The dark side’s coming now, nothing is real…

If you know that lyric, you probably grew up in the 80s. It’s not at all what my new novel is about. But it was stuck in my head, so now it can be stuck in yours as well. You’re welcome.

DARKSIDE is the name of my newest book, and the latest installment in the Carl Butler (Planetside) series of science fiction mysteries. Since I haven’t done a very good job of maintaining my website, I thought I should give a little update on that book and what’s coming after that.

Here’s a bit about the book:

Colonel Butler has paid his dues and just wants to enjoy his retirement on a remote planet. But the galaxy has had other plans.  He has been roped into searching for a politician’s missing son and an industry magnate’s missing daughter. He has been kidnapped, violated numerous laws, and caused the destruction of colonial facilities. He’s famous—or infamous, depending on who you ask—praised and reviled in equal measure across the galaxy for his exploits.

And he is determined to never let the government drag him into another investigation.

But when a runaway twelve-year-old girl whose father has gone missing asks him for help, well…it’s a lot harder to say no.

The girl’s father, Jorge Ramiro, was supposed to have been on Taug, a moon orbiting the gas giant Ridia 5, working on a dig with a famous archaeologist. But now there’s no sign of him and no record of him being there. Mining operations on the moon are run by two different consortiums, Caliber and Omicron—both of which have tried to kill Butler in the past. Butler doesn’t believe in coincidence.

Landing on Taug with his right-hand man Mac, computer genius Ganos, and an elite security squad, Butler soon finds that they’ve charged back into the crosshairs—because Ramiro is not the only who has disappeared, and the perpetual darkside of this moon is hiding more than the truth about a missing archeologist…

Available in all formats on September 24th, 2024

So…why now? The last book in this series came out in December of 2020, which, despite it seeming like yesterday, was over three years ago. At the time, I put the series on hold because it felt right. I had other things I wanted to write, and I had told the story of Carl Butler the way that I wanted to tell it. I wrote three other books since then–three stories I really wanted to tell. But I still love Butler, Mac, and Ganos, and the time felt right to come back to them.

Plus Harper Voyager offered to pay me to write it, which…I’ve talked before how both creative and financial aspects determine which books get written. This was a situation where the book I wanted to write and the book they wanted to pay for lined up, which is nice.

The book is finished and likely either at or headed to the printers. I think it came out well — I’m really happy with it, and I think that fans of the series will be as well. For my audio fans, RC Bray is contracted to do the audio, reprising his role as Carl Butler. As for me, I won’t touch the book again until a box of paperbacks shows up on my porch.

But that doesn’t mean I’m done with Carl Butler. In fact, I’ve started writing book 5 and done some of the initial planning for book 6. And while that’s not official, I think you can reasonably expect to see more information about those two books in the near future. Let’s just say I don’t think there will be as long a wait as there was for book 4 (DARKSIDE).