I spend a lot of time day dreaming. Usually, it’s strategic day dreaming where I internally steer my thinking to be about Super Penguin and where his story goes next. As I wrote book one, I had most of book two in mind. I’ve struggled at times while writing book two, because I didn’t know what happens next in book three and beyond. (It’s very hard to foreshadow, when the writer isn’t aware of what’s coming down the road!)
This past week, I’ve spent more time daydreaming than I normally do, and at times outside my normal daydreaming time. For example, I had a rough bought of insomnia Tuesday morning, so between the hours of 2 and 3am, I stared at the ceiling fan above our bed and thought about superhero penguins instead of going back to sleep. There was also some planned daydreaming time, mixed in with some meditation and prayer, where I sat in a dimly lit room, played an Apple Music playlist called “Chill” and dreamed about Super Penguin’s future adventures. Last but not least, I bounced some ideas off my buddy, Gardner, too. Gardner is the kind of friend that every dreamer needs. If an idea is dumb, confusing, or defies the laws of physics he’ll tell you it’s dumb, confusing or physics-defying. (Fun fact: if you want to get Gardner fired up about super hero physics, ask him about Ant Man sometime.)
As I dreamed this week, pieces started to fall into place. Some of the pieces, I’ve been carrying for awhile, and I’ve not known where to place them. Others I’ve only had for a few days. But as I arranged the puzzle of Super Penguin’s overarching story, I began to see the bigger picture, and have much more clarity than I did the weeks prior.
I don’t want to ruin anything with spoilers, but I thought it would be fun to share an incredibly vague vision of what’s to come, sort of like how Kevin Feige announces upcoming Marvel movie projects or how James Gunn recently revealed his plans for the rebooted DC move universe. So, here is the planned future for Super Penguin! All the dates are my goals, we’ll see where life takes me and hopefully I can stay on track!
Book 2 (target release date Fall/Winter 2023)–Super Penguin 2. Picking up directly after the events of Super Penguin. The titular character learns how to deal with the aftermath of the events of the first book. New super powered friends join the fray, as well as a mysterious new villain who’s been hiding in plain sight. This book has a few twists that I think will make you want to go back and read the first book. It totally changes so much of Book 1 by showing this one character in a new light.
Book 3 (target release date, Spring/Summer 2025)–Untitled Spin-Off Story. Following the events of Super Penguin 2, two unlikely characters team up on an adventure away from Eagle City. This story idea is the newest in my brain, but I’m very excited about it. My goal is that it will fit nicely in the six-book arch, but that it could also work as a standalone book. Even sharing its title will be very spoilery, so the title will be announced after Super Penguin 2 is released.
Book 4 (target release date, Spring/Summer 2027)–Super Penguin 3. As Super Penguin becomes more popular in Eagle City, more citizens want to be heroes too…some more heroic than others. Some are answering the call and defending the city they love, for others it’s a publicity stunt, or a way to get more followers on social media. Will these new heroes help Super Penguin? Or just get in the way? Book 4 will have many new characters and will be more of a war story than a classic hero vs villain story. Some characters I’ve had set aside for awhile and I haven’t known what to do with them or where to plug them in, this week, I figured out where. I won’t tell you all of them but some of them include: a warthog who looks eerily similar to Rambo named “War-Pig”, the hockey playing turtle Wally Whax will use his hockey stick to fight crime as “Shell-Raiser” and there will be a dolphin in a mech-suite. This one will be crazy, but I think a lot of fun!
Book 5 (target release date, Spring/Summer 2029)–Untitled Sam Hart & Ricky Boone prequel. My hopes is that this book will be reminiscent of classic buddy cop movies. Set years before the events of Super Penguin. I don’t know a lot about what will happen yet, but I again aim for it to be an important part of the overarching story, but also work as a standalone book.
Book 6 (target release date, Spring/Summer 2031)–Super Penguin 4. I don’t know that this will be the last Super Penguin book, but it will at least be a definitive end to this phase of Super Penguin. There will be a big, bad villain unlike any previous villain, and Super Penguin will reunite with the friends of Book 3 and Book 4 to work together to take down this threat.
What do you think? Let me know in the comments!
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