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Fragments

Fragments Cover Reveal!

Fragments Cover
I’ve been waiting for a long time to show this off. It’s another amazing Joe Slucher piece. He somehow manages to figure out exactly what I’m looking for, even when I’m not sure what it is that I’m looking for.

I’ve had the art since January. I wanted to wait until I finished the initial edit, which would mean that there’s a finite amount of time left before I publish the book. The book is with my beta readers right now (an intrepid bunch). When it comes back from them, there’s another edit pass (to incorporate their comments), and then the process of publishing.

I know some of you have been waiting a long time for this book, and I can’t wait for you to read it.

Anyway, props to Joe. I hope the book lives up to the cover.

StoryBox

StoryBox 2 Beta

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I mostly don’t blog here about my software, anymore. It’s a separate business from my writing, and I prefer to keep the two as separate as possible. However, I wanted to mention a development, just because I thought some of you might be interested.

Today, I uploaded the open beta of StoryBox 2. You can download it and use it, and write awesome stories with it.

StoryBox 2 has a 45 day trial. The days are non-consecutive. If you open it up on one day, it counts as one. If you don’t open it up on a day, that day won’t count. You get 45 actual days to use it. If you open it and forget to open it again for six months, it won’t expire on you in that time.

This is a change. I know it’s a change. I know some people won’t like it, but it’s something I have to do.

The original StoryBox versions will still be available until StoryBox 2 is finished. Those of you who are using StoryBox for free right now can continue to do so until the end of time, but the only updates going forward will be to StoryBox 2.

Also, the price of StoryBox will be going up by $5 once StoryBox 2 is finalized. All existing registered users will be able to upgrade to StoryBox 2 for no cost. So if you want to save yourself $5, register before StoryBox 2 is finalized. I don’t know the exact date, but there’s a list of things to do on the beta page, and when that list is empty, StoryBox 2 will be done.

I hope you try out StoryBox 2, if you are at all inclined toward writing, or if you’ve been using StoryBox 1.x, and I’d like to hear what you think.

StoryBox 2 Open Beta

A list of some of the major changes:

  • Menu moved to bottom center of the screen
  • You can now open most tool windows while in full screen mode.
  • Themes use larger fonts and have been updated in many instances.
  • Combined all of the wordcount bars into a single tool window called Progress
  • Reworked the Export window. You can now save export profiles and toggle which files are included directly from the Export screen.
  • Individual story properties are now in the Document Properties window when you select the Story document
  • Added an Export To HTML option on the right click menu for the outline view
  • Many changes to ePub export to fix lingering issues on several devices. It also now passes epubcheck validation.
Fragments, Grim Repo Files

Grim Fragments Progress Report

It’s actually a Grim AND Fragments progress report, but I thought the title was more amusing without the AND.

Off to the right, you’ll notice that Grim Repo 2 looks like it’s done, with more words than the target. It’s not done. It’s on the border of being done, and I can see the other side, but there’s a minefield between here and there that I have to cross, first.

The Fragments edit is coming along. I have five chapters left to do, and I should be able to get them done tomorrow, barring any unforeseen circumstances. It’s taken so long, because I had to do some major edits early on in the book. Several people had to be written out. It was horrible. Don’t worry. You don’t know any of them, and they’re all mostly alive, I think

Another factor in the delay is that it’s nearly 25% longer than Shattered. I’ve hadn’t written anything as long as Shattered since Shattered, and I forgot how long it takes to edit something this long. I’m anticipating that Reworked (the third A Wizard’s Work book) will be longer, still, and I’ll have to adjust my schedule to account for it.

As soon as I’m done with the Fragments edit, I’ll reward myself by doing something I’ve wanted to do for awhile. I’ll show you all the cover (again, done by Joe Slucher). I think it’s fantastic, and I’ve wanted to show it off for a long time.

Writing, Zombies Ate My Mom

The Order Of Things

I had planned to have Fragments out toward the middle to end of March, but that’s not going to happen. It’s one hundred twelve thousand words, and it’s taking longer to edit than I planned for. It will also take longer to publish. I should be finishing up my first edit of it this weekend, and it will go out to beta readers early next week. If it’s awesome, and everything else goes well it won’t be long after that before it’s done. If it’s not awesome, well, I don’t want to talk about that.

In the meantime, I don’t want to leave you empty handed. I think I can squeeze the second Zombies book out, now called Zombies Bought The Farm, before the end of March. It will go to a mostly different set of beta readers, and is only about one fifth the length, so I might be able to get it published before Fragments comes back from its beta readers.

In other news, as soon as I finish my edit of Fragments, which should line up nicely with the completion of the first draft of Grim Repo 2, I’ll start work on the third book of A Wizard’s Work. I’m itching to get started on it.

A Tower Without Doors, Fragments

A Tower Without Doors on Apple, and other things

A Tower Without Doors made it onto the iBookStore today, which is awesome. It’s the first one I’ve uploaded directly, and it means that Apple doesn’t hate the ePub that StoryBox generates.

One of the “other things” is that Minders is near the end of it’s first draft. I might finish it this weekend, or, more likely, on Monday. It’s another departure, for me, from the fantasy work that I really want to be doing, but it just sort of showed up and said, “Write me now!” I couldn’t exactly refuse.

Another of the “other things” is that I’m working on the first edit for Fragments (for real this time). I hope to be done with that next week, and then I’ll send it out to my Tell-Me-Where-It-Sucks crew. If all goes well and it doesn’t suck, I’m estimating the end of March for its release date. Far too long, really. I’ll get the next one out quicker, I promise.

Cover reveal for Fragments will happen on the day I finish this first edit. Sort of a reward for getting it done.

A Tower Without Doors, Bookstore

A Tower Without Doors Released!

Few Dare Cross Its Shadow

The tower stood for centuries, a dark and forbidding figure against the horizon. Bremin toiled in its shadow his entire life, just like his father and grandfather. It did not appear the tower or Bremins’s life would ever change…

Until the day a tight-lipped stranger offered Bremin an enormous sum of money to guide him to the tower so that he may discover its mysteries.

Only, Bremin knows the tower’s power, and he fears what might befall them should they cross through the tower’s shadow.

A Tower Without Doors is a much-much-post-apocalyptic novella that turned out far different than I anticipated, as well as about twice as long. At first, I thought it would be a fantasy short story, and then things happened, as they usually do, and it became something else. It’s available in all the usual places right now (Apple should be along in a week or so – I’m going through them directly now, so I’m not sure how long that will take). If you want a paper copy, and you purchase from me, I’ll sign it and throw in the electronic versions for free!

There’s a quick preview on the book page.

E-Book Paperback
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