Three years ago, I converted a short story entitled “The Chronicles of Raf” into a full length novel by the name of Anstractor Vestalia. I wrote Chronicles of Raf several years earlier when Hall of the Black Dragon was just my personal blog, and I wanted to share some of my creative writing with visitors to the site.
Back then, I was reading a lot of books about the streets, and it influenced my writing in every way. This led me to developing the title character into a sort of complicated good guy. Complicated may be too nice of a word for what Rafian VCA was in Chronicles–since he was a thief, murderer, and pimp. Raf took on a change of heart when his one girl—he was a chili pimp—died violently and he fell face first into a world of drugs and alcohol.
Doesn’t sound very Science Fiction does it? Well, there were scientific technologies, aliens, and planet busting, but at the core of the story was this terribly complex human being. Surprisingly people who read the short really enjoyed it, and so when it came time for me to write “my first book,” I chose to expand upon the Rafian VCA story.
This month ushers in the third and final book in the trilogy of Anstractor. If you would’ve told me three years ago that I would have written and edited down over 300,000 words, I would have probably laughed at you. But here we are, and Rafian’s tale is complete.
It has been a wonderful ride but not without a few sinkholes and furious bandersnatches along the way. Anstractor was fully rewritten at the end of last year. I fumbled the release of Blade of The Lucan, and I had to remove Lady Hellgate from the store so that it too could get a rewrite. Look, I’m my own worst critic and I don’t plan to make rewriting a habit–trust me, but Anstractor is special, and I wanted people to love it.
Now I have arrived… I have a trilogy. An introduction to a world that will lead to plenty more stories, and a possible future series involving Rafian VCA and his Phasers. Have you had a chance to read the new Anstractor?