Another Week Off?

Spine is, if not screaming, then still vigorously complaining.  I suppose this is a good sign from a certain point of view that this really is the area that's the main perpetrator and it's taking a bit longer to heal up.  But yeah, still bruised and swollen where they burnt the nerves out.  Pain and aching all down my left shoulder and around my neck too.  Woke up to a thirty minute intense cramp in my left foot today, that was fun.

So...no work getting done really.  Few days back I managed to hand edit a whole 8 pages of the last chapter (which is the only chapter still left in first draft state), but I've been paying the price ever since.  Just very gun-shy to push myself with more and think another week of FM and reading in bed is probably the smarted thing to do.  No matter how frustrated it makes me.

Read through the four Thursday Murder Club books, good fun if weak on the mystery aspect.  Septuagenarians solving murders from their retirement community if you haven't heard of it.  Turning it into a movie with Helen Mirren as the lead, should be fun.  Highly recommend Penguin if you haven't started it as well.  Don't even really need to be a comic book fan to enjoy it, I'd say.  It's once again made me realize how little time I have for even "good" television these days when we have so much "great" media swirling around.  Been struggling through quite a few shows the last month maybe forcing myself to ingest an episode a day and then devoured all four episodes of Penguin yesterday, and I can't wait for the next one.

Anyway, 3 paragraphs is about what I want to push myself to type at the moment, so here's hoping I have more productive news to report in a week or two.

Week Off

Burnination C4 to C7 left side tomorrow morning.  Be out of action for a week at least.  Got tried of note taking and worked on editing the first chapter of Seismic Semester the last couple days.  I think it's like...done.  Just don't see anything more I can do with it.  Nothing to add, did my subtraction edit.  It feels pretty tight.  Might be some typos I catch on the kindle or the beta readers notice, but...feels locked.  So one down and eleven to go.  Granted the first chapter is the shortest and simplest by a mile, because of course it is!

Regardless, it being done, I'll post it as a sample chapter later this month or early November along with the cover reveal.

Hope any of you in Florida are staying very safe.  Had some of my family dodge the worst of Helene in NC.  Not fun, not fun at all.

October Preview: FM6 Noteapalooza and Burnination

4 doctor appointments, including the left/right C4-C7 RFAs this month.  So far I'm usually in extra amounts of pain for about a week after every RFA, I imagine it will continue this time.  Two weeks after I start feeling better with pain levels dropping.  Since the vast majority of my pain is radiating from this spot, no idea how much extra pain or how much it will drop once they're through burning those nerves out.

My hope is that I'll be able to sit in chair and type for 8 hours a day afterwards.  Being able to go for a morning walk and use a video game controller and not having to wear wrists braces 24/7 would be nice added bonuses, but I really just want my typing to be painless again.  Or at least a lot better than it is now. So, that's the hope.

I have started the FM6 readthrough.  Got through 5 sessions in 2 days and I already want to die (22 left to go).  104 notations already.  Pfft.  Already noticed a couple things I'll need to add to Seismic Semester, imagine there will be more.

So that's me for the next month.

Totally recommend playing Tactical Breach Wizards if you like puzzle/tactical games btw.  It's not like XCom where you have percentages and every encounter is long and grindy.  Is much more like a puzzle game since every skill hits and you're expected to clear rooms in two turns max (very few go longer if you're doing things right).  Good characters and fun urban fantasy story too.

10/5 Update:  Well, they timed the RFA just right, because the one they did last November is starting to wear off and I'm struggling.  Can't work but ever other day, even editing instead of straight up writing.  Have managed to get 11 chapters down, with 16 left to go.  196 notations.  Eek!  That's where most of the pain comes from, handwriting everything down.  Here's hoping handwriting detection AI gets better over the next 5 years so I can more easily digitize everything in the future.

Was reading the Learning Council powwow chapter today, where Moira Welf gets her first real introduction.  Funny to think she wasn't really around for so many books, since she's so important later in the novel and especially going forward.  As I've said before, Vicky is the POV character of her novel, but Moira is the driving force.

First Draft Done

Brain mush.

9/25 Update:  You can't even begin to imagine what a massive weight off my chest this is.  I wrote the first chapter of this novel in 2018!!!  So much insanity in my life and to just have a first draft done, to be able to say, "this is a story," is such a relief.  I have 31 different corrections/rewrites I need to fix so far, need to change a ton of characters from [XXX] to actual names, beautification, clean up, tightening, formatting, all that fun, but...it's officially 225k words of story.  Sessions 81 to 92 to be exact.

I think genre wise, it's probably most accurate to call it magic school slice of life.  I'm sure some percentage of my fanbase addicted to explosions and vampires and dragons might not dig that, but if you love the characters, there's so much time with Val and Miranda and Welf and all the new Singles and Ceinwyn and Plutarch, probably the most Lady that's ever been in a FM novel, Asa has a subplot, Ronaldo and Makayla speak, what's the world coming to!

Last Big Scene Down

3 falling action scenes left to write and the Seismic Semester is over.

Also, the cover is finished!  Probably reveal it and give you lot the first chapter in November if all goes well (December if all does not go well...January if things go very badly).

9/23 Update:  So I miscounted and it was actually 4 falling action scenes, but it's down to 3 now!