Behind The Pages: An In-depth Look Of My Novels

The Outer Red Rebirth

A short story turns into a 4-part book series.

Jun 08, 2025

So, Distant Saga Trilogy wasn’t a rousing success for my first book, but in it, the short story I interjected at the end, was a bigger draw than I realized. Outer Red, was my interpretation of a fairy tale set to sci fi fantasy, and clearly, there was an interest. At least, so I thought. When shifted my author chops onto that one, I was fully committed. I had a clear vision of how the story would go, the characters involved, and try to make a fun adventure for everyone to read. Who doesn’t like a good fairy tale reimagining? I’d seen some other writers taking a stab at the classics, most were in fantasy alone, or dark fantasy set in modern times, but I never really saw anything geared towards a sci fi spin. It wasn’t until I published the first re-worked short into a novella when others started to turn up (Red Rising for example). Interesting that, ain’t it?

**The Original Cover and Card Promotion 2015**

Of course, I’m sure there’s been many interpretations, but mine was more action/Star Wars inspired than any other. Outer Red Part One - Off The Given Path, was about Red, a young commander, piloted her small golden spaceship called, The Goldilocks, with her AI companion, Grimm. They’re on a mission to save the Galactic Kingdom from a rising new threat, one that could spark another Great War amongst the cosmos. It was an ambitious idea, one I wasn’t entirely sure I could fully complete. The only way I could make this easier on myself was to break it up into four or five parts. What had been just a short story in the beginning, was now going to be a sort of mini-series of the first book. Would it work though? Would people even buy it in short stints? I wasn’t sure. Still, I went ahead and gave it a shot. Part one was completed rather quickly (a little too quick) and I placed it on Amazon’s KDP Unlimited.

The book shot up to number one in the first hour of being published on there. I was baffled. I didn’t realize there was an algorithm that would shove it up to top spot due to the genre labeling. I guess the combo of sci fi fairytale was rather unique and brought it to the front of the line. I was thrilled, naturally. But, in the following hours, the book started to drop lower and lower. I guess it managed to properly filter the keywords and brought it below the other top sellers. Bummer… but hey, at least it was number one for a bit, right? The book took many months before being read by anyone. Once I got a few hits, and the reviews came, they were the most harsh and critical responses I’d ever had in my life. They complained about the lack of editing, spellchecking, characters, inconstancy in plot…. on and on. Whew! That was a lot to take in. But, I got their point. I shouldn’t have launched my first draft as a finished product.

So I did my diligence and overhauled the story. I listened to the critics (ego bruised as I was), and tried to launch it again. It did a bit better. Still, the editing thing was a problem for some. I had no editor. I couldn’t afford one. The book was all me, because I just couldn’t spend money that I didn’t have. I did my best. Well, over the months I kept tweaking on it, expanding it, making it a bit longer. That was the bulk of complaints, it was too short. I didn’t realize there was a word limit for certain types of books. Mine was under 20, 000 words. That classified it as a short story, not as a book. Had I made it over or near 30, 000, then it’s classified as a novella or novelette. Good to know. Again, I was new to this whole novel writing world, I hadn’t a clue how to make this work. The learning curve was humbling, to say the least. But still I persisted and tried to perfect the story. Once I was done tinkering, I let it be. In that time, I had another issue, the cover… it sucked. So much so, that it ended up on a website devoted to pointing out bad covers and horrible images. Yikes… So, I tried to re-do the cover, using better images and working more on my graphic art experience, I gave it a whole new look.

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The reviews were few, but they were getting better, and less sarcastic in tone. I needed to reach a broader audience if this book was going to do some sort of sales. Then I remembered the audiobook experience. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to attempt it again, seeing how DST did so poorly. I finally bit the bullet and gave it another shot. This time, I wouldn’t settle on the first person who replied. I allowed multiple voice actor/producers to give it a go. That’s when I was contacted by someone from Punch Audio, they wanted to offer me a good deal for profit sharing. I sent them the script, heard the actor, and was horribly disappointed. The man was so flat, so un-involved in the reading, I shot back to them that I was not happy about it. That’s when the owner of the studio contacted me an asked me to give another actor a try. She would be a better fit for the role. I accepted the offer.

Dana Dae was a professional actress, one that knew how to give a better voice acting style and pace. She was great for the book. I loved her voice work and how she interpreted the story. The recording took some doing, apparently they did find some errors, spelling mistakes (again *groan*) and I had to have them fix a few lines that didn’t sound right. But, once that hurdle was over, the audiobook got completed. It launched on Audible, and sold a few copies here and there. The reviews were mixed, but not terribly bad. So… it was a success, sort of. The book was making barely anything, advertising was very non-existent, again, I had no experience on doing that. I researched hard on how to do it, looking at online articles, YouTube videos, and the like. I went on social media to spread the word. It took a bit, but it worked. While the numbers weren't great, it was still enough for me to continue writing the next one–Outer Red Part 2: The Three Little Peggs.

That’s when it started to feel fun to me. I loved writing the story and the characters. I couldn’t wait to flesh out the new novella that I had envisioned. It was funny, quirky, and far more action than the previous part. I’ll go on more about that in my next Substack segment - Who’s Afraid Of The Big Bad Reviews?

Jeff Walker Books

The Outer Red Rebirth

A short story turns into a 4-part book series.

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