Angelbound ACCA: Why I wrote this after Armageddon

Some readers have been wondering why I wrote ARMAGEDDON (Angelbound Book #5) before I wrote ACCA (which is now book #3). Good question!

Here’s the deal. There are two Christina Bauers (not literally, but work with me here.) One is Business-Me, who sets all the publishing deadlines and stuff. The other is Writer-Me, who does the you-know-what. In the Angelbound series, Business-Me wanted a wedding at the end of Book #2, SCALA. It seemed logical, eight?

Writer-Me thought that was a shitty idea. Writer-Me wanted to dive into ARMAGEDDON.

So Business-Me overrode Writer-Me. Long story short, I compelled myself to write the wedding scene anyway. After days of forced solitude with my computer, I had all of two pages to show for my pain. In this version of the wedding, Myla was all ooey-gooey about getting married. Lincoln looked awesome and said sweet stuff. Everyone showed up on time and cried at the right moment. Then, Business-Me thought everything through carefully (as Business-Me is wont to do). The ensuing internal conversation went something like this:

Business-Me: This sucks!!! Myla and Lincoln can’t have a typical wedding. There has to be a battle. WTF?

Writer-Me: I want to write ARAMGEDDON.

Business-Me: Can’t we just try to make this scene a little longer? Get some conflict in here? At least, have her break a stained glass window or something.

Writer-Me: What part of “I want to write ARMAGEDDON” was unclear to you?

Business-Me: Can she maybe trip on her way down the aisle?

Writer-Me: Keep fighting me on this and I won’t even write blogs for you.

After this little convo, Business-Me took a tactical retreat and—you guessed it!—validated the decision to skip the wedding scene and go right into ARMAGEDDON. By the way, this inner conflict (Business-Me versus Writer-Me) happens a lot. More often than not, Business-Me wants to take Writer-Me out back and kick my own ass. True story.

So in the end, I wrote and published Armageddon. People liked it. Still, some readers reached out and said they wanted the wedding. And Writer-Me was like: “that’s fascinating, but I got nothing for you.”

Then, one day last summer, I was walking back from riding the Boston T and—WHAMMO—Writer-Me saw the whole wedding scene in my head. This was not, however, a particularly good time for this revelation. Thus, Writer-Me and Business-Me had the following pow-wow:

Business-Me: Can we hold off on the wedding for a while? We just outlined the MISTRESS DRAGON series, which tells the story of Portia and Tempest… as well as their kids. Everyone loves Portia and Tempest. I really want to explore them some more.

Writer-Me: I want to write ACCA. Now.

Business-Me: But we have the cover done. It looks really cool.

Writer-Me: (Covers ears) La-la-la-ACCA-la-la-la.

Business-Me: Can’t we negotiate?

Writer-Me: What a great idea! How about this…You get me a mocha and then I write whatever the fuck I want. How’s that for a deal?

Business-Me: (sighs) ACCA.

So, there it is. This might not the best answer the whole ‘Why ACCA now’ question, but it’s the truth. I’ve never been a linear thinker, if that’s any help. And yeah, I might also be a little nuts, but in my defense, I think the best people are. And to this day, I still have no real idea how Writer-Me works. I’m just glad she keeps coming up with stuff that people want to read 🙂

On that note, I must now get Writer-Me another mocha and return to my latest book. These days, all Writer-Me wants to do is tell stories about fairy tale shifters…Who’d have guessed it?

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