5, 6, 7, 8

Okay, I'm just two days out from handing in the final manuscript for Hal 4. Since I emailed it to my first readers a week or so ago I've polished and tweaked, tweaked and polished, and it's really taking shape. (All the excellent feedback really helped - and there's more coming in all the time!)

So, now that Hal 4 is nearly done, what next?

Here's the plan:

Hal 5 is loosely plotted, and I'm intending to write 50,000 words of it next month for NanoWrimo. It's a big Hal and Clunk quest, with less focus on secondary characters.

Hal 6 is already 85,000 words. This was GOING to be Hal 4, but the plot outline kept changing until it was nothing like the stuff I'd already written. It's a jumbled mess right now, but I'll do a new outline based on what I have and take it from there. (It's a dig at the art world, with a cargo of valuable gear, neurotic artists, exhibition disasters and so on.)

Hal 7 consists of a couple of notes I've had knocking around for a year or so. Confident (brash) fighter pilot, military stuff, threat of alien invasion, Hal deeply involved in military affairs for some strange and as yet unexplained reason. (Note to self: avoid similarities to Han Solo/Star Wars.)

The idea for Hal 8 just came to me, but I can't say much because it's all spoilers. Expanding the business with the help of an old friend is the best hint I can give.

The order of these novels isn't set in concrete, by the way. I'll write whichever excites me the most. And perhaps by the time I hit #14 or #15, they might even (gasp) be available outside Australia and New Zealand! (Powell's and Amazon sell the Hal books as imports, but they're rather pricey.)

Onwards, Hal and Clunk!