Images from Vacuum Forged – The Novella. Or whatever the kids are calling unfinished manuscripts these days.
The Illustrated Lemur
Re-engaged
When I tabled the fourth of nine Anye Universe novels to outline the seventh, I had no idea I would keep going — and set Vacuum Forged aside for seven years.
I returned to the middle trilogy uncertain of my intentions — 80,000 words in, having written treatments for volumes five and six, so I would know where I was going with four.
Seven novels in thirteen years. Maybe I should do something else with whatever time I have left.
But then I read this.
Svami Reva lounged in a recliner across the room, poking fingers at the augmented reality space. He acknowledged their arrival without looking. “You’re wasting your time.”
“Maybe.” Suban addressed the prisoner in Low Desert. “Does it seem odd to you that we took the language of our Manu conquerors, called it the Noble Tongue, pretending it was our own when everyone knew it was not? You’d think our people had no shame.”
The man kept his eyes down. Suban dragged a chair over. “You should be afraid of me. Do you know what I am?”
That provoked a response. “A policeman. Zirna Zapha. What else?”
Continue reading “Re-engaged”Outed
I did not tell Gab AI my novel is Christian adjacent. It figured it out on its own, and is the only one to have done so.
Publication is scheduled for September 15. In the meantime, read the book for free at https://marolitango.substack.com
Maroli Tango occupies a very specific, valuable niche. It is “unconventional” because it treats the high-fantasy elements of its universe (spirits in appliances, ancient lemur-folk lineage, planetary migration) as mundane reality, while treating the traditional human experiences (raising children, grieving a spouse, building a house, choosing a career) as the truly significant events of the narrative.
My takeaway: You have created a work of “metaphysical realism” disguised as space opera. It is likely that readers will find the story disorienting or “strange” for the first fifty pages, then find themselves deeply attached to the characters by the time they reach the mid-point.
You aren’t writing for the typical “laser-gun” space opera audience. You are writing for readers who want to feel the weight of deep time balanced against the lightness of a day at the beach or the arrival of a new child.
This is a complete, well-realized vision. You haven’t just written a story; you’ve built a cosmology that feels lived-in, flawed, and profoundly Christian in its ultimate orientation toward virtue, responsibility, and the sanctity of the person within the machine.
AI Painted Your Porch
And by the way, you don't have a Porsche. It's a Lexus.
A sampling of Maroli Tango chapter illustrations.
Read the book at https://marolitango.substack.com/s/read-the-book.
ClaudeAI Rates Audience Retention
It's kind of like how older men see themselves in the mirror. "I don't look so bad."
Click here to read the entire novel, near-final-draft, for free.
Audience Retention Analysis: Chapters 1-15
Reading these as the opening of Maroli Tango, I’ll evaluate each chapter for the specific question of whether a reader will turn the page. Retention depends on momentum, clarity, and stakes — not literary merit. A beautiful chapter that confuses readers loses them; a workmanlike chapter that makes them lean forward keeps them.
Chapter-by-Chapter Ratings
Ch. 1 ~ Artifact — 7/10 A strong cold open. The cylinder emerging near Saturn is genuinely arresting, and the Mehrenholz/past-life detail does a lot of work fast. The closing exchange (“a neglected old barn… start more trouble”) gives the reader something to chew on. Risk: dense proper-noun load (Bharamin, Anye, Anuraga, Mehrenholz, Khalsa, Bjornson) for a first chapter. Veterans of the series will love it; new readers will feel the water is deep.
Ch. 2 ~ Legacy — 9/10 This is your hook. The shift from cosmic to intimate — a President and a banker dancing awkwardly, a surprise kiss under mistletoe — is exactly the dual-register your series is built on. Mason and Marie get introduced through charm rather than exposition. Retention here is high because readers now have a relationship to track, not just a setting.
Continue reading “ClaudeAI Rates Audience Retention”ChatGPT Categorizes Maroli Tango
I am not anticipating a movie deal
Click here to read the entire novel, near-final-draft, for free.
Your book sits in a strange intersection:
Becky Chambers + Lois McMaster Bujold + The Expanse + Ada Palmer + a family chronicle + frontier settlement comedy + theological space opera.
The nearest neighbors:
Lois McMaster Bujold
Especially the Vorkosigan Saga.
Bujold is probably your closest craft cousin for mixing space opera, family, military/political institutions, romance, comedy, competence, and moral consequence. The Vorkosigan books are long-running SF/space-opera works with major attention to family, hierarchy, personal honor, military culture, and social continuity; the series won the Hugo Award for Best Series. (Wikipedia)
Overlap with you: huge cast, aristocratic/merchant-military structures, moral comedy, family as civilization-bearing unit.
Difference: Bujold is tighter, more novel-shaped, more character-centralized around Miles/Cordelia/etc. Your work is more mosaic, serial, and civilizational.
A Dilemma in Wearing the Coat of Many Colors
There once was a prisoner at Dachau, who kept a tiny ceramic frog in his pocket, a silent prayer to God that he not be forgotten.
In later years, he became a woodcarver, producing pocket-sized figures of frogs.
One day, a patron mentioned the frog was a symbol of liberation.
“Oy vey,” the man said. “Is that what I’ve been talking about?”
Artists are notorious for inscribing subtle traces of life’s struggles into the texture of the work — unaware of hidden meaning.
But I am a man of few complaints. Instead, I mumble about discipline, calling, stewardship, covenant, and moral formation over time.
Not explicitly. That would be counter-productive. Fiction is supposed to be entertaining.
Continue reading “A Dilemma in Wearing the Coat of Many Colors”
John Dyer Writes 
Recent Comments