{"id":7356,"date":"2026-02-11T07:56:28","date_gmt":"2026-02-11T12:56:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.dremadeoraich.com\/?p=7356"},"modified":"2026-02-11T08:19:31","modified_gmt":"2026-02-11T13:19:31","slug":"the-chronicles-of-jenny","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.dremadeoraich.com\/index.php\/2026\/02\/11\/the-chronicles-of-jenny\/","title":{"rendered":"The Chronicles of Jenny"},"content":{"rendered":"

I\u2019ve decided to kill a fan.<\/p>\n

In fact, she paid good money to charity for this chance, so I don\u2019t feel guilty. And the planning is half the fun \u2013 for both of us.<\/p>\n

But I wanted to document the process, so I\u2019m sharing Jenny\u2019s story here with you all as we go along. Here\u2019s what happened.<\/p>\n

At MarsCon<\/a> last month, Michael Khandelwal of The Muse<\/a> suggested something a little different when I donated my usual full set of books to the charity auction. \u201cWhy don\u2019t you,\u201d he suggested, \u201cdonate the chance for the winner to get a character named after them\u2014and killed off\u2014in your next book?\u201d<\/p>\n

I hadn\u2019t thought of that before. But it was a great idea, so I said sure. I\u2019d do that.<\/p>\n

\"AI dropped off my books, as usual, along with a slip of paper describing my rather atypical auction offering, and went about my business at the Con. I\u2019d already met Jenny, who was in charge of the charity auction donations; she was right next to my vending table in the dealer\u2019s room. We\u2019d chatted a bit and seemed to hit it off right away.<\/p>\n

Fast forward to Saturday night when Michael texted me to say the auction was beginning, and I should come right away to the presentation room. I hustled over and let them know I was there, so when it was my turn for Enthe\u00f3phage<\/em><\/a> to be on the auction block, Michael described the book, then called me up to the podium to describe the rest of the offering.<\/p>\n

I stepped forward and spoke into the mic, watching faces in the audience light up as I said, \u201cIf you win, I will name a character after you\u2026\u201d The audience got even more excited when I went on to say, \u201c\u2026and then kill them off in my next book.\u201d Audience volume rose as people began to excitedly discuss the possibilities of that. I loved the reaction, but I wasn\u2019t watching the sidelines. Not at first. I was focused on the audience, where I expected the bids to come from.<\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t until I stepped aside to stand near Jenny\u2014the auction coordinator\u2014that I realized bids would also come from the sidelines, including staff. The bidding started at $50, immediately got lively, and quickly grew into a bidding war. Jenny was determined to get that prize and finally won with a bid that went far higher than I expected. (All proceeds went to the Virginia Beach Animal Shelter, so it was for a great cause.)<\/p>\n

When Michael declared Jenny the winner, she was ecstatic. I\u2019d never seen anyone so excited about winning an auction before! This would have been fun anyway, but it\u2019s proving even more of an exciting project given her enthusiasm.<\/p>\n

The Nexus trilogy, which will follow the Founder\u2019s Seed trilogy<\/a> through the eyes of different characters, is next on my plate. Book 1 will feature Jenny’s “demise,” so I told her a bit about it, and its history. She\u2019s got the full Founder’s Seed trilogy on her TBR list now and will be reading it soon so she\u2019s up to date on the storyline, the Founder\u2019s Seed universe, and some of the related characters.\"Two<\/p>\n

The first Nexus book is already drafted, but needs a lot of fleshing out, so the first task was to find a good place for Jenny\u2019s character. I looked it over, found a perfect role, and ran it past her. She loved the idea! I sent her a questionnaire to help me flesh out the character details and match them to her as much as I can, and she\u2019s returned her answers, so now I can start to create Jenny the character. I\u2019ve already started finding spots early in the book (from the very first chapter) where I can start introducing the new player and making her part of the story. The real-life Jenny and I chatted recently via Zoom to iron out any lingering details and get a feel for where I\u2019m going. Also? I have Jenny\u2019s permission to share this story with you all, so I\u2019ll be blogging about our process throughout, whenever I have a few minutes here or there to bring you up to date.<\/p>\n

I expect to be quite busy in the next few months with vending and travel, so the Jenny integration and second draft of this novel will no doubt be slow. But if you want to ride along while I journal about the \u201ckilling\u201d of a fan\/character, stay tuned. It promises to be fun!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I\u2019ve decided to kill a fan. In fact, she paid good money to charity for this chance, so I don\u2019t feel guilty. And the planning is half the fun \u2013 for both of us. But I wanted to document the process, so I\u2019m sharing Jenny\u2019s story here with you all as we go along. Here\u2019s…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7356","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog-posts"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8n0kX-1UE","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":310,"url":"https:\/\/www.dremadeoraich.com\/index.php\/2017\/09\/04\/learning-by-doing\/","url_meta":{"origin":7356,"position":0},"title":"Learning by Doing","author":"DremaDeoraich","date":"September 4, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"Most targets for our submissions, whether they be online zines, print magazines or book\/novel publishers, do not offer any sort of feedback when they send rejections. I understand why. With so many queries and submissions, and slush piles that may sometimes seem to rival Mt. Everest, there isn\u2019t enough time\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Blog Posts"","block_context":{"text":"Blog Posts","link":"https:\/\/www.dremadeoraich.com\/index.php\/category\/blog-posts\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":441,"url":"https:\/\/www.dremadeoraich.com\/index.php\/2017\/11\/06\/critical-mass\/","url_meta":{"origin":7356,"position":1},"title":"Critical Mass","author":"DremaDeoraich","date":"November 6, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"I wrote about critiquing once before (Like Minds and Other Sounding Boards, May 22, 2017), and said at the time that it is hard to sit and listen to people critique your baby, the words you\u2019ve sweat and bled over. Now I\u2019m back on that topic to change my tune.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Blog Posts"","block_context":{"text":"Blog Posts","link":"https:\/\/www.dremadeoraich.com\/index.php\/category\/blog-posts\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":931,"url":"https:\/\/www.dremadeoraich.com\/index.php\/2018\/07\/16\/fear-of-revisions-you-can-do-it\/","url_meta":{"origin":7356,"position":2},"title":"Fear of Revisions: You Can Do It!","author":"DremaDeoraich","date":"July 16, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"Last week I mentioned that my fiction intensive class (with author Lydia Netzer) would be critiquing the first 25% of my manuscript. Everyone said they loved it. Many offered specifics on what they loved and why, as well as what drew them in. 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Themis, Kara and Vincent have become parade attractions, t-shirt slogans and action figures while the science team continues to probe Themis for new technologies. Everyone\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Reviews"","block_context":{"text":"Reviews","link":"https:\/\/www.dremadeoraich.com\/index.php\/category\/reviews\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.dremadeoraich.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/WakingGods-197x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":4573,"url":"https:\/\/www.dremadeoraich.com\/index.php\/2024\/07\/12\/jack-and-anna-new-scourge-rising\/","url_meta":{"origin":7356,"position":4},"title":"Jack And Anna: New Scourge Rising","author":"DremaDeoraich","date":"July 12, 2024","format":false,"excerpt":"By R.S. Penney \u00a9 June 3, 2024, Next Chapter ASIN: B0D62DV7FL Kindle Version, file size 1704 KB Jack and Anna are special agents with special powers, bonded with symbionts and out to save the worlds. 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