Otherworldly Emergence - My journey

I don't know when it started, date wise, but I met Dianna some time in 2024. She'd just started up BCP Creatives and wanted to put out a collaborative novella series.

When she pitched the idea to me, I thought "what an interesting concept". Since creating two versions of two characters (don't go there), I had been wanting to write the story of the younger versions for a few months but couldn't get it to work. I even put them into my Character Café on Discord, but I still couldn't pull a story out of them.

I knew what I wanted, I knew how to write it.

When Otherworldly Emergence became solid, I ran the two characters around in my head and started talking them over with Dianna. In a few months, I definitely had some ideas to work with. I had my pitch interview, the premise grew and lo and behold, Not Your Normal Heroes was born.

It went through a bit more tweaking, but eventually, the story of Jordy and Rafe and their impossible rescue came to fruition.

Now, because I can be an over achiever, I was also toying with a paranormal idea. This idea was - what if a ghost hunter met a demon hunter? Because I already had a demon hunter. So, I teased that idea out while I was still working the basics of Jordy and Rafe's story.

Then in a conversation, Dianna let it slip that she was short of authors. I suggested my paranormal story and she liked its idea. So, I pitched that one again. Thus, Matt and Nina finally met each other in 2025.

For me, this was not really the best time to start two brand new, time-sensitive projects. I was trying to get my own books republished in my own name and now I had two 45,000 word stories to write. What was I thinking?

But I managed it. I concentrated on Jordy and Rafe and got their story down on paper, then moved to Matt and Nina. Their story went through a few changes (the emergent element I'd first envisioned became too controversial, so that was changed) and got rid of some other elements, too.

Writing 90,000 words in one year can be time consuming. Add to that paid work and two quick trips over to the eastern states of Australia and time becomes a sought-after commodity. My weekly planner turned into a specialised diary - I had a monthly planner but whole pages to a day. And sometimes I used it and sometimes I didn't.

But I learnt a lot through that frantic year of writing. I learnt that I could do it. I could put out those stories. And with the awesome help of Selina Shapland, thanks to BCP's sponsorship, my writing has become not only more active, but I can show emotions a lot better than I ever did. (oh, dear. Looks like I'll be rewriting some of my older stuff. Again.)

Working in a collaborative series is a fun experience. You get to talk to people who are working on completely different works yet they have the same issues as every writer does - procrastination, questioning where the story is going (pantser or discovery writer). How do I make this stand out more? How do I get people interested past all the social media strains.

BCP has provided two platforms where us collaborators can work together. We have a discussion board, called Bushland Squires, and we have a channel on the BCP server in discord. Here were do write-ins almost daily and it's nothing for Dianna and I to be online at any time during the day.

The experience I've had with the Otherworldly Emergence novella series is something I will cherish forever. I'll cherish it so much that I am participating in Otherworldly Origins that opens this year in July (that's when pitches start happening). Origins is giving me an opportunity to expand my horizons in the universe I've created through Not Your Normal Heroes and Hidden Heritage.

Because both of those stories have opened up a whole new playing field for me. So many options to choose from with regard to that universe and the fact that both the stories belong in that universe just leads to more stories to be told.

Yes, it's been a hard slog, but what writing isn't? The fact that I've had other writers to work with and support along the way by way of monthly get togethers and workshops has made that slog even more fun. It helped me hone in on what I needed to do to get both of these stories to the level expected and I don't know about anyone else, but I'm excited they're being released this year.

I will be forever grateful to the Otherworldly Emergence novella series, because it gave me the platform to tell Jordy and Rafe's story and got me past the point of struggle of how to tell that story. Because their story is powerful and I'd like to think that it's what would happen if the situation ever happened in real life.