Seems I only get on here once a month anymore. Too much life interferes with what I want to do. Anyway, here I sit in Fullerton, CA waiting for my wife and her cousin to return with dinner.
I’ve spent the past two months doing research for my next novel, Rigel Kentaurus. I had intended to start that back at the beginning of November, but the more I thought about it, the less comfortable I was using the plastic villians I had conjured up. Since these folks will show up again in future novels, I wanted to give them some depth. For that, I turned to a book that had been sitting on my shelf for several years, “History of the Goths.” After reading the early history of the Gothic tribes through the third time Alaric was encircled by the Romans, then released, I have the aliens significantly more fleshed-out than I had them in October. While I still have a large chunk of that book to finish, at least these antagonists now have a name.
They are a mish-mash of Gothic, Hunnic, Roman, and original. I took to the sound of the area in Europe called Thrace, and that is what I named these aliens. I am now sketching a history of the conflict between the Thrace and the Betels, the other major race in my future history. As things develop, I will post updates here.