[Today, we sit down with AJ Drummond, author of the just-released dark fantasy, Penance of Blood. Here, he discusses the development of the book, and his upcoming projects.]

Forests Haunted by Holiness: You just published Penance of Blood, the first book in a new fantasy series. First, congratulations! Second, you initially released Penance of Blood on Royal Road. Why that platform? Did you find this technique — serialization to stand-alone publication — satisfying? And do you think this technique will work for others?

AJ Drummond: I originally went into writing wanting to do serialized web fiction. There were actually other projects before this one, a lot of false starts and half baked ideas that I ended up dropping. Part of the draw was that I’ve always liked serialized fiction. I was a fan of web serials like Worm and A Practical Guide To Evil around the time I was finishing up college, and they were sort of an epiphany for me, this idea that I could work on and share a story with a public readership without the stresses and uncertainties of publishing.

Given that, I had a lot of false starts. I wanted a project I could and would invest in for the long haul, with the understanding that it might take me years to finish it and that I needed to keep up on a posting schedule while telling a satisfying story. I chose Royal Road after shopping around for places I could post my work, and originally I tried just using a private website, but it proved impossible to actually draw readership to it at the time. RR seemed to have a good interface and a large community, and I read that classic fantasy did have a niche space on the site. I did not expect or necessarily want Oathbreaker (the name of the series on Royal Road) to be picked up for publishing, and I actually almost rejected the offer when Podium reached out to me, because I went in wanting to do web fiction on my own terms without any other hands involved. It wasn’t until discussion with friends and family and the surprisingly relaxed way the publisher interacted with me, that I made the decision to go through with it. I still get to do my web serial, and am still posting chapters multiple times a week even as we’re in the process of adapting the early arcs into publication. I also enjoyed the excuse to create revised, better edited versions of a story that was ultimately a rough draft in its original form.

As for whether I’d recommend this for others, it entirely depends. Keeping up on a posting schedule week to week is important to maintain a readership and can be exhausting, though I find it keeps me committed to the work.

FHBH: Penance of Blood opens in the aftermath of a terrible supernatural war. Your protagonist, Alken, is a “disgraced paladin.” Without spoiling too much for your readers, can you tell us how Alken came to be disgraced? And does he have any hope of redeeming himself?

AJD: Unfortunately the situation that Alken finds himself in does involve a lot of spoilers. One of the things I wanted early on was to write about a character with a deep and complex history, because it seemed fun to me to reveal that history piecemeal as the narrative progressed. It was one of the things that’s kept me going through a lot of the story, the anticipation of adding another clue, another piece to the puzzle that is Alken. He’s a troubled guy with a troubled past, and there are elements of his character that are still developing and being revealed even about a million words into my plot.

What I can say is that the situation he’s found himself in is to a large degree due to his own choices and the consequences of those choices. As for redemption, that’s also a tricky question. What does he actually want to be redeemed of, and what does that redemption look like? Does he even understand it himself? It’s a big question across the whole story.

FHBH: Can you give us a hint as to what sort of dangers Alken faces in Pennace of Blood? Monsters? Evil enchanters? Vile warlords?

AJD: I’ve tried to incorporate a large menagerie of fantasy whatsits across the series, and I provide a decent number in the first book I think. I didn’t want to break the mold with the setting of Penance, so a lot of it is referencing classical fantasy and “dnd” tropes. There are ghouls, demons, elves, ghosts, evil wizards, vampires — all the stuff you might expect in a world like this, but in most cases I’ve tried to put my own spin on them. One element I play with is that Alken’s job is as an executioner tasked with hunting down other humans who’ve crossed certain lines, and a major theme across the story is that humanity often creates its own monsters. Literally, in some cases ….

FHBH: Where can readers find your book?

AJD: Right now the best place to grab the story is at Podium’s website, where I can be found under A.J. Drummond and my first book can be searched by the title of either the book or the series; Penance of Blood or Oathbreaker respectively. That will give you all the links to the different sellers. It’s being sold on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Bookshop, and Audible right now. The audiobook is narrated by Raphael Corkhill, who did an incredible job. Once people are done with the first book, they’re also free to head to Royal Road and continue the series from the second arc, and it’s all free and public there. Eventually, each arc will get removed from RR for the publishing treatment, and since they’re my own original drafts they won’t be quite as clean since they lack the publisher’s editing runs. Books 2 and 3 (arc 2 and 3 on Royal Road) are slated to get stubbed and published later this year.

FHBH: What other projects are you working on?

AJD: Right now I’m very busy just keeping up on Oathbreaker‘s continued story. We’re in arc 8 right now, and last time I checked I’m hovering around a million words on the saga total. I release 2-3 chapters a week for the readers who keep up on it, and that can take a lot of time in addition to a full time hourly job.

I’m hoping to cut back on my day job soon so I can dedicate more time to other projects I have on the backburner, which do include other book/web serial ideas. I also run and play a lot of TTRPGs with my friends, so I keep a pretty full plate creatively speaking. I’m also still working with the publisher to get books 2 and 3 ready to go in 2026.