Welcome to my tour stop for The Dawning of Firebird Alex by Orren Merton. The tour runs April 27- May 8th. Check out the tour page for more information.
The Dawning of Firebird Alex by Orren Merton
Eighteen-year-old Alexandra Gold is a Seduman: her humanity and compassion come from her deceased human mother, and her powers over spirit fire and super-human strength from her demon-like Sedu father. Collecting the first three novels inThe Sedumen Chronicles, this volume includes:
Firebird Alex: When Alex unearths her father’s Sedublade, it sets in motion a journey that challenges everything she thought she was. Rescuing her friends from another Seduman gives her a taste of the heroine she might become.
Lady Firebird: Her old nemesis, down but not out, executes a horrific plan to conquer both Earth and Sediin. It’s up to Alex to assume the mantle of Lady Firebird and hunt her adversary across universes.
Firebird Vengeance: Just when Alex thought she’d won, she discovers her victory has unleashed a horrible vengeance that threatens to destroy human and Sedu alike. In order to save everyone, she must convince skeptics in both universes that she truly is the heroine that she claims to be.
Also in this collectionFirebird Manor: In this bonus novelette, Alex and her friends unwittingly awaken a murderous eldritch horror in a beachside manor. They must defeat the monster before it kills again.
My Favorite Failure
By Orren Merton
In a very real sense, The Sedumen Chronicles came out of a failure. An epic failure, really. But it was an epic failure that taught me a lot.
After I'd published my first novel, The Deviant, in 2010, I had an idea to write a young adult paranormal romance, featuring an eighteen year-old protagonist named Melanie who could communicate with ghosts. I was very excited about the characters and the environment I had in mind, and I started working on it in 2011.
Almost immediately, it became clear this was a novel that simply didn't want to come easily. I had various story elements but they didn't quite connect up smoothly. I got carried away fleshing out and creating the characters; I was extremely proud of how uniquely I had developed their independent voices, but I suddenly realized after nearly a year of work, I'd written almost 150,000 words—that's almost double the length of the individual Sedumen Chronicle novels—but I had barely written half the story! And after all that time, I still didn't come up with a title I liked.
I tried to edit the novel, to rewrite it, but I'd spent so much time and energy on it, and it just wasn't working. So I put it aside and wrote an adult science-fiction novel, Skye Entity. But I always wanted to revisit the YA genre, specifically with an eighteen year old girl as the star.
It was at this point, I got the idea for an eighteen-year old girl who was half-human, and half-demon—but she wasn't a monster, she was a hero. If she was a demon, what would her power set be? Obviously, fire would be a part of it. And at that point, a name came to mind: Firebird Alex. I loved the name for the character, but also for the novel.
All the hard lessons I'd learned with my failed novel came back to help me here. When I plotted out the novel, I made sure that it made sense and moved quickly. I still did my best to flesh out the characters and give them unique voices, but not to the point of self-indulgence. And if something wasn't working, I cut it out, which sometimes is the hardest part of all.
And thus, Firebird Alex, and The Sedumen Chronicles was born. Sometimes we need to fail before we can succeed, and this was one of those times. In the moment, I felt quite disheartened, but looking back, I can see how necessary it was, and I'm glad that I tried so hard and learned so much. I came out of that experience a better writer, and for that I'm grateful. And that's why it's my favorite mistake.
Orren Merton started writing fantasy and science fiction at an embarrassingly young age. In high
school, he picked up guitar and start playing up and down California in a few bands, culminating in his industrial rock band Ember After. During that time, magazines, developers, and corporations began to pay him to write and edit music software related articles, manuals, and books. Since then he has written the urban fantasy novel The Deviant and the science fiction novel Skye Entity before working on his current series of YA novels. He lives in Southern California with his family, pets, collection of sci-fi/fantasy memorabilia, and curiously large stuffed animal collection.
Orren will be giving away ecopies of his book to 5 winners of the below Rafflecopter.
a Rafflecopter giveaway
This event was organized by CBB Book Promotions.
I think we definitely have to have some failures to grow. But sometimes our failures really aren't failures at all in the end!
ReplyDeleteThanks so much for hosting a tour stop!
Thanks for giving me the microphone for this post, so to speak!
ReplyDeleteIts always a pleasure Candace & Orren! :D
ReplyDelete