With Pride in the Highlands\u2019 annual week long celebration here, R.C. Hannah, a queer author who grew up in Haliburton County, says he will be back in town this weekend promoting his latest fictional work, Warforged.<\/p>\n
Set in an entirely different universe from his post-apocalyptic thriller Death and Red Trilliums Haliburton \u2013 Book One, which was released last summer, Hannah\u2019s latest novel kickstarts a brand-new sci-fi series.<\/p>\n
The 353-page Warforged was published in May and is geared towards young adults, said Hannah, real name Codie Hunt.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s like a flashy sci-fi that takes place inspace completely detached from the dark and gritty. I had a little fun with the writing, I had to do a ton of research because for readers of the genre, if the science doesn\u2019t check out it kind of takes them out of the book,\u201d Hannah said.<\/p>\n
The protagonist, Crash McDuff, is a pilot and \u201cprofessional pain in the ass,\u201d Hannah said. After being captured by the Trask Imperium, he\u2019s sent behind enemy lines to gather intel for a war he isn\u2019t sure he agrees with. Previously thinking he was incapable of love, McDuff struggles to navigate a romance that was never part of his mission.<\/p>\n
Hannah said the book is the first installment of a planned trilogy.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s also working on the second feature of Death and Red Trilliums, while a two-book romance duology is also percolating.<\/p>\n
For some fiction writers, juggling three different worlds would be a practical impossibility \u2013 but Hannah said it\u2019s
something he\u2019s basically been doing his entire life.<\/p>\n
\u201cI have horrible insomnia. For years, I would tell stories in my head to fall asleep. Then, one day, I decided I\u2019d try writing some of them down. I have had a bazillion ideas, so I figured some of them are solid enough that I could flesh them into a book,\u201d Hannah said.<\/p>\n
He spent a year on his first novel, which has performed well since it was published in May 2024. He\u2019s sold over 400 copies, released a hardback copy and recorded an audio book.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt definitely was a surprise \u2013 a debut novel from an unknown author, there\u2019s like a 90 per cent chance it\u2019s going to disappear into the ether. There are thousands of books published everyday, but it did really well,\u201d Hannah said. \u201cIt motivated me to keep pursuing the dream.\u201d<\/p>\n
Running his own furniture delivery company in the GTA provides Hannah the opportunity to set his own schedule.
Business has been good since launching in 2018, allowing him, now, to dedicate more time to his writing.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s aiming to release Death and Red Trilliums Haliburton \u2013 Book 2 later this year. It picks up from where readers left Cody Thomas, a Haliburton man navigating life in an undead Highlands region. The next installment will take place in the County and Fenelon Falls.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m starting to expand the circle of what we\u2019re seeing in the world,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Hannah will have a booth at Rainbow Streetfest in Minden Aug. 24, where he will be selling copies of his two books.<\/p>\n
Commenting on the recent rebranding of Pride in the Highlands, from Minden Pride, Hannah felt it was a positive, long overdue move.<\/p>\n
\u201cTo see that the whole area has expanded and become a part of this is great \u2013 there\u2019s a lot of things slipping the other way right now socially, so I\u2019m glad to see that at least my hometown is stepping forwards instead
of backwards,\u201d Hannah said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"With Pride in the Highlands\u2019 annual week long celebration here, R.C. Hannah, a queer author who grew up…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":87673,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[353,49,48,75],"class_list":["post-87672","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-books","tag-books","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-entertainment"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87672","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=87672"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87672\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/87673"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=87672"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=87672"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=87672"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}