It took a lot of thought and experimenting, but I think I've found what I'll write next. To my surprise, the story of Avery Special, teenage necromancer, is in Penny's world, although I doubt she herself will appear at all. I've run it through my alpha readers, and I'm pretty sure this is viable. As usual, here is the sample first chapter if anyone wants to read and comment!
Ok...the ending was a little unexpected but it was good. We got a potential new team of young villains and more importantly; SUE! Look forward to it.
ReplyDeleteHuzzah! And I'm totally adding "footling" (which I actually had to look up) to my everyday vocabulary. :)
ReplyDeleteI love each and every new kid character =D I love Penny's world. I'm so glad we get more novels in it even if Penny is out of the spotlight. I am kinda hoping to see Claire though. She's a budding young career villian, and I miss her. Everyone's power is awesome and interesting. The boy Avery kissed is interesting and I see young romance on the horizon. I'll definately want to read the whole book :D
ReplyDeleteThe ending was not what very odd but interesting. I really do hope to see a lot more mad science in this book and am hoping Ray makes some appearances in this series.
ReplyDeletedefinitely has my interest and if i can't have mad science then i'm glad it's necromancy instead.
ReplyDeleteinteresting enough this will be the third superhero/villain book i've read that prominently feature a super villain with bug control powers getting shoehorned into the super villain lifestyle.
worm?
Deleteyes and forging hephaestus by drew hayes had one too.
DeleteOoh necromancy!
ReplyDeleteHello Richard Roberts!
ReplyDeleteI think you have amazing potential as an author. I would like to offer you a non-exclusive contract to publish on our platform, http://webnovel.com.
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What about the last book about Magenta. Is there any update on when that will be available?
ReplyDeleteWell, I'm late commenting on this. At least no one will notice me going overboard on this.
ReplyDeleteThe new team is fun. It's nice to see Sue again, and especially her fitting in so very well as both somewhat veteran of trying to get people out safely, and just... You have an individual with mind control powers. She doesn't know him well, nor does Avery. And when she strains her power as they are attempting to escape, she is the last one through the shadow passage. Sue is just very much good people in this first chapter.
Which serves as a very strong indicator of a theme with the team. They have "villainous" powers. Necromancy, fire, mind control, shadows and bugs. But they are not bad kids, nor villains in the slightest. You have the most combat suited power not being used because Annie quite understandably is not capable of setting people on fire.
Peggie sets ants upon the guards, but tells them not to bite, when she and the others were actively abducted and that the guards had guns.
Meanwhile Chris is trying to just be a good person despite the very obvious potential for abuse with his powerset.
Which makes the group referred to as new supervillains all the more galling because they were just kids trying to escape from an abduction.
And personally I'm very suspicious that the story is going to have a theme of dangerous powers, or at least not friendly powers, not meaning bad people. And also that the yet to be named director won't survive the story.
ReplyDeleteBut first Avery. Oh her being from outside of the city and utterly no knowledge about the superpowered community is going to make things interesting. Like not noticing the Librarian setting her up with Grimoires interesting. (And I must wonder what the Librarian was up to, because yes the teenager would obvious try reading it immediately given that the Librarian knew enough to bring out the grimoires. And said Librarian is well aware that Mourning Dove lives in the library and would react badly to attempts to control her. Because made a zombie with essentially programmed obedience under very certain circumstances.) This is likely going to lead to a fun dynamic with Sue in that Avery is the soft touch reassuring leader while Sue is the sergeant rock of the group.
Though honestly I think it'll take Avery awhile to notice she is the leader of the group given her self esteem/confidence issues. Which in its own way is kinda good because she does have a real tunnel vision it seems, such as getting very excited at having a grimoire at long last versus realizing that she accidentally tried to control someone. And there is quite a bit of humor for Avery being both right and wrong as to Mourning Dove, mostly. Yes she is one of the libraries' pair of guards to all the artifacts within the library. No that is not nearly all of that. And that is why it's a mostly humorous thing.
Because that is setting up a parallel with our yet to be named kidnapper. Because she so far looks to be so unaware of the rules of the Community. For instance --- kidnapping a random super powered teenager is something that is right on the edge of breaking the rules. And if anything had happened to the kids in the first chapter, I fully expect she would have had Mourning Dove on her.
For once there was a super powered teenager that drew the eye of someone with superpower tech, and she died. She died alone and afraid. She was just abducted, not part of the super scene, just a girl with powers figuring out how to use them. The difference between Avery and Bluejay with the kidnapping is mostly in that Avery is not going to die at least this time. And unlike Avery the unnamed abductor so far has not gotten any warnings before anyone gets hurt. Which given the ghost on set...
Avery is acting as if the ghost that died died awhile ago. But while the five dollars a day thing hints at the ghost being old, it could also be the ghost saying that give dollars a day could have prevented whatever killed her. Also when a ghost is saying "This is what I died for," and the this appears to be undefined the fact the ghost is very aware of the environment may mean that she's a really recent death. In which case you may want to get "this" defined.
Just a wonderful first chapter, the only thing that confused me honestly is this line: "My first day, and the superheroes of LA had already noticed me and were helping me learn to use my powers."
It did not appear like Avery realized that the Librarian and Mourning Dove were heroes.
hmm. Well, I'm feeling it. Certainly seems worthy, though Sue won't be happy about the whole villain thing. She'll be pissed, in fact. But hey, I digress it was truly an epic chapter one. Also, I'm Late For Alchemy Class was amazing, but when are we getting it in print? I hate an incomplete collection.
ReplyDeleteYeah. I’ve been waiting to hear about that book for a while. Do you have any indication of when it will be available.
DeleteCan you pu
ReplyDeleteCan you put in another post or comment regarding where you are with your books. I’ve been waiting for more updates for months.
ReplyDeleteCan you put in another post or comment regarding where you are with your books. I’ve been waiting for more updates for months.
ReplyDeleteThis author has a Twitter account that's updated more often than this blog. This blog seems to usually be focused on book release information.
Deletehttps://twitter.com/MadeOfTeeth
I apologize for this out of place comment but I hope that you can see this Mr. Roberts. What made Penelope ‘Bad Penny’ Akk so powerful?
ReplyDeleteI got notification from Amazon that there's a new book coming; is this the same one? Odd no announcement on frankensteinbeck
ReplyDeleteIf you're talking about “Please Don't Tell My Parents I Work for a Supervillain” out this may, that one's about the Alchemist Magenta that we we're given a sampling of in the post “Poor Mirabelle”.
DeleteThe one in this post is a new protagonist, Avery The Necromancer, but I don't know how many books Roberts plans to write with Magenta before getting to Avery.
It has been almost a year since the last post. Are you alright? If COVID got you I am going to be so mad.
ReplyDeleteHello! Apologies for the out of the blue response, but I've been desperately looking for a copy of your book "Wild Children". The premise is so intriguing, especially looking at your other work and writing style. The problem is, I literally can't find it anywhere for sale. If there is a way to purchase a print or PDF of your book, I would be elated!
ReplyDeleteThank you for your time :)
Wild children is a great story, especially when you realize it's told from the perspective of every other person, except the main character. ^.^ You'll see when you read it.
DeleteIn case anyone don't know, Book 7 'Please Don't Tell My Parents I'm Queen of the Dead' is now up for pre-order.
ReplyDeleteHm, I think when I hear about your new books via my Kindle recommendations rather than from your blog, maybe that suggests it's a good idea to post news updates more often?
ReplyDeleteI was still waiting for word that book 6 was published, when I was recommended book 7...
On the other hand, I did buy them anyway of course, so... job accomplished?
Just got to the Menolly reference – what a treat to see!
ReplyDeleteI need to sit down and get books six and seven. Queen of the Dead definitely interests me, but also interested in Magenta. What girl at a comic con hasn't felt like that, nobody remembering your face; knowing they did stuff with you once you tell them, then forgetting. ^>^
ReplyDeleteIt'll give me more fuel for the fanfiction I've started writing