originally posted by Marcel
Please bring your Books in German(y) too!!
originally posted by Julie
Hi Janny
Thank you for exemplifying what help and kindness looks like. Its really so easy isn't it? My husband calls our elderly neighbors everytime he goes shopping (at least several times a week) since their children are not always available.
My hospital unit became the covid-19 ward several weeks ago. Fortunately, we have had time to prepare for a surge that our incredible colleagues in New York, China, and Europe did not have. We have also seen the positive effects of social distancing. Patients coming in for non-covid emergencies are able to be seen and treated without competition for resources. Hopefully this scenario will continue.
Stay well everyone!
Julie, is there anything I can do for you, your work at the hospital must be incredibly hard! I am glad to hear you are able to meet the needs of those that need care, may that continue!
In addition to the list above, we have planted and deer proofed the garden. I'd let it go with the deer population explosion, too hard to keep them from eating it, but since I had jump standards and hog wire in storage, seemed a good use for the gear. Now if the weather will only co-operate.
Stay well! And take care, Julie.
Marcel - I would love nothing more than to see the books available in Germany…an offer on the table would be so uplifting! I will keep you posted.
I have an art deadline to attend to…so at least paying work for the near term.
originally posted by Julie
Janny:
Thank you so much for your offer but we are doing well at our medical center(yay social distancing) and the outpouring of local support has been amazing (and fattening).
Any chance of another sneak peak?
Be well everyone
…shuffle shuffle whisper…
Hear that?
That was twenty five sweated over pages hitting the cutting room floor.
Why? (I like to torture myself, nope. NOPE!)
The framing and staging was wrong, wrong, wrong. Every bit of the written events were correct - they HAPPEN - but - reading them as they were was not gonna cut it (booooring!) The actions in them had to be led up to and framed in another way to give the developments the vivid context they require.
So: remedy: Rip apart the last one line pastiche view at the end of Chapter 5/rewrite it with a different spin to CONNECT to stage the opening of Ch 6. CHANGE THE TIME LINE to six months sooner, it wasn't working - the time line was just screwing things royally, slowing down what didn't need to be drawn out and speeding UP stuff that has to come on strong with tension/earlier on.
Then fit the new frame to OPEN that can of worms and 'place' the events into a much, much more tensioned context - won't feel like 'marking time' or showing you character stuff you have ALREADY SEEN BEFORE. Ugh. I cannot stand retreading what is KNOWN GROUND.
And - fit THAT into a 'moving' of other upcoming events - juxtapose THIS denouement with THAT collision of forces - and thread the staging for THOSE into THIS chapter set…set the ground for - OMG! You'll see…
It's just - closing down the last volume. I HAVE outlines for each plot thread's resolution - know where they're going/roughly when they occur - but fitting them INTO each other, nesting the little dolls into ORDER of play to make the explosive impacts foreshadowed, then strong with a BANG!..I just cannot dally around with this bit and that bit tinkering along in a linear structure - EACH chapter has to move ALL the pieces into play, and when which bit gets denued HAS TO SET BACK into other moving parts, in fact, solving this has to hinder THAT, or you just get a syrupy little milk run without surprise or tension.
It took me a LONG time to 'nest' the seeds for the entire series into volume I and in many cases, there just Wasn't a straightforward way to present everything to make the building tension UNSTOPPABLE.
Whelp. This is that 'problem' seen through the wide end of the telescope to the narrow - With the expectation that THIS BOOK WILL TOP EM ALL. And it will. As it MUST. It has to unspool with a relentless cascade that does not PAUSE for a shilly shally moment.
Fitting the frigging pieces together Just SO, so that it all builds and finales with out SAG and BAG - lacing the denuements in that outline INTO themselves like you expect from an Arc Finale - it's damned HARD. Arc IV was damned hard; Arc V is killing it hard. But! It is HAPPENING.
It is not at ALL that I don't know where I'm going - it's HOW the steps slide one into the next, that order is CRUCIAL. Nothing, then, can be written without advancing or knowing IN DEPTH - where ALL of the pieces are current - or - there's just words tossed on the cutting room floor. Ruthless care. Every step.
Happy Day. In resolving the slog in this chapter, I've also SOLVED some other bits and fitted them into sequence going forward. Nothing lost… The tight wrap for Ch 6 set is spinning into place to stage for 7. It's just - frustrating! There is nothing simple or quick about the process. I wanna have that 'done de book' celebration…but like writing Mistress, it will be cooked when it's really DONE, not a raw mess of slop.
It's not just the words on the current page, but the three foot spread sheet ALL OVER THE FLOOR, and about a billion fragments of notes that all have to fall in line to create the read that will - mwahahaha - deliver it ALL.
Happy trails…I hope to have this bit kicked to the curb pretty soon. Only took a month of brain burn! to plow the ground to seed the beanstalk.
originally posted by Judy
This is why we wait (mostly) patiently for you. We know it will be impeccable once it hits the printing press, with no worries about a letdown and anticipating one whopper of a finish.
originally posted by Neil
Thanks Janny for the update - it was only last night I was reading some of Destiny's conflict…was it really published in 2017?
Really looking forward to this next book…although I fear fitting in SoTM next to the other WaLoS books will end up knocking lord of the rings off the end of my bookcase?! I will need to rearrange my books…or buy a bigger bookcase…but I can live with this.
You sound like you could well be more than a third of the way along and getting some good momentum going…good luck with the remainder of the story…I am hoping for a happy ending for Arithon!
Yes, sigh - it was published in 2017 – I lost a chunk of time to redoing this office (it was a sad, sad garage makeover, with a lot wrong with the construction.) Also lost another chunk to downsizing my Mom's house to get her into assisted living - ALL her accumulated lifetime, and Dad's, the dismantling and dispersal and all the family stuff that entailed. And lost several chunks to artwork - both to make ends meet, and for a book cover/special edition of Daughter of the Empire.
And you got The Gallant, Black Bargain, The Decoy and a few other assorted shorts…
We've also got a political situation that's got everybody's hair on fire…what a see saw whiplash of a three years it has been!!!
The Gallant took a hundred page chunk, and the two shorts, another fifty…but they seemed worth writing, and I HAVE TO do something to keep the publicity wagon rolling, or we don't see any new readership at all.
Thank you if it was one of you here who posted that very NICE!!! review of Hell's Chasm on GR, and the topic review on r/fantasy two days ago - all that helps so very VERY much!!! You have no idea.
And the two discussions kicking up again in the Fantasy Buddy Reads group, ditto. That sort of visibility is PRICELESS, and I do see the stats move when it happens.
The pandemic mess is a horrible snarl in everybody's lives - at least we are used to working from home, so I should not be sidetracked, though lord, the mess of Let's Profit Off This vs. Let's Help Others - the divide and the dissonance is dragging every single creator I know, not to mention everyone else.
Stay safe people, listen to the experts.
Take heart, the nasty long grind is paying off. I have the new framing assembled and tightened down, with only the last bits to refine; then the part on the cutting room floor - what can be salvaged, revamped, will retailor the impact very nicely.
I am closer to having this sequence done than I was at the start of the week. YAY Hallelujia! The subchapter to come ought to fall like a domino, and the midpoint crisis is broached!
Wow, it is so quiet in here, I am concerned everybody is OK!!! (By now, most of us know somebody who's had the virus, and some of us have lost someone, or a family member) Hugs, chin up, I am thinking of you all in this difficult time.
Whew, yay, today I got through the worst of the re-tool on Chapter six main and it is there but for five more odd pages of touch up.
You may be wondering: why all this constant scrapping and sharpening…the series history extends back a whole lot longer than you may realize.
I sold Vol I, Curse of the Mistwraith as a finished book, totally polished up/DONE.
I had existing draft I'd worked on for YEARS - entire volumes - all the way up to Kewar Tunnel in Peril's Gate, including the finishing scenes. Yup. Completely done in draft…a lot of it hand written, or done on a very old manual typewriter. So you see: when I sold the series, I did a LOT of this sort of retooling and revision to that existing work.
Many of the peak scenes in later volumes were dashed out in completed notes - which thinned out to outlines and notations the farther out from Arc III. Many of the peak scenes in Arc IV were well written out and planned, too.
But the farther out from start, the more the notes were not fleshed into scenes because: too much ran before and it was shaky business digging into a final scene in that sort of depth.
There are exceptions…but at this stage, ALL of the work is happening on the page - no coasting on decades of tinkering with draft on the side, as I worked on other, simpler books.
So it is funny to note that I haven't so much 'slowed down' as caught up with myself.
It is immensely happymaking to see the set up/stage of this volume nearly complete/and the tipping point happening.
Today's update complete.
originally posted by Xepheus Shazar
Hi - Greetings and well wishes from New Zealand to everyone here during this truly difficult time. I think we are lucky enough here in NZ (cross fingers) to have missed the full impact of Covid-19 by the mere fact of being a set of islands. But the devastation I see in other nations is truly heartbreaking. My heart goes out to everyone here who has lost loved ones to the virus. May you find comfort at this time in the hands of God, whoever he/she may be to you.
Glad to hear you and yours are well, Janny and things are progressing nicely with the book - very exciting. I know we're all looking forward to the release of the final chapter of this series. I, like so many, love this series and have introduced many a friend and family member to it; my daughter devours your books and is also hanging out to read the final one. Our love of your work means we always have to buy two books every time you release something new! She can't wait for me to read it and then hand it on to her! So know you have 2 guaranteed sales in my house. Any idea of a publication day yet?
Anyway, this is really just a note to all just to say, Be Safe and Be Well.
God Bless.
originally posted by Melanie Trumbull
It was late February of this year when I admitted myself to a mental health clinic in rural New England. I was one of the last people admitted before the pandemic caused the clinic to suspend admissions; new admissions resumed only this month. 'Congregate Housing' such as this in-patient center for long-term residential treatment, is under a 'shelter-in-place' order even when most citizens of this state are simply 'stay-at-home.'
This is an unusual place. This institution, from its beginning, has included this amongst its founding principles: treatment here will always be voluntary, and no patient will be kept here against their will. Fortunately, although I am getting treatment, I am not, nor ever have been, suicidal. But some applicants/patients sadly need to be in a place with locked wards and suicide watches. Some of my fellow patients here required treatment at such places before they could transfer to this clinic, where they have to formally commit to ask for help if they experience a return of an urge to harm themselves.
Having qualified this clinic in that respect, this small institution is still an accredited hospital. They are not used to quarantine here, and yet this place has adapted. We patients, who get really wonderful care here, on occasion have been ill, some of us, however when tested we were always COVID-19 negative, thankfully.
It has been a different story for the clinic staff. They are in no way underpaid but some of them are certainly overworked, and all of them, under stress. None of them have died; but several staff members, taken ill, tested positive for COVID-19 and had to spend weeks recovering.
Because treatment here is voluntary, and because patients here are separated from family and friends, a number of fellow patients have discharged, since the pandemic, earlier than would have happened otherwise: the wrench of being separated from spouses and children was too great in a time of crisis.
Even as rooms were emptying here at the clinic, the medical CEO was receiving pointed e-mail memos from, of all entities, the National Institute of Health, reminding the clinic that it has a mission to fulfill, that there are people who need mental health treatment urgently, and that the clinic MUST re-open and resume new admissions in order to respond to the crisis.
So we admit new patients here and, upon admission, they go straight to the admit wing which has been turned into a fourteen-day quarantine location, and we ongoing patients don't see the new patients except when they use ZOOM technology on their smartphones or computers from the isolation of their little rooms. Their treatment with therapists and psychiatrists is being done in this fashion, remotely. And they are thankful to be here rather than on the outside.
I am beyond fortunate and blessed to be sheltered and cared for here in a time of such extremity. Thanks for listening.
Glad to see the updates for those who posted. Always here for you!! even in the downs, as well as the ups. May the ups get better and brighter.
Where am I?
Getting unburied…I completed ALL the interior art for Grim Oak Press's special edition of Daughter of the Empire. It will be a truly beautiful book, said with a sigh, as someDAY I'd love to see something like this for the series. The Map is just about to be turned in, too, redesigned to mesh with the artistic details of the book…if you love this series, you are in for a surprise. The art is very elaborate and pretty.
Athera update: I used my spare bits of time to HAND MARK the chapter draft I'd shredded and painstakingly reassembled. Those mark ups need to be entered, then that bit goes out for test. I have the next subchapter started. And the following one sketched out as plans…this IS the tipping point action that breaks up the marble pack…probably unusual for this book, there will be Another such peak before the finale chapters unwind it. I know I'm being a fuss pot, but there's this one chance to get it right.
The good news: I've no other deadline pending/we are both OK, and the garden's producing, and the grass is going summer crazy, but the mower was thoroughly overhauled. Other than a few SAR call outs, things have been pretty peaceful.
Hoping everyone is thriving!
We're on Day 78 of our COVID self-quarantine and although our state has timidly started reopening, we're content being a few weeks behind the rest. Gaining weight from supporting local merchants with curbside pickup and celebrating the rare times when there's a good-looking steak for grilling in the grocery store.
I'm not reading anything at the moment, but did get my non-fiction preferring wife into the Empire series recently. Hope everyone is well and reading good books!
originally posted by David Cornelson
Mostly okay here. My 18yo is bipolar so she's been going to outpatient for support. On the bright side, she got called back to The Gap for mail order work. My 20yo got a job at Burlington Coat Factory. My work and my ex's work have been stable. Our very indoor cat escaped for 32 hours of pure mayhem. Left at 10pm on a Friday night, returned Sunday morning at 5am. No idea what he did that entire time. He opened the screen door on his own. He's very clever.
The quarantine is hard. I rarely have anxiety, but this stuff is even getting to my head. Warm weather helps a ton.
originally posted by Daisy
All good here in Queensland, Australia. our restrictions are easing but people’s businesses and livelihoods have been badly affected. But my family have been very fortunate which I am thankful for. We are coming into winter so am a bit worried that covid will morph into another strain or the flu season will cause a second wave. But am telling myself what I can’t control, I shouldn’t worry about. Still waiting very patiently for the next volume in one of my most favourite series. Positive vibes to everyone. Keep safe and well.
Passing the tipping point, or the first one, anyway.
I have not yet entered all of the tweaks in Set 6 main, but: the two subchapters have roared to life. I've got the first set down to the final scene (with notes for the connection to the finale) and a bit of tweaking to finish and flesh it out.
And I've got the second sub-chapter several pages along with more notes, running all the way up to the scenes to finish it off; and noted the markers for what will gel into the upcoming one liners.
So Set Six is dovetailing very very nicely toward the ramped up finish I aimed for, with the set up for Seven in line to cascade.
Page count, too, has crossed another threshold. I will post up the number when I have the pages in line.
Lord, I am thankful I will NEVER have to write the 'set up' for another volume like this monster ever again…even if I wanted another eleven book series…the publishing world life comes at ya too fast to manage an extended project.
So it will be shorter works, one offs, and little sequels from here.
Glad to hear from those who checked in! Stay well. Florida's one of the hairy crazy states; and I still get called out to search, so being careful as possible, even if neighbors are not.
Starting into the wrap of Six set - crossed the rubicon of the turning point and into the START of the explosive convergency and page count is into the 400s.
Onwards, and have a nice day.
(test reads, get ready to flip your wigs…it's game time).
originally posted by Auna
How very exciting to see the end approaching! I can't wait. 
originally posted by Auna
Also, I tried to leave a post on the Stormwarden thread and it gave me an error. Then it gave me an error when I tried to email the admin (said not deliverable). o.O
I just wanted to know if Stormwarden had an ebook MOBI to download anywhere.