So if you've been around here for a while, you probably know that when I first starting writing and publishing I had no idea what I was doing, and quite frankly had no real direction. I just knew that I wanted to write a big fantasy epic.
For the sake of brevity and time, I'll try to make a really long story short.
If you want the TL;DR just scroll to the bottom.
After I'd finished writing Dragon's Fire and moved into writing The Halls of the Fallen King, I realized that I had nothing to offer new potential readers and that THotFK would take a while before it would be ready. I needed to get something out to not only existing but to potential new readers as well. So, I decided that I'd write a prequel that would not only provide some historical context to the world of Aurion. I also wanted to use it as an opportunity to introduce the readers to the magic of the world of Aurion, which you don't get in Dragon's Fire—because those characters are unaware that it even actually exists outside of myth and legend. Thus The Chronicles of Aurion was born.
I wrote a fun little novella that I am actually quite proud of. It's a very unique look at the world's history and it is framed as a story within a story. I took a chance on the delivery of the narrative, but readers love it. I guess it worked out.
But I digress (often), TCoA did serve to provide historical context to the world as well as giving readers a solid introduction to the world's magic. However, the one piece of feedback that I received early on was that they enjoyed reading TCoA after Dragon's Fire. Go figure.
So, I ran with it. And for years I've treated TCoA as the second book in the series, including in all the recommended reading orders I've listed on my website and in the back of my books. However, after taking more time and looking at the books themselves, I realize this was a mistake. TCoA is a fantastic first foray in the world, and it really should be that very first entry point into the world. Now it's certainly possible for readers to just jump into Dragon's Fire and skip TCoA and they'll be okay, but they'll miss a lot of great world building. Then ideally readers will naturally go into Dragon's Fire next, which will naturally take the reader right into the events of The Halls of the Fallen King. Having a small and seemingly random jump from DF into TCoA then back into THotFK just never really seemed to fit right. So now I'm making all the necessary changes across all my books, my website, and even Amazon to update the recommended reading order.
So why the blog article and not just number them 1 through 6?
Ah, and therein lies the rub. Apparently Amazon's series naming and numbering policy have strict limitations on what you can and cannot do. You can only use whole numbers, and those numbers cannot be contradicted anywhere on the cover or descriptions, etc. That's completely reasonable, but it totally prevents me from having a prequel as anything other than Book #1, which means I would have to redo the covers of all my books, because TCoA would then need to be Book #2, etc. I looked at a number of different ways of trying to solve the naming/numbering dilemma, but ultimately the only "right" way to correct the issue will require me to "reskin" the entire series. At this point it's the only way to make sure all the numbering (and ART) across all the books is consistent. That's a pretty pricey undertaking though, so it's best left alone for the moment.
In the future, I think I'll just plan these things out ahead of time.
So without further adieu, here is my own personal recommended reading order. Beating Back the Darkness
The Chronicles of Aurion Dragon's Fire
The Darklight's War (Coming Soon)
Then, of course, there's also...
