How to Read the Dwellers and Country Sagas

As the release of the 7th and final book, The Earth Dwellers, in my combined Dwellers/Country Sagas looms closer, I'm getting tons of questions on how to read the combined series. Do you read all three Dwellers books, and then the Country Saga? Or can you read the Country Saga first, and then the Dwellers series? Or, if you're feeling particularly crazy, can you alternate reading a book in each series until you get to the end?

The Answer: Those are all valid options!

The way it works is that the Dwellers and Country Sagas are sister series, which means that they take place in the same overall world (sort of) and time (mostly), but that the characters, settings, and plotlines are completely different. They're different series, so to speak.

HOWEVER...

At some point THE TWO SERIES COME TOGETHER! That's right, the characters meet, the plots merge, the action of both series becomes one book, called The Earth Dwellers, which comes out on September 5th everywhere ebooks are sold and in print on Amazon.com.

So the short answer is that you can read the books in any order that you want, and they won't spoil each other. There's no real benefit to reading either one of the series first. So just pick the first one that looks interesting, and get reading! And don't stop until you've read all six books in the two series and you're ready for the release of The Earth Dwellers. Trust me, it's going to be epic!!

Here's a full list of the books you need to read to catch up:

 

The Dwellers Saga:

1- The Moon Dwellers

2- The Star Dwellers

3- The Sun Dwellers

 

The Country Saga:

1- Fire Country

2- Ice Country

3- Water & Storm Country

ENJOY and I can't wait to see your reviews of each book on Goodreads and Amazon.com!!!

My Literary Agent Story!

I’ve got HUGE news today, the BIGGEST NEWS yet for my three-year-old writing career. Today, on August 6^th of 2013, I’ve got an agent! *double happy dance with an ill-advised attempt at a breakdancing move*

I am now a client of Andrea Hurst& Associates, an awesome and experienced literary agency that I’ve been stalking…ahem, I mean querying for over two years. Well, all the hard work paid off when I accepted Andrea’s offer of representation TODAY!

Andrea Hurst is an amazing author and incredible literary agent with tons of experience finding publishers for her author clients. She’ll be working with me to expand the audience for the combined Dwellers/Country Sagas (all seven books), developmentally revise the books, and land a publisher to take my career to the next level. So first I just want to say THANKYOUTHANKYOUTHANKYOU to Andrea for believing in me enough to take a chance on me and my books.

Next, for those interested, I’d love to tell the story of how I landed my first ever literary agent. Here goes…

It all started on a cold and rainy night many years ago…wait, sorry, wrong story. Bad author habit…

No, it started two and half years ago on a sunny day in Sydney, Australia. I’d recently written my first ever YA trilogy and the first book in my Nikki Powergloves children’s series, and I was full of confidence and energy. I was going to be the next bestselling author! No one could stop me!

So I started querying every last YA literary agent I could find. Surely one of them would like my ideas, my writing, my stories……right? Uh, not exactly. The rejections came in swiftly and knee-deep. Each one was like a stab to the gut, leaving me exhausted and frustrated. Those agents wouldn’t even take the time to write out a personalized rejection! They were form letters!

My confidence waned.

Enter Andrea Hurst, who might just be the female version of Clark Kent. Literary agent by day and superhero by night! She agreed to read Nikki Powergloves and provide me with feedback, even if she was unable to offer me representation for my children’s books. She read my book and loved it! We had a Skype call and she said super nice things about my writing style and the raw talent I had that just needed to be honed (like really really honed). She gave me barrels of tips and advice and sent me on my way.

I soaked her advice up like a sponge, and worked on my craft, churning out a new book every couple of months. I ceaselessly queried and watched as the rejections from literary agents and publishers piled up, climbing well over fifty. I received a couple of full manuscript requests only to have them rejected in the final rounds. My skin grew thicker. I should have been frustrated, but I wasn’t…because Andrea said I had talent; she was the only agent to give me the time of day.

I wrote the Dwellers Saga, then the Country Saga, and after months of giving away free books, promoting the heck out of them, and getting a whole lot of generous and selfless support from my growing group of readers, the series started to sell. Like really sell. TheMoon Dwellers began hitting the top ten on many lists of favorite dystopian books and books to read if you like The Hunger Games. Things were about as good as I could expect them to be without an agent. But they were about to get better.

Three things happened that pushed my books to higher highs:

First, a Buzzfeed article was published that listed 15 Series to Read if you Enjoyed The Hunger Games, and guess what? The Dwellers Saga was number 15! The other 14 were awesome bestselling series by big published YA authors. This did wonders for my sales and visibility.

Second, The Moon Dwellers began consistently being listed on the Kindle bestseller lists for YA dystopian, action and adventure, swords and magic, and science fiction books.

Third, Andrea Hurst was contacted by a film production company who was interested in the film option for The Moon Dwellers and who thought she was my literary agent! Of course, she wasn’t; at least, not yet.

Andrea contacted me to tell me about the inquiry and we restarted a two-year-old dialogue about possible representation. I filled her in on everything I’d been doing, my small successes, how I’d grown my social networking platform and Goodreads Fan Group (shout out to the 1,600+ awesome people I chat with every day!), and she was impressed.

What felt like two seconds later, she offered me full representation for my Dwellers and Country Sagas woot woot! Best. Day. Ever. Adele and I celebrated and laughed and hugged and a lot of silliness ensued, and then, when we’d calmed down, we read through the contract and agreed to it! So now, almost three years and more than 1.1 million words later, I’ve got a literary agent!!

I couldn’t be happier having Andrea and her team as my agents. I have no doubt that together we’re going to create something special. Thank you to everyone who has stood by me and supported me as I’ve grown as an author and person. I consider each and every one of you my friends, and I’m so glad to be sharing this journey with you.

I can’t wait to see what the future holds!

David Estes

The Earth Dwellers Cover Reveal!

I'm extremely pleased and excited to reveal the cover for the 7th and final book in the COMBINED Dwellers and Country Sagas! The book is called The Earth Dwellers and will bring together characters and plotlines from both series!! A HUGE thanks to my incredible cover artist, Tony Wilson at Winki Pop Design, for creating yet another BEAUTIFUL and ARTISTIC cover that perfectly emulates the series. Tony has designed all four covers in the Dwellers Saga, as well as the four covers for my Children's series, Nikki Powergloves. Take a look!

 

 

It's beautiful, right? I hope you all love it as much as I do! Now, for information about the book, The Earth Dwellers. It comes out on September 5th, so just around the corner! For those of you who are wondering what you need to read in order to get ready for the release, I'd STRONGLY advise that you read BOTH the Dwellers Saga (The Moon Dwellers, The Star Dwellers, The Sun Dwellers) and the Country Saga (Fire Country, Ice Country, Water & Storm Country) prior to reading The Earth Dwellers. Otherwise you will be VERY confused :)

 

Here's the synopsis:

 

All your old favorite characters from both the Dwellers and Country Sagas come together in an epic 7th book!

When President Borg Lecter threatens to wipe all four native tribes off the face of the earth, Adele designs a plan that will send her deep into the belly of the beast.

At the same time, Dazz must convince the new ice country consortium to the Unity Alliance, a pact with the Tri-Tribes that may be their only hope of survival.

Meanwhile, Tristan is forced to face his greatest challenge, the unification of the Tri-Realms, in an attempt to garner support against Lecter and the earth dwellers.

Finally, Siena and the Tri-Tribes march on the Glass City in an attempt to take the fight to Lecter and his army of killers.

The entire world, both under and above the earth's surface, sits on the edge of a knife. Will the efforts of Adele, Tristan, Dazz, and Siena be enough to save the ones they love?

_________

 

Thanks SO MUCH for all the incredible support, the last month has been an epic ride for me as The Dwellers Saga has really taken off, getting positive publicity on Buzzfeed as well as reaching the top 100 bestsellers in 4 Amazon Kindle genre bestseller lists! I couldn't have done any of it without ALL OF YOU!

 

Oh, and by the way, I've got some other BIG NEWS coming soon, I can't wait to tell you!! Stay tuned ;)

 

David Estes