What I'm Writing
The Legacy (working title and originally part of The Speaker)
Status: First Draft 50% Complete
Awards: Finalist in 2022 ACFW First Impressions contest in the Speculative Fiction category.
Finalist & Longlist in 2022 Page Turner Writing Mentorship Award.
Some invitations should never be accepted.
The threefold Towers are a beacon of strength and might, protecting the colonists from hostile forces. The most promising of citizens compete to become one of their elite. Twins, inseparable since birth, share that dream until a single mishap tears them apart. Renden is deemed an ideal Tower candidate, but Sol is rejected and sent to the Institute.
Shrouded in mystery, the Institute’s Speakers handle the diplomatic interactions between humans and their alien neighbors. One isn’t trained to become a Speaker, they are born into it, but what makes the Speakers unique also divides them from the rest of humanity—a fate Sol resists until he learns his blocked memory might hold the key to saving humankind from an approaching alien threat.
The more Sol learns about his family heritage, the more he begins to doubt the Institute's altruistic veneer. For the Speakers have their own agenda and it doesn’t include Sol discovering his legacy.
To claim his legacy, he must lose his future.
The Speaker (working title) — sequel to The Legacy
Status: First Draft 75% Complete
Some memories should never be remembered.
Powerful forces lead Sol and Renden toward their separate destinies as an ancient darkness threatens their galaxy. The key to stopping this threat is locked within Sol’s mind. The only problem is the Speakers can’t retrieve those memories without allowing Sol to claim his family’s legacy, something they fear more than the approaching menace.
Exploiting the link between the brothers, humanity’s hope rests on the ties binding the twins as Sol, the youngest of the Speakers and barely trained in his growing abilities, is sent to another realm to determine the fate of an alien species—a strange people who may be able to aid the humans against the approaching evil. There Sol will have the freedom to tap into his legacy and grow into his evolving abilities.
Plunged into intergalactic intrigue, the brothers will learn if blood truly is thicker than water, for everything has a price, and remembering his past could cost Sol his humanity.
To save his future, he must remember his past.
The Echo (working title formerly Lost Wanderer)
Status: Complete
Awards: Won 2018 ACFW First Impressions contest and semi-finalist in 2020 ACFW Genesis contest in the Speculative Fiction category.
Finalist & Longlist in 2021 Page Turner Writing Award.
When life is treated as a game, what will you do to survive?
At the Center for the Gifted, the right to live depends on having a useful ability to the society. Echo is the Center’s highest ranked Judge and is disillusioned with his role of separating the worthy from the castoffs. Sent to rule on a mental patient’s value, Echo’s life becomes complicated when he meets Riel, a secretive boy with the raw potential to become a strong Weapon.
Forced to choose between judging Riel as a castoff or risking his own position on a precarious hope, Echo goes against his orders and saves Riel, for Echo needs a powerful Weapon to partner with him if he ever wants to free himself from the Center’s control.
Getting Riel into the Center is the easy part. Him surviving their games and avoiding the label castoff—that is more challenging.
The Fall (working title formerly Lost Reaper) sequel to The Echo
Status: First Draft 50% Complete
When surviving isn’t enough, what will you do to thrive?
Echo, a disillusioned Judge, is determined to reclaim the life the Center erased and regain the freedom denied to him. Riel, a castoff Weapon, is determined to forget his past and avoid being recaptured by his brethren, the Numbered. The Game bound them together, but it’ll take trust and the truth to keep their partnership from fracturing—especially when the Numbered learn Riel is no longer safely contained in his prison cell. Echo is about to learn that the Numbered imprisoned Riel for a reason, and they’ll do anything to prevent Riel from discovering who he is and what he can do.
In Mirris, time has little meaning, nightmares are real, and mirrors do more than reflect.
The Err (working title formerly Lost Dreamer) — sequel to The Fall
Riel battles his inner demons and his Nightmare nature while the Seasons beckons to him to restore the imbalance created during the war. Legend has it only a Reaper can restore the lands of Autumn and unite the Seasons. While the Servant trade offers a way for Riel to contain his Nightmare nature, Twilight, the Keeper of Dreams, has plans of her own—plans that include Riel becoming a Nightmare.
Status: Outline Complete