Well, things are happening!

My editor at Creative James Media fell in love with ‘Scales & Stingers’ and finished the edits! She’s someone who has no idea what D&D is, or reads a lot of fantasy, yet she connected with the characters and the story. For me, this is great news. It means there’s a chance that my readership for the series is bigger than I thought it might be.

I got the file back on Friday, along with instructions to make changes and send a clean copy back by June 1st. Next step is copy/line editing. There’s 3 books ahead of mine, so there wasn’t a rush. I tried to explain that to my anxiety, but it wasn’t having any of that.

I worked them some on Friday, after work. Had a wonderful phone call with the editor, cleared up a couple of comments. Let her know about a continuity issue I’d found and how it got fixed.

By Sunday afternoon, the edits were incorporated. Rewrites on a few sections done. And it was back with the team at CJM.

I took another look at ‘Shield & Scepter’. Yup, that same continuity issue. This is part of the problem with being a pantser. The spots weren’t problematic when I wrote those books. Something that happens toward the end of ‘Sword & Soul’, however, made them red flags in my mind. Scenes where a small detail had been overlooked when it came to Jinaari and his paladin Order. Fixed the problem, sent the file in again. With a promise I’d stop tweaking it.

I hope. I mean, I have finished the trilogy so there’s not going to be any huge (for me, anyway) issues that suddenly crop up. The urge to tweak is, sadly, something that never quite goes away. There’s always the itch to fix a line, make a description better.

What do I do to combat that? I start another book. And I’ve decided what comes next. I’m going to write a prequel of sorts. It’s time for the story of how the Gods of Avoch became such.

Will I start this week? Highly unlikely. The strike’s still ongoing, to the best of my knowledge, but I’ve got a ton of work that needs doing. I’ll be working four, if not five, days this week. But my brain’s already figuring out which God will be the main focus. How to start the story. And the logistics of where they’re from and how they come together as a group.

I’ll probably build a new playlist sometime this week. Thia’s story is over. Will there be a lot of carryover? Probably. But it’s still going to be different.

If nothing else, it gives me an outlet for my creative energy until things happen with ‘Scales & Stingers’. We’re still six months from the cover art reveal. Eight months until pre-orders can happen. And eleven from release.

My fingers have to stay busy.

BB/Chan Eil Eagal Orm