Steel Reign (Author Interview)




Steel Reign looks like a great science fiction book. Any plans to turn this into a series? 
Steel Reign represents a segue novel that will connect the two worlds of my Scifi Universe of THE RED GEMINI CHRONICLES. It takes place in a nearby galaxy called Proxima Centauri, where two twin Red Dwarf stars have gone Supernova and merged with one another. This happened in the previous series called THE STAR-CROSSED SAGA, which won multiple awards for science fiction, including Readers’ Favorite, CLS International Book Awards, and Literary Titan Book of the month. This was a trilogy that spanned both Proxima Centauri and our galaxy, The Milky Way. Once it was completed, the main characters of the story, William and Sydney, relocated back to Proxima Centauri on William’s homeworld of Fabricius. That's where William now reigns as the king and faces challenges from the neighboring five Houses and mercenary factions spread across ten Inner and Outer Colony planets. They would all love to conquer Fabricius since it has the most optimal living conditions and, therefore, prime resources. 
I was inspired to write Steel Reign’s story because once I finished with THE STAR-CROSSED SAGAS TRILOGY of books, PROTOSTAR, SUPERNOVA, and SOLSTICE, I wanted to build out this fabricated universe of mine and I needed to have a fulcrum on which to work from. Steel’s character was so impressive that I chose to build an exposition narrative through him to smoothly transition readers into the next phase of my storytelling. Steel Reign is a Bounty Hunter that was introduced in THE STAR-CROSSED SAGA and had a growing character story arc in book three SOLSTICE. The story, in particular, STEEL REIGN: FLIGHT OF THE STARSHIP CONCORD, builds on his character development and provide more history of Proxima Centauri and sets up the more extensive series that I am working on called THE RED GEMINI CHRONICLES, which I compare to a Game of Thrones in Space.  

What can you tell us about the main character, Steel Reign? 
Like the tagline of the book says, Steel Reign was a spy, turned thief, and then turned hero (a reluctant one at that), who helped to fight back the Dagmans Clan in THE STAR-CROSSED SAGA. He now finds himself in a race for his life as he attempts to free his long-lost sister Olia from the clutches of a Space Pirate while trying to save himself from a dangerous disease he contracted over the years that is threatening to take his life. In an attempt not to give much of the story away, Reign is a complex character who was an orphan early in life and never quite found his sense of purpose. That is, until being recruited by the Thieves and Spy guild, where he found sanctuary in a surrogate family of similar members. As he developed over the years, Reign came into his own and followed a tattered path, where he built a laundry list of regrets and pain from experiences through rogue missions that he participated in.   

Why did you decide to become a writer, and is there any crossover between your other books? 
I was called to be a writer back in 2010 during a Sunday service at church. I was in a bit of a rut, working my gig as a full-time physical therapist and the preacher said that God was talking to him and was telling him that He wanted to use someone to do something special, and use it as a testimony of what can be done when someone acts on faith. So I started praying and asking God what He wanted me to do, and I distinctly heard Him say, ‘write a book.’
Up to his point, I had never written anything in my life, and the idea of taking on such an arduous task was daunting, to say the least. But after sketching out a quick outline on the back of one of the pamphlets at church, I went home and did the diligence of researching what it all entailed. And before you know it, I was on my way. Three months later, I was looking at a 90 thousand word rough draft of PROTOSTAR. 

How did you come up with the story in Steel Reign? 
Who doesn’t love a bad guy, turned good, right? It’s the original prose of writing where you try to force the reader into believing the unthinkable and fall in love with either the character or the story. Reign gave me a chance to do both since I had already built out THE STAR-CROSSED SAGA and was looking to glue things together in a separate transition novel. Reign had been introduced as a badass character, hat you weren’t sure you could trust when he is introduced in SOLSTICE, but then you soon realize he’s the real deal and you quickly cling to him. A lot of readers of THE STAR-CROSSED SAGA expressed that they wanted to know more about him, so it seemed very obvious of the direction in which I would go to fuse more of the story of Proxima Centauri along. 

Did anything stick out as particularly challenging when writing Steel Reign? 
The challenge in scripting Steel Reign’s story was finding the right amount of conflict to continually move the story along while trusting that the readers love both the Sci-Fi world I was building out and remaining attached to Reign and not getting lost in the details. But since I, fell in love with the world on my own, the transition began to develop with increased ease over time. The duality between Reign and the galaxy of Proxima Centauri – a complex world, ever-changing, while containing equal parts volatility and predictability – was quite remarkable in the end.  

What do you like to do when not writing? 
I’m an avid gamer – VR is where it’s at right now, and I’m a self-proclaimed movie buff for sure. 

Where can readers find out more about your work? 
You can find out more about me and more works, over 16 novels and novellas, along with multiple screenplays at www.braxtoncosby.com and my publishing company, run and owned by me and my wife Shontel Cosby at www.cosbymediaproductions.com. You can also follow me at the links below on social media:
Instagram:
braxtonacosby
Twitter:
@BraxtonACosby
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