proxima: A Human Exploration of Mars (you should, by the way), you may know the first guest author. They're great.

The next lore post is forthcoming (Dramatis Personae Part 2: The Federated Minervan Republics and the Interbellum Period). This is a continuation of the Dramatis Personae series and will give you a bit more information than the UN counterpart, because Minerva is something that doesn't exist in real life. It should help shed some light on a country that may have thus far felt mysterious or confusing— and should clarify some of the cultural quirks of Santi, Joey, Clara, and Roz. This one has taken a little longer because there's just gonna be a lot more information. I hope you enjoy it.

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Arc Flashes

Waybound, as a fictional universe, exists in arcs. Currently, we’re trying to tell the story of the Akrotiri Crisis and Fools’ War arcs, which really couple together so tightly with the overarching Interbellum that they can't all be taken out of context of each other. While the stories may start out seeming fairly disconnected, I hope the common thread will start to become visible as more stories fall into place and the anthology winds up closer to completing a volume. There's still one more big arc after the Interbellum before the time period where the novel is set, and there are arcs planned after that. Once we reach that point, though, I'll be pivoting to writing the novel; occasionally I'll keep writing short stories, but the majority of the effort will be on the book. However, that's still some ways away.

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In Space, No One Can Hear You Shout(-Out)

I should probably take a second to recognize how much help

Reconstructionist

has been in streamlining both my and

Kirkkerman

’s thoughts on much of Waybound’s lore, the politics especially. My wheelhouse is aerospace engineering, not political science (though it is interesting to me, I lack formal education beyond a bit of international relations), so his expertise has been groundbreakingly helpful in getting Waybound into a state where we can shove it in front of all your eyeballs. Thanks, man. You all should read

Victory Vignettes

by the way. You probably already do (I've seen my subscriber analytics). Telling you again shouldn't hurt. Time travel alternate history and kicking the absolute hell outta the Nazis is one of my ideas of a good time, and if it's one of yours too, do yourself a favor and check out some immaculately written fiction.

I'd also like to shout out

Deepdownderp

, whose

No Kings Rule Here

is a recent addition to Substack. Writing Blood in the Snow’s infantry combat would have been pretty hard without his input. I asked a lot of dumb questions, I'm sure. Sorry buddy. Anyways, if you like magical fantasy, and you like military realism, and you were wondering what a special forces mage would look like, check his work out. It's a pretty sick combination.

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In Closing

We really value your feedback and your thoughts on Waybound. It's been a great first three months so far and I've really enjoyed the ride; and I have no plans to disembark. If you've enjoyed Waybound, feel free to drop a comment below; tell your friends about us; join our Discord; yell at me on Twitter (@njmksr), and if you haven't already, drop a subscription here! It's free. It's fun. It's not known to cause cancer in the State of California¹.

For those of you who have subscribed, I'd like to thank you for coming along on this journey with us.

Kirkkerman

and I appreciate the support. We've been working on this world for about four years, a love letter to our favorite sci-fi— and what good is an unread love letter?

We hope you're having as much fun with this as we are. Let us know what you think, and we'll see you around.

1. Subject to change.