“Update on Nanotroopers: Halfway Through!”

I have just posted Episode 11 of my series Nanotroopers to Smashwords a week ago.  Already it has garnered 50 downloads (after 3 days) and this milestone means I’m halfway through the planned 22 episodes of the series.  Episode 13 goes up September 2.

First, some statistics.  All episodes uploaded together have achieved over 2400 total downloads since January 2016.  I assume many of these are the same readers, checking out later episodes.  Which means they liked what they read enough to download future episodes.  By the way, all episodes of Nanotroopers are free downloads.

One of the challenges of doing a series is just keeping the series going.  I do have detailed outlines for each episode but I’m finding that I need to veer away from the outlines more and more.  I have tried to end each episode with a sort of cliff-hanger ending, hoping to attract additional readers for the next episode.  This means I have to resolve the problem at the end of one episode at the beginning of the next one.

Writing a series story has a lot of constraints that the storyteller has to deal with.  You’re constrained by what has gone before, what has been written before.  You have to check back and write the next episode in a way that is consistent with what you did three episodes before.  This involves a lot of fact-checking and some occasionally twisted transitions.  I spend a lot of time planting little hints and motives that will play out in later episodes. 

One of the original desires I had in doing Nanotroopers was to be able to use snatches of text, dialogue and story from my larger novels in Tales of the Quantum Corps.  I had hoped to be able to cut and paste, do a little modifying and be able to move the individual stories along with a little less writing on my part.  By and large, this has worked pretty well, but this also brings up another constraint.  I have self-limited myself in Nanotroopers to stories and scenes and locales set on Earth of the mid-21^st century.  However, much of the latter part of Tales is set off-Earth.

Halfway through the series, I find that I’m running out of settings and locales and conflicts.  In Episode 13 (’Small is All”), I’m going to take a deep breath and venture off-Earth for the first time.  Johnny Winger will lead his nanotroopers on an expedition to investigate some strange goings-on on the Moon.  Red Hammer is clearly up to something no good and the Corps has to find out what.

The general plot line that drives Nanotroopers, as stated in the introductory page of every episode, is this: UN Quantum Corps must defeat the cartel Red Hammer’s efforts to steal or disable their new nanorobotic ANAD systems, so as to have a free hand on Earth (and the Moon) to pursue their criminal enterprises. 

Which leads me to think that one story line I could pursue would be to follow the Red Hammer side of things and show how they go about their nefarious schemes from their point of view.  Hmmm….

Another possible source of new plot lines, as needed, would be to concentrate an episode or two on nanotroopers other than Johnny Winger and tell the story from their perspective.  People like Deeno D’Nunzio, Mighty Mite Barnes, and An Nguyen surely must have an interesting take on what it’s like to serve under Lieutenant John Winger. 

But as always, my cardinal desire in each episode is to have lots of action, the more the better.  I want each episode to drop the reader right in the middle of some furious, fast-paced action and then explain things later.  So any plot line or conflict I choose has to enable this approach.

More on Nanotroopers to come.  Keep downloading!

The next post to The Word Shed will come on August 29, 2016.

See you then.

Phil B.