Despite some recent challenges with the dogs, I finally finished up the first draft of the heavily-rewritten The War of the Ravels, which concludes the story begun in Shards. At almost 50% longer than part one, The War of the Ravels wraps up the contest between Mercy, Kihantroh, and a few new players in the quest to reassemble Tyndallëau’s Heart and put it to use saving the world, or something.
Tag: editing
Finished!
Well, for the one or two readers (both of whom are most likely in the UK) who are still waiting for the follow-up to Dragon Stones (which was once upon a time the #1 best seller on the Kindle fantasy lists in the UK), it is finally finished! The new book, Shards, is part one of a two-part fantasy series, and clocks in at about 111,000 words. For those who are keeping track, that’s somewhat shorter than A Flock of Crows is Called a Murder or Dragon Stones, but longer than Night Watchman or Long Before Dawn. Why release it as two books instead of one? Well …
Where’s Jim?
I’m still here!
If you’ve been following this blog for any length of time, you’ve probably noticed two things in the last few months:
- My posts have slowed down
- The promised edition of Father’s Books is nowhere to be found
These two items are of course closely related. The main reason for both of them is that I’ve been having so much fun writing Dennis’s Diary of Destruction that I haven’t made much headway at all editing Father’s Books for the last couple of months. I’m sure that I’ll finish it eventually, but for now, the adventures of my gullible, narcissistic, grammatically-challenged, slightly paranoid vizsla seem to be taking precedence. Why? Let’s trot out another list:
- Immediate feedback in the form of comments is pretty gratifying
- I’m enjoying the change of writing absurd comedy and slapstick instead of horror (I would say that much of Dennis’s diary still qualifies as fantasy, my other major genre)
- I never made any money off my books anyway
So if you were breathlessly waiting for Father’s Books (that’s okay, I know you weren’t), I apologize for the delay. But in the meantime, can I interest you in some GIMPed pictures and nonsensical conspiracy theories?
Galley Ho!
This is just a short note to let all who may be breathlessly waiting for Dragon Stones know that it has entered what might be called the “galley” phase, where I order finished copies from Lulu.com and go through them with a highlighter to fix any remaining formatting or style issues (at least, things that I consider formatting or style issues). I’ve already been through this process with Long Before Dawn and it probably took about two months, but I expect it to go faster this time now that I’ve already done one. I expect to hit my target of releasing Dragon Stones some time in June, though it won’t be available from book stores until 6-8 weeks after that due to the ISBN lag time.
In the meantime, I’ve started editing my next release, Father’s Books, a ghost story (of sorts) that I wrote after A Flock of Crows. By now I’m sure everyone realizes that I can’t write a “normal” ghost story, but that’s the easiest way to label Father’s Books right now so I’ll stick with it. More information will surely follow!
Viscosity 