Arcanocene took about two years from start to publication. It did not begin with a book in mind — I was writing material for Smilodon Disrexus and experimented with a faux socratic dialogue between S. Disrexus and one Vulpus Fatalis. Yes, I accidentally misspelled Vulpes in those early scribbles. This was in the spring of 2018.
A handful of connected dialogues accumulated, and I concurrently noted some lively text exchanges with friends that had a similar vibe. The collection grew, and I wondered if a short book was hiding there in spite of all marketability concerns. Around sixty dialogues coalesced by the fall of 2018. New characters had emerged. “Vulpus” stayed as is. The dialogues rested for a bit — life intervened anyway, but I hit it hard again in early 2019 and had what I thought was a book. I let it sit again, just in case, then tore it open during the summer.
Something was missing.
The dialogues seemed to float in amorphous space. Not bad in and of itself, but I indulged in some head scratching and doubt. Summer heat brought the realization that some prose might help anchor the thing, so I scribbled a rough draft of the piece with the giant salamander. Better. Rough drafts of the other prose chapters were there by early fall.
And Fatalis became Fatalux, as far as Vulpus was concerned.
The winter, rolling into 2020 — I repeatedly set it aside and dusted it off again — prose revisions, dialogue tweaks, and some re-ordering. A bit of new writing and some cuts. Generous beta readers. The style settled, especially as far as the nonstandard punctuation. Someone is sure to look at that and consider it sloppy editing, but it seemed like a good idea at the time. Might still be, along with the careful decision to leave two spaces after a period. At the risk of offending modernists, two spaces seemed to add a sense of visual openness to the text. Regardless, all writing and stylistic decisions were pretty much done by April 2020.
The actual publication on Amazon — that’s another topic. Learning curve, for sure.
All this is front of mind within the work on Volume 2…