[Letters From the Labyrinth] Official Brian Keene Newsletter

Hi. I'm Brian Keene and this is Letters From the Labyrinth, a newsletter for fans of my work. Previous issues are archived here, for your reading pleasure.

The gears began churning this week for THE FALL (the final book in THE RISING series). I've said before that I know it will be a big book -- probably around 200,000 words. What I didn't know -- until this past week -- was how those 200,000 words fit together.

Usually, when I write a novel, I craft it in order, meaning I write chapter 2 after I've written chapter 1, and so on. I start at the beginning and finish at the end. Not every author does this, and there's no right or wrong way, but for me, storytelling has always been a pretty straightforward venture. With THE FALL, I've found myself writing things out of sequence, simply because the book is so massive, and because I've had some really cool scenes in my head that were fresh and ready to be written and I didn't want to lose them.

But still, I wasn't sure how it all fit together. Much of THE FALL takes place during the events depicted in the second half of THE RISING: SELECTED SCENES FROM THE END OF THE WORLD. But while that book focused on a global scale, THE FALL is a more contained story. Still, there's this character in California, and a CITY OF THE DEAD character in New York City, and a character in Pennsylvania whose job it is to safely handle America's nuclear power plants in case of the apocalypse, and a character who is watching his supply of insulin dwindle down to nothing, and some astronauts who have been orbiting the Earth this whole time as part of the secret space program. I wasn't sure how they all fit together...but now I am.

I talked a bit about this on social media, and was surprised to discover that there are still people who don't know there are four books in THE RISING series. If you are one of those folks, here is the series, in order:

THE RISING: Paperback – Kindle – Nook
CITY OF THE DEAD: Paperback – Kindle – Nook
THE RISING: SELECTED SCENES FROM THE END OF THE WORLD: Paperback – Kindle – Nook
THE RISING: DELIVERANCE: Paperback – Kindle – Nook
THE FALL: Coming 2019

We can also include CLICKERS FOREVER, as it features Ob and the Siqqusim invading another Earth some time after they've fucked up the Earth in THE RISING and CITY OF THE DEAD.

CLICKERS VS. ZOMBIES: Paperback – Kindle – Nook

Hope that helps!

Over at Gingernuts of Horror, Kit Power is about to embark on a pretty cool mission. He's going to read all of my in-print books, in order, and write about them in a series he calls Exploring the Labyrinth. You can read along with him, if you like. He has the full details here.

PROJECT CEREAL is gearing up, too. (If you're new to the newsletter, that's the codename I've given to a showrunning gig that I am not allowed to talk about yet). The first writer's conference takes place in January, and the project itself looks to take up a big portion of the first half of 2018 for me. Hopefully, there will be a press release and some news about it soon.

RETURN TO THE LOST LEVEL — the sequel to THE LOST LEVEL — comes out February 2018 in paperback, Kindle, Nook, and Kobo.

Kindle editions are now available for pre-order.

War has come in this sequel to the best-selling novel THE LOST LEVEL.

The snake-like Anunnaki have always been a blight for the people living in the hidden dimension known as the Lost Level, but now, the denizens are fighting back. After their community is decimated and their loved ones are enslaved in the aftermath of a devastating Anunnaki attack, Aaron Pace leads a diverse group of warriors — including the bow-woman Tolia, the mighty Karenk, a baby Triceratops, and a time-displaced Ambrose Bierce — on a trek through primordial jungles, dark forests, and a sun-blasted desert while battling pterodactyls, man-eating worms, and other dangers.

Can their small band lay siege to the Anunnaki city and rescue their friends, or will they suffer the same cruel fate so many others have before them? Find out in Brian Keene’s RETURN TO THE LOST LEVEL.

I’m happy to announce that my podcast, The Horror Show with Brian Keene, has officially surpassed 200,000 downloads for 2017. Thanks to my co-hosts Dave Thomas, Mary SanGiovanni, Mike Lombardo, Geoff Cooper, Phoebe, and Dungeonmaster 77.1, and to the Project Entertainment Network for hosting us.

If you’ve never listened, now is the perfect time. The shows are free, and available on iTunes, Stitcher, iHeartRadio, Google Play Music, and all other platforms. You can even listen from your computer via the Project Entertainment Network website. Every episode features a mix of genre and industry news, jokes, insight, and interviews with folks like Joe R. Lansdale, Jack Ketchum, Edward Lee, former Queensryche frontman Geoff Tate, Linda Addison, F Paul Wilson, John Skipp, Sephera Giron, Wrath James White, Chet Williamson, Jeff Strand, Maurice Broaddus, Nick Mamatas, Witch Mountain’s Nate Carson, Xander Harris, Yvonne Navarro, Christopher Golden, Gene O’Neill, Dan Padavona, Paul Tremblay, Rachel Autumn Deering and countless others.

Visit our show archives for a complete list of all past episodes, in order, including links to listen.

“Thurg Life” – chapter two of Brian Keene’s HISTORY OF HORROR FICTION – is now available for free over at Cemetery Dance.

If you missed chapter one, click here to get caught up.

DVDs of THE NAUGHTY LIST have begin shipping to Kickstarter backers. There are a few of you we still need to hear from. Please check in over on the Kickstarter page.

That's it for this week. A few reminders:

PATREON - Where I post new short stories, a serialized ongoing novel, and behind-the-scenes stuff.

TWITTER - The only social media outlet I still use regularly.

See you next Sunday!