Reader's Choice: 2024 Serial Poll
Vote for the next serial to appear on Strange New Worlds
My busy season as a sports journalist is drawing closer to an end.
From August to mid-April, my daily schedule is hectic as I juggle covering college football, college basketball, and the NBA. I'm a month away from the end of the NBA regular season and the calendar opening up to focus greater attention on my fiction writing endeavors.
To that end, I'm planning my next serial that will run in weekly installments in this newsletter. The serial will run during the summer and autumn, much like Snow Dragon did a year ago, and episodes will be available exclusively to paid subscribers of Strange New Worlds and paid subscribers to my Patreon page.
Snow Dragon was a monster tale that also served as a prequel to my horror novel Pandora Reborn. It won an earlier reader's choice poll deciding my 2023 serial. (All 11 episodes of Snow Dragon are available to read in the Strange New Worlds archives with a paid subscription).
Now, I'm offering a new reader's choice poll. Tons of ideas for my next serial are swimming in my head, but I want to see which stories readers of this newsletter want to read. Please take a minute to vote in the poll below and let me know which stories capture your interest the most.
Here’s a few details on your poll choices:
Fire at Will: This science fiction adventure serials follows Will, a wide-eyed cadet assigned to serve aboard the Newton — an Earth spaceship. This is no ordinary sci-fi tale. Fire at Will is an Earth TV show existing within the Alien People Chronicles universe. (In other words, Fire at Will portrays one fictional universe existing inside of another separate fictional universe.) The Fire at Will TV show is a satirical take on popular real-world sci-fi shows such as Star Trek: The Next Generation and Stargate SG-1. I plan to serialize 10-episode “seasons” and present each episode in weekly installments whenever I complete a full season.
The Ghost Diaries: I’m a huge fan of classic “Treehouse of Horror” episodes of The Simpsons that air each Halloween. This story firmly embraces a similar spirit of comedic horror. The Ghost Diaries is set in my Deer Falls horror universe and chronicles a ghost whose afterlife is turned upside down when an obnoxious redneck family moves into his haunted house. Each episode will consist multiple diary entries from the narrator ghost detailing his persistent efforts to scare away the obnoxious family and regain his peaceful afterlife. This story is designed to be a limited series for now but can be expanded into a longer series later.
Tales from Lathos: If you’re dying to learn more about Lathos and the aliens who call this exoplanet home, this anthology will scratch your itch. Tales from Lathos is set on the homeworld Calandra Menankar and Xttra Oogan — my co-protagonists in the Alien People Chronicles science fiction series. It will operate as an anthology (comparable to The Twilight Zone or The Outer Limits in nature) with a mix of standalone stories and interconnected tales drawn from thousands of years of Lathoan history. The tone of these stories will vary from serious and dark to light and comedic based on their characters and settings. I’ll present Tales from Lathos in volumes consisting of multiple stories. Each volume will feature stories published during one calendar year.
Earth Defense Bureau Files: In the Alien People Chronicles universe, the Earth Defense Bureau is a US government agency tasked with protecting Earth from alien incursions. These are the violent Earthians whom Calandra and Xttra encounter in their first contact visit to Earth. Earth Defense Bureau Files will be an X-Files style anthology centered on the titular agency dealing with extraterrestrial activities on Earth. Similar to Tales from Lathos, I’ll present Earth Defense Bureau Files in volumes consisting of multiple stories. Each volume will feature stories published during one calendar year.
Which serials excite your imagination? Which one do you want to read first? Cast your vote and share your thoughts in the comments.
These all sound great. :)