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Happy 4th of July, everybody!  If you’re looking for a fun summer read that includes a lot of fireworks, look no further.  Romae Futurum: Invaders is a fast-paced, action sci-fi thrill ride — a big summer movie in book form.  Perfect for the beach or a long flight.  I hope have as much fun reading it as I did writing it!

I could not have done it at all without the help of the stalwart Silvern Press production team:  My editor, Clancy Vettel Mendoza; beta readers, Daniel Robichaud, Mike Billips, and Todd Rainsford; and my consulting art director, Tom Edwards.  Thank you, one and all.  I am grateful beyond words.

Enjoy,

David L. Duggins

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In a distant future, the Roman Empire is at war.

It is the reign of Gaius Augustus, son of Julius, the greatest Emperor in Rome’s twelve thousand year history.  Gaius, a more compassionate, temperate ruler than his father, would see Rome become a Republic again.

Many others in the Empire seek their own paths to the throne, aligning forces against Gaius.  Some bring armies to batter down the doors and flood the streets with blood and death.  Others scheme in shadows, waiting in the half-darkness between worlds for a chance to strike.

An Emperor has enemies on all sides.  Gaius has more enemies than he knows, but he must first face the threat of an enemy army on his doorstep.

An army led by the mother of his child.  The woman he once loved.

There are two things Dave Duggins wants readers to know about his new book, Romae Futurum: Invaders.  First, it’s not a horror novel.

Duggins, better known for his short horror fiction appearances in magazines like Cemetery Dance and his two novels through Silvern Press, has something a little different in store this time around.  A lot different, really.

“I’ve always loved pulp fiction in general,” Duggins says.  “Regardless of genre.  For every Lovecraft story, there was a Harry Harrison, or one of Howard’s Conan stories.  I’ve always loved escapist action and adventure.”

As the editor of Spacesuits and Sixguns magazine, Duggins chose a blend of SF, horror, and noir stories for each issue.  Eventually, he realized he’d never written anything like that himself.

“I also love comics and big summer movies,” Duggins says.  “So I wanted to bring those elements in as well.  The Marvel movies are great—epic stories, big themes, but with lots of great character moments.”

Duggins worked on background for Romae Futurum: Invaders for over two years before beginning to write.  “It was the first book I’d written that required that kind of commitment to research,” he says.  “It was bigger than anything else I’d done, and pretty intimidating.  It took some time for me to feel comfortable enough with the universe to start writing.”

While Duggins’ concept of a Roman Empire 10,000 years in the future is not, strictly speaking, an alternative history, or even rooted in actual history, critical story and setting elements from various historical periods grounded the book’s reality.

Which brings us to the second thing Duggins wants you to know:  While you may see some familiar names from history, and a smattering of details and events based in history, the book quickly establishes its own reality, and leaves real history behind.

“There’s probably just enough real history in there to annoy history buffs,” Duggins says. While armchair historians may take issue with coexisting influences from Rome, circa 63 B.C., China’s Eastern Zhou period, and contemporary Sudanese conflicts, Duggins hopes that most readers will just have fun with the story.

“It’s big, loud, and melodramatic,” he says.  “There’s some darkness—I can never leave it completely behind after so many years publishing horror.  But there’s hope, too.  A sense of unity, and a greater good.”

The emphasis is on fun, rapid-fire storytelling, with plenty of action.  “Stuff blows up,” he says.  “A lot of stuff blows up in this book.  Which made it a lot of fun to write.”

Romae Futurum: Invaders will be available July 4 in eBook format through the Kindle Store, with a paperback release in August.

If you came here from my Facebook page, you might know that I’m publishing a new novel, Watershed, in the next couple of weeks. I’ve been asked a lot of questions about writing over the years–mostly about the process. What’s it like? How do you maintain continuity over the weeks and months required to complete a draft? How do you maintain sanity?

The answer to the latter question is simple: You don’t.

When I first started writing Watershed, it was not itself. Which is to say, it was something completely different – a young adult fantasy novel, to be precise. I was very excited when I started working on it. I did research. I had a concept I thought was an original twist on a familiar trope. The first hundred pages wrote themselves. I was golden.

When I got to page 150, it just fell out from under me.

Whatever I had planned to do with the story, it was gone. Plot threads slithered through my fingers. Place names escaped me; situations stalked out like jilted lovers; character arcs unbowed. I came completely unplugged. I was despondent.

It took weeks of journaling and soul searching to discover the problem. It’s an old problem, an old story, old as the Bible. Older. I was in love with that book, you see. But in the middle of my work with it, I fell in love with something else. A new idea. A different idea. A bolder, broader, darker and more textured idea.

Watershed.

It took me a long time to accept that, just as it often takes a long time to admit that a relationship is no longer working. There’s a lot of fear, frustration, that feeling of wasted time. I wrote 150 pages! 150 pages I can’t use? Months of work, down the drain. Time and effort wasted.

I temporarily forgot my own advice, as we are all inclined to do. I did not remember that all writing is good writing. All writing is practice, even if it never sees the light of day.

Eventually, I remembered that lesson, and set to work on Watershed. I also learned a new lesson: accept what’s happening with your work, trust your intuition, and roll with it.

Sounds simple, doesn’t it? But it’s so hard to follow when you’ve invested time, dedication and emotion. You hang onto it – or, rather, your ego hangs onto it. Your ego is invested in the outcome.

But we don’t write our best work from ego. And we don’t truly control anything. We only think we do. We will struggle against ego if we don’t embrace the idea that we write from beyond it. And there’s little point in being attached to the outcome of fiction writing. Is anything less predictable?

So I say this: if your story changes, let it. If your main character bows out and a secondary character takes over, allow it. See what happens. Let the story be what it wants.

Often, it’ll be something good. It will surprise you.

If it surprises you, it’ll surprise your reader, too.