Draxton’s Destiny is approaching its release date, so I thought I’d share a few thoughts on the book, a peek at the early reviews, and a deleted scene that I loved but didn’t fit.
Before I dive into my thoughts on writing Draxton, here\’s a look at some of the early reviews:
“An Amazing intergalactic mystery [from]…a weaver of intricate plot and political intrigues.
“MM Book, Goodreads & BookBub reviewer
“…a complex universe of worlds and political machinations.”
Patrick, a Goodreads reviewer
To say I’m thrilled is an understatement! When I settled in to take the serialized flash pieces and put them together in a cohesive novel format, I (naively) thought it’d flow as easily as Petri had. It didn’t. It fought. It fought so hard. After trying to piece things together and realizing it wasn’t working, I moved everything aside and started fresh. This wouldn’t be a revision so much as a full rewrite. Then the Wolves of Sorrow happened, and Draxton was pushed aside again. But I had a plan!
I’d work on the first two Sorrow books since they were shorter, then I would finish Draxton before moving on to something else. It…was a struggle. By the time I finished it, I just knew it was utter and complete trash. I hated it, didn’t care if it made sense or was good. I was just relieved it was done and hoped I could fix it in editing. I put it aside for NaNoWriMo and Izabel, third in the Sorrow series. After NaNo, I dove into editing Draxton and discovered… maybe it wasn’t so bad after all? The parts I hated, I barely touched in editing, but there were things which needed to be pulled. The snippet below is one of the things which didn’t fit.
I intended this snippet to be a sort of interlude chapter, one outside the main PoV characters to show what’s going on behind the scenes. I encountered one major problem with this: I needed to give the main characters that information, too, which would require repeating that information. Boring! So I pulled them out and decided to use them for promo.
This interlude was originally placed between chapters one and two. Draxton’s been shipped off to the slave market, seen and been seen by Petri, and sold to Losha Brixys. Petri contacts his brother to find out where and to whom the sergeant was sold. The resulting interlude is the Ravyn’s point of view.
Interlude: The Ravyn
“You’d better have a good reason for interrupting me, Draizri.”
Kittryk Ravyndaar stomped onto the bridge in a foul temper. Things had just gotten interesting with a pretty little Nergalese trader when his first mate commed him. He was frustrated and aching and more than a little hungry. Not a good thing for a Velen’Daar. “I had the most delectable…”
“Captain.” The male’s voice, half apology and half command, scattered his irritation like shadows in a sunbeam. This wasn’t just his crew pouring cold water on his plans as a prank. Something was wrong. “Message from Pietro sent to your private channel, encoded and marked urgent.”
“Play.” He worked the fastenings of his shirt while his fangs lengthened. It was too soon. He’d just found him. If that smuggler let something happen to his brother, he’d tear off the male’s horns and use them to carve out his deceiving heart.
At the Fair. The 23rd male discussed in the Between now banded. Need trace and destination. Warrior will retrieve.
“Warrior will retrieve, my ass. You’ll stay out of this, brother,” he muttered. “Idaerra, restart the trace on Sergeant Draxton Larrimore of the 23rd Legion. Scour all Alliance channels and send it to my quarters. We missed something big.”
“Larrimore’s dead,” she grumbled though her fingers flew over her console. “The Legion annotated his records thirteen Alliance months ago and closed his file. I triple checked those records, personally.”
“Dig deeper. Pietro saw him on auction at the Drak’Taurean slave market, so start with the list of merchandise on offer and work backwards from there. I need to know how he slipped past our crawlers, the identification codes of the slave bands, who purchased him, and where he’s going.”
“We’ll find him.”
“I’m counting on it.”
The Ravyn gave those on the bridge a final nod before heading back to his quarters with a sigh. No time to play. Not even a little sip. He had to get his ship ready to fulfil a promise.
Draxton’s Destiny, June 21, 2022. Preorder now available