Yearly Look Ahead 2026
Another year down, and a fresh new one facing us up ahead!
2025 was a hectic one; I attended the always immense Dragon Con, my first goth convention with Convergence, and the very first Lit-RPG con, getting to meet some awesome readers at each one. I published Roverpowered #3 and #4, Villain’s Vignettes: Volume II, as well as the final book in the Fred the Vampire Accountant Series: All Accounts Settled.
The Patreon has continued to develop as I moved into my first sequels to existing stories with The Holly Claus and plans for an eventual Action Kadabra sequel. We’ve also hit the end of what one might call the initial phase as we adjust Thursdays to encompass a wider range of content.
And of course, there was writing. A shitload of it, and not all where I’d planned it to go. Those of you who follow me on social media or the Patreon’s own Discord might have seen my post about Spells, Swords, and Stealth #6 going only 40k+ over what I’d actually planned for, as opposed to #5, which went 60k over.
Now while that is technically an improvement, and a funny recurring bit, the reality is also that I had to spend a fair bit more time on the project than scheduled. In turn, that has a knock-along effect on the books that were waiting to go after it, which in this case was 5-Minute Sherlock #4. As excited as I am to write the next chapter in Sherman and Watson’s story, unfortunately that delay was large enough to knock the book out of its planned spot.
Why not just write it next anyway? Well… I can’t tell you. Or rather, I won’t tell you, for the same reason I don’t give out spoilers. What I can say is that I am a very big fan of long-form storytelling, and right now we’re at a point where certain projects have to happen in sequence to keep everything flowing along as intended. Is that a satisfying answer? Hell no. In a few years, will folks reading this blog go “Oooooooh, that’s what he meant.” I sure hope so; it’s certainly my intent.
But all of that is in the past, and this is the Yearly Look Ahead, so let’s turn our focus to what lies on the horizon for 2026. Rather than resolutions, I like to set goals for the year to come, starting with:
1. Publish Roverpowered #5 and #6, along with the Volume 1 Hardcover collection:
My scrappy little family-friendly novella series continues to keep punching above its weight class, and I’m super excited to be able to keep the story going. As usual, I’ve got two planned for this year, but there’s also a hardcover collection of Books #1 - #4 in the works.
We couldn’t really do hardcover for any of the single issues; it's just not viable for novellas. However, four of them collected into a single volume makes for a respectably sized book, easily big enough to handle hardcover. Readers with especially sharp memories might remember that I referred to Roverpowered #4 as a sort of season finale. I tried to them with a sense of arcs in the hopes that the collected volumes will still feel like complete tales, even with more story still to come.
That also means that Roverpowered #5 would be the kickoff to Season 2 in this metaphor, and having already written it, I can say that boy howdy does it start off with a bang.
2. Publish NPCs #6 (Swords, Spells, and Stealth series):
At some point, I need to officially change the name of this series. It’s fairly clear that people know it as the NPCs series and that’s almost certainly what I should have used from the outset. Ah well, the benefits of hindsight.
With this massive tome being fully written, all that’s required to get it published will be rewrites and edits, so this is a very achievable goal, even if it won’t be finished any time soon. As always with the huge books, they take a longer time to edit, so I’d expect this one in the back half of the year, at soonest. I’m excited for once we reach that point as well, this deep into the series we’re finally getting into some of the meatier bits of the lore and world-building.
3: Write Villains’ Code #4:
As those of you who saw the Q3/Q4 Combined Sneak Peek will now know, I’ve actually gotten a head start on this one.
There’s only so much to reasonably say about it for now though, other than it will clearly take up the vast majority of my 2026 writing time. You all know the drill by now, these books clock in around 250k - 300k, which is the equivalent of about five regular novels or two and a half fantasy novels. Point is, it’s a lot of words, and a more sensible author would probably treat each of these as multiple books that could be released more frequently.
But y’all have got me instead, so settle in because I’m planning to write another behemoth. Expect this one to actually publish in 2027.
4. Work on 5-Minute Sherlock #4:
I used “Work on” rather than “Write” because to me the second one implies completion, and I’m trying to keep this goal realistic. I really hated having to push back Sherman, especially with where we are in his story, and I want to keep the tale’s momentum alive. Since it lacks the ticking clock that some of my other works are constrained by though, the most I can reasonably promise is to put in the work when time allows. Without any real idea how much that will be, this goal represents an intent for best efforts without a specific time frame in mind.
5. Mystery Project(s):
As much as I like the transparency and ease of having these posts as a single place to point whenever folks ask what I’m working on, some projects work better when not announced beforehand. Now this is nothing really new, I’ve had secret projects before, most commonly when I’m working with a publisher and don’t have full go-ahead to share details yet.
Usually I can space them out in a schedule well enough to hide their existence, but this year a few things are on the docket, enough to where I felt it was appropriate to address the lowered output. By the end of the year, I think I’ll be able to talk about a fair bit more, but for now enjoy the fun of wild speculation!
6. New Authors & Dragons Projects:
On top of my usual appearance at Dragon Con and a planned return to Lit-RPG Con, the rest of the Authors & Dragons team and I have been working on something special. Longtime fans might remember we used to have our own yearly convention before Covid and the convention market cost explosion that followed. While it's still not feasible for us to bring that back, we’re all working to try and coordinate something at an existing con.
And I’ve also begun work on a new side game where I’ll once again be the DM.
This one will be infrequent, Dicey Bastards is still going strong, but after a few years on break I’m ready to run a game again and have a very fun idea to turn the idiot brigade loose on.
7. Work on the Super Powereds Web-Comic:
Yes, this is still in the works, and I’ve seen the development firsthand. As with most projects the size of Super Powereds, everything gets expanded to accommodate the sheer scale, and that included the pre-production process.
To be fair, that title is a bit of a misnomer, as it’s actually a lot of other talented folks who are doing the real work of the adaptation; I’m mostly there for consulting and continuity. That’s about all I can really share on it for now, just wanted to reassure folks that it is still coming down the pipeline, even if not at the pace I know a lot of people would prefer.
8. Continue to Develop the Patreon:
It’s now been two years since the revamp, and we actually just underwent our first major alteration, as Thursdays will no longer be the exclusive domain of Author’s Commentary entries. I’ll touch on the new schedule more soon, but the main point here is that one of my goals is to keep adjusting the Patreon so it’s offering content that folks enjoy.
9. Movie Deal:
Tradition is tradition, even as the cinema landscape is shrinking. I take comfort in the fact that my odds were so low to start with, they haven’t measurably lowered even with fewer studios out there making flicks.
Those are my goals for 2026, but I’d love to see yours as well. Leave them in the comments below, and have a great New Year!