Another summer passed. I got around 25k written this summer, which is much more than last summer, but I had far greater opportunity. Unfortunately, I also extracted 21k words from the same WIP, saving those two story lines for a third book. This left me not far from where I was, although in truth it is much farther progressed. My skeleton for the book is now almost complete but for a few toe bones.

I wrote chapters 2, 4, and 6, mainly. These would be following the characters from the end of Purge of Ashes and picking up shortly after it left off. I cannot stress enough how much more difficult it was to work on these than the other seven or so I had already written. Those chapters were fresh characters, fresh locations, fresh story lines, and lots of action. It felt great to hammer those out because building and creating is just a lot more fluid than grooming and preening. But these follow-up chapters, that start after a climax, are tough. You have to re-establish the ambitions of each character, you have to deal with the repercussions of what just occurred, and in my case they themselves had to re-establish what the hell they’re doing and how they are going to do it. It’s a lot of exposition or inner monologues, with less time for action (not a problem since half a world away every other chapter keeps the pace up).

So while the word count is not as special as I would have hoped, the actual job done in steering the story in the right direction was essential: a worthy challenge for a mind without the distraction of the day job. After this post I’m starting on a pair of chapters that are basically a heist. I’ve been waiting to write these scenes for years. They up the ante and the adrenaline. It’s nice to know, now that I’m teaching all day again, that it is this kind of work waiting for me at home – where I can get into the adventurous side of things rather than the emotional. It’s freeing.

1 of 7 beta readers are in, and the others have till the end of the month. Moving on Purge of Ashes will come sooner than I expect, and I hope my finances are ready. I am not publishing anything short of a pearl this time. There can be no regrets.