History That Never Was

Home of Dawn Vogel: Writer, Historian, Geek

My Steampunk Books

| August 24, 2021

Steampunk is one of my big loves, with it being the genre for my published trilogy and one other book. Brass and Glass: The Cask of Cranglimmering started out as a short story. Then it became a novel. Then, when asked if I had more set in this world, it became a trilogy, with Brass and […]

The Brass and Glass Trilogy

| June 1, 2021

It’s been just over three years since the second book in my Brass and Glass trilogy came out, making it about four years and two years for the other two books. It remains the most ambitious project I’ve completed to date, and it all came from a short story about a wild goose chase for a […]

A Treat for Brass and Glass Fans

| February 9, 2021

Another result of some recent cleaning I’ve been doing was finding the hard copy of a map that I sketched for the Brass and Glass series. It didn’t appear in the books because it never went farther than this very rough sketch, but in case you’ve ever wondered where the various cities in the Brass and Glass […]

My Steampunk Trilogy

| December 31, 2020

As I’m working toward the release of my first stand-alone novel, I don’t want folks to forget about my steampunk trilogy. Though the topics are different, I think people who enjoyed the Brass and Glass series will also like Promise Me Nothing, and if you come into my writing with my young adult urban fantasy, you might […]

Story Arc in a Triology

| May 26, 2020

The nice thing about writing a trilogy or other series is that you can have a story arc that lasts longer than a single book, allowing for a much larger story arc. Taken individually, the books in the Brass and Glass series each have their own arcs: 1) find the Cask; 2) find the map; […]

Fun Steampunk Reads to Pass the Time

| March 19, 2020

If you’re looking for books to read to pass the time, may I recommend my steampunk series, Brass and Glass? It’s action and adventure with an ensemble cast, similar to if Firefly was on an airship. The trilogy is complete, so no need to wait around for the ending, either! You can find all three of them […]

Future Stories in the Brass and Glass World?

| February 13, 2020

I recently received a review on book three of my Brass and Glass trilogy in which the reader was hopeful that I would someday return to this world and write some more. While at the moment, I see Brass and Glass as a completed series, that doesn’t mean I’m against writing shorter fiction set in the same […]

The Brass and Glass Series

| January 16, 2020

I’m very proud of the Brass and Glass series because it’s a series. Most of what I write outside of the Cobalt City universe is stand-alone, so it doesn’t require a lot of double-checking and cross-referencing of what I’ve written before. For this series, I kept track of places and people and things so that the […]

2019 Awards Eligibility

| November 26, 2019

It’s the time of year when folks start posting lists of their stories and books from the past year that are eligible for award nominations. And here are mine! Flash Fiction: “Coffin Coffee Table,” The Journal of Compressed Creative Arts (March 2019). “Brick-Red Love,” The Arcanist (April 2019). Also available in The Arcanist: Year Two. “Safe Haven,” Five Minutes at Hotel […]

Brass and Glass 3!

| November 19, 2019

Have you had a chance to check out Brass and Glass 3: The Boiling Sea yet? I’d love to know what you think of it, and of the trilogy as a whole! You can find the ebook and print books online, and you can leave reviews at Goodreads, Amazon, or wherever you’ve bought your copy! Or, […]