Writing Update

10-9-2019 -- I self-published Caledfwlch on Amazon Kindle. I think it's pretty much perfect (or as close to it as I'm able to get it). It should go live on Amazon within 24-hours. So now, with that done, I guess I'll have to get to work on Black Tower. You know, writing a series of books is rather difficult.

4-5-2017 -- Got some feedback from beta-readers of Caledfwlch, so I'm working on edits again. This time, Kolin's accent was too strong. I gotta tone it down :).

11-3-2016 -- Started final edits for Caledfwlch. Would like to get it sent off to the publisher by the end of November. This is an ambitious goal but maybe doable. At least I've got The Orb of Winter published (see news section).

10-25-2016 -- The Orb of Winter is now for sale as a downloadable ebook from Amazon. It is a beautiful book with great cover art and an interior map. Go to THIS LINK if you want to purchase :).

10-7-2016 -- I'm almost finished with edits to The Orb of Winter, which I will soon publish for ebook readers (Amazon Kindle). The cover art for the new book is done and has been posted in the "News" tab/section. Go there if you are curious.

6-19-2016 -- Chapter 43, the conclusion of The Orb of Winter, is now published in the forums. Thanks for reading. The tale will continue in the second novel, The Keep of Silverhawk. Stay tuned.

6-12-2016 -- Chapter 42 of The Orb of Winter is now published HERE. The last chapter will be published next week! I hope you all enjoyed the read.

6-5-2016 -- Happy Pride Month. Chapter 41 of The Orb of Winter is now published in the forums. Go read it quick! Only two more chapters remain in this book. :)

5-30-2016--Happy Memorial Day. Chapter 40 of The Orb of Winter is now available online to read (in the forums).

5-22-2016-- Chapter 39 is up! Read away peeps. The novel The Orb of Winter is almost done (yes there will be a sequel). Five more chapters may finish it off. Prepare for a cliffhanger ending that takes us into the events of The Keep of Silverhawk!

5-15-2016-- I posted Chapter 38 of The Orb of Winter in my forums. I had to break it into two parts because the spam filter for Nabble was having issues with the words in the long form chapter. The Nabble administrators don't allow administrators of the forums to control the spam filter settings. I did send them an email, but have not heard back from them as yet (to reduce the spam filter settings). I apologize for any inconvenience this has made for my readers.

5-8-2016 -- Chapter 37 of The Orb of Winter is now published in the forums.

5-1-2016 -- Chapter 30 thru 36 of The Orb of Winter is now published in the forums under the "Books" Tab across the top. I am currently working on Chapter Forty and expect to finish it this week. The Orb of Winter is almost finished. I estimate that there may be forty-five chapters total, and there is going to be a sequel called The Keep of Silverhawk, which I shall begin working on after I get The Orb of Winter published on Amazon kindle.

4-24-2016 -- Because I'm more than ten chapters ahead, I published Chapters twenty-seven thru twenty-nine of The Orb of Winter in the forums. Hopefully, there will be some excited readers :). I'd love to get more comments and emails.

4-17-2016 -- I published Chapter Twenty-Six of The Orb of Winter in the forums. Click HERE to read it now.

4-10-2016 -- Chapter Twenty-Five of The Orb of Winter is now available in the forums. Additionally, I've begun editing Chapter Twenty-Eight of the same story. Things are going along nicely. As usual, click HERE to be taken to the forum or you can find a link in the "Books" tab across the top of the page.

4-4-2016-- Chapter Twenty-Four of The Orb of Winter has now been published on my forum.

3-24-2016-- I finished Chapter Twenty-Four of my serialized novel The Orb of Winter, but I haven't posted it. I need to let it rest so I can read it later for errors. But there are currently twenty-three chapters published in my forums.

3-16-2016 -- I'm up to Chapter Nine of my serialized novel The Orb of Winter in the forums.

2-9-2016 -- Posted Chapter Three of my serialized novel The Orb of Winter in the forums.

1-28-2016 -- My first beta reader for Caledfwlch said, "I just finished Caledfwlch! I loved it. I felt like I was reading a complicated Dr Who series in one book, which is a great compliment. I say that because (as a fan of Who) they are constantly bringing up past characters and past events and storylines and mixing them back up in current events." I gotta say, that makes me excited to get the editing done and to send it off to Double Dragon Publishing.

1-10-2016 -- I finished the first draft of Caledfwlch. Now it's gotta go to beta-readers and to editors. :) And after that's done, then I'll send it to my publisher.

1-9-2016 -- Finished Chapters 28 and 29. Writing the conclusion now.

1-8-2016 -- Finished Chapter 27

1-7-2016 -- Finished Chapter 26.

1-6-2016 -- Chapter 25 is done now. It only took me eleven months. The end is so close I can taste it LOL. I better start looking for an editor.

12-28-2015 -- I started working on "Caledfwlch" again after taking a hiatus most of the year. I got spurred on by a nice fan mail and began anew by editing all the stuff I've written (some 300+ pages). I also got a beta reader (which is kind of a first for me). I think I'll be ready to finish up the last 10% of the book very soon and then begin looking for an editor (as my small-time publisher doesn't provide one). I've gotten some good feedback from my beta-reader already. It's fun to chat with someone that's so invested in the story. :)

2-7-2015 -- Chapter 24 is done. Working on Chapter 25.

11-2-2014 -- 2100 words in the past two days. I'm on a roll! Will have Chapter 24 done in no time.

11-1-2014 -- Chapter 23 of Caledfwlch is done. Been taking a break. I'm making it a goal to pound out this book this month, so expect more updates.

6-16-2014 -- Began work on Chapter 23 of Caledfwlch. I'm going to focus all my efforts on getting this thing ready for publication. Chapter 23 has Jordan and company entering a very alien spaceship. It's kind of exciting to describe everything they see. This is no "Star Trek" type spaceship but more along the lines of something you'd see in an "Alien" movie. Grotesque and horrific, it's going to be a spooky chapter for sure. Great for those who crave/love dark fiction!

6-8-2014 -- Planet 99 eBooks has now published Assassin of the Silver Rose. This book was previously published in weekly installments featured on the Nifty Archive. The book features spectacular cover art and great editing. This completes the Sword of Rogues duology.

4-2-2014 -- The last installment (chapter 39) has been sent to Nifty for my story Black Dragon Rising. I intend to publish it soon and make it available on all formats. Thank you for the fan mail. It has been wonderful.

3-20-2014 -- Sent off Chapter 38 of Black Dragon Rising. It is the second to the last chapter of the story.

3-12-2014 -- Done with Chapter 37. Nifty should be publishing it by Thursday night.

3-5-2014 -- Chapter 36 is off to the presses. However there's a typo that says it's Chapter 35. Sorry!

2-27-2014 -- Chapter 35 of "Black Dragon Rising" should show up on Nifty in the next 24-hours. Hold onto your butts! It's intense!

2-19-2014 -- Mailed off chapter 34 of BDR. Keep the fan mails coming :).

2-12-2014 -- Chapter 33 on its way.

2-6-2014--I shipped off Chapter 32 folks! Wait for it to get posted on Nifty and let me know what you think in an email. I LOVE fan mail :).

1-30-2014 -- Nifty has the next chapter of BDR. Shouldn't be long now peeps :)

1-23-2014 -- The next chapter of Black Dragon Rising is up. Go read it NOW! :)

1-15-2014 -- I sent off Chapter 29 of BDR. It'll appear soon on Nifty.

1-8-2014 -- Chapter 28 of Black Dragon Rising has been sent off to "the presses." Thank you for your support.

12-19-2013 -- I sent off Chapter 27 of Black Dragon Rising to Nifty this evening. This is the last chapter I'm publishing before the New Year. Have a happy holiday.

12-12-2013 -- BDR Chapter 26 is off to the e-presses. Enjoy. I also got my rejection letter from Angry Robot books. It was pretty good as far as rejection letters are rated though. I still think it was a form one, however, even if it was written with amazing tact. I think at this point I will pursue self-publishing for my novel, Assassin's Gambit, as querying is really just a huge time suck. It's a story that takes place 100 years after the events in Black Dragon Rising. If anyone wants to read it before that, send me an email or drop a note below with your email address and I'll ship a pdf off to you.

12-04-2013 -- Black Dragon Rising Chapter 25 is on its way! I can't wait to see what you guys think about it :).

11-21-2013 -- Chapter 24 of BDR is queued on Nifty.

11-13-2013 -- Finished Chapter 23 of my serial novel, Black Dragon Rising. It's been sent out for publishing. This chapter is quite large so I hope some of my fans out there send me some feedback via email :).

11-8-2013 -- Chapter 22 of Black Dragon Rising is published on Nifty. Enjoy!

10-31-2013 -- Chapter 21 of BDR is headed to "the internet presses." Also, I sent off a novel to be published by Angry Robot. They're open for submissions by unagented authors until the end of the year. I figured since my submission did so well at Harper Voyager (I made it to the top 10%) that I'd have a shot with Angry Robot, which is a small press based in the UK. They're very selective though and frequently partner with the big five enough that they're probably darn close to being an actual "imprint." So yeah, there's a little prestige associated with that.

10-24-2013 -- Sent off Chapter 20 of Black Dragon Rising.

10-17-2013-- Got quite a bit of writing done today. Sent off Chapter 19 of BDR to Nifty. I also got Chapter 22 of Caledfwlch done (this one is closing in on the climax!) It's very exciting to be nearing the end of the first draft of Caledfwlch. Then comes the arduous task of editing. Sigh.

10-10-2013 -- Chapter 18 of BDR has been emailed to Nifty. I also got my rejection from Harper Voyager today. It took over a year, and I made it into the top 400 (out of 4700). Considering that's the top 10%, I feel I did okay.

10-3-2013 -- Chapter 17 of BDR is off to the presses! Nifty readers, it should only be a few hours now :)

9-19-2013 -- A smutty chapter 15 of Black Dragon Rising should be published either today or tomorrow at Nifty. Happy reading!

9-15-13 -- Chapter 21 of Caledfwlch is done. Getting ready to start the wind up to the finale! Can't believe the end is actually in sight. This book has taken a lot out of me as a writer.

9-12-13 -- The next chapter of BDR should be published soon.

9-5-2013 -- Despite my move and the new place being torn up, I got Chapter 13 of Black Dragon Rising sent to Nifty. Warning: this chapter is filled with adult XXX content. Look for it soon! Chapter 14 is going to be even better.

8-28-2013 -- Chapter 12 of Black Dragon Rising is off to the presses!

8-20-2013 -- Chapter 11 of Black Dragon Rising is done and sent to Nifty. It's pretty long too. I can't wait to hear what you guys think of it. Please email me :).

8-16-2013 -- Chapter 20 of Caledfwlch is done! Woo hoo. Getting closer to the end.

8-14-2013 -- Sent off chapter ten of Black Dragon Rising. According to rumors passed by someone attending a conference where Harper Voyager editors spoke about the digital submissions, they have now winnowed the "Open Call" that started in October 2012 down to 400. I am still in the running with my story Assassin's Gambit. So that puts me in the top 8% according to Absolute Write. I'm rather happy about that :). For those of you who are interested in knowing more of Assassin's Gambit, it is a full-length completed novel starring Kian from Black Dragon Rising, only it takes place almost a century later than that earlier work. I'm also making some progress on Caledfwlch.

8-8-2013 -- Sent off chapter nine of Black Dragon Rising.

7-20-2013--Finished Chapter 19 of Caledfwlch.

7-19-2013--Chapter 18 of Caledfwlch is done. I also published the latest chapter of Black Dragon Rising on Nifty.

7-10-2013--Black Dragon Rising chapter 5 is on its way. Still no update from Harper Voyager. Soon it will be one year! Patience is the food of any serious author.

7-4-2013 -- Chapter Four of my serialized story Black Dragon Rising has been sent.

6-26-2013 -- Chapter Three of Black Dragon Rising has been sent to the Nifty Archive for publishing. Please note that the first book in the series, The Nightshade's Apprentice, is free to download all day from Amazon (until midnight). Enjoy.

6-19-2013 -- Chapter Two of Black Dragon Rising is now published on the Nifty Archive.

6-12-2013 -- I sent out the first chapter of Black Dragon Rising Wednesday to the Nifty Archive by email. As of Friday, it has not posted yet, but it should be soon. Thank you for your patience.

6-9-2013 -- Finished final edits on the first chapter of my serialized novel Black Dragon Rising. For those of you who don't know, I serialized the first book in this series called The Assassin's Apprentice on the Nifty Archive at the rate of one chapter a week. I'm doing the same for Black Dragon Rising. When I'm finished, I'll bind all the chapters together, do another thorough edit, and make it available online as a downloadable ebook. If you haven't taken a look at The Nightshade's Apprentice page, please do as there are book extras I put up. Expect chapter one of Black Dragon Rising to be published on Nifty no later than Friday of this week. Thank you for your continued patience and support :)

6-5-2013 -- The Nightshade's Apprentice has been published. This is an updated and heavily edited edition of The Assassin's Apprentice, which previously appeared on The Nifty Archive, a NSFW website.

5-14-2013 -- Chapter 17 of Caledfwlch  is done. Got a little writer's block but kind of powered through it.

5-5-2013 -- Chapter 16 of Caledfwlch done!

5-4-2013 -- Finished Chapter 15 of Caledfwlch. Word count stands at roughly 80,000. Feel like I'm seeing the finish coming up in a few weeks, and I really like all the character development I'm exploring especially with regard to Andy.

4-29-2013--Chapter 14 of Caledfwlch done! Huge chapter, and I feel really good about my progress. I'm now more than halfway completed.

4-24-2013--Chapter 13 of Caledfwlch is done. Also got Chapter 29 of The Assassin's Apprentice done and ready to publish for Friday.

4-18-2013--Finished Chapter 12 of Caledfwlch. Also got Chapter 28 of  The Assassin's Apprentice published just in time for Friday. Thanks for all the fan mail you guys have been sending. It's a real "pick me up" after a day of work. I'm so glad you love the story. SMALL FAVOR: Please go answer the poll in the forums!

4-14-2013--Chapter 11 of Caledfwlch is done. Halfway through Chapter 12. Word count is at 55,000 or around 200 pages. Published chapter 27 of The Assassin's Apprentice this weekend too. Still no word from Harper Voyager on manuscript submitted in October 2012.

4-10-2013--Chapter 10 of Caledfwlch is done. Made good progress on Chapter 11.

4-7-2013--Finished Chapter 9 of Caledfwlch. Made good progress on Chapter 10.

3-22-2013--Published chapter 24 of The Assassin's Apprentice. This chapter is huge (10,000 words). Next one will be big too. Still have not heard of HV. Will work some on Caledfwlch this weekend.

3-14-2013 -- Published chapter 23 of The Assassin's Apprentice to Nifty.

3-7-2013 -- Sent out chapter 22 of The Assassin's Apprentice to be published on Nifty. Still no update from HV. Plan on working on Caledfwlch some this weekend now that I'm out of surgery.

2-25-2013 -- Finished with chapter 8 of Caledfwlch. Still no word on Harper Voyager submission. Sent a query letter for a story called Assassin's Gambit to a literary agent seeking representation.

2-13-2013 -- Working on finishing chapter 7 of Caledfwlch. Story is really flying now. I'm over 30K words  which is about 25% done.

2-7-2013 -- I emailed chapter 18 of Assassin's Apprentice for publication. Still no word from Harper Voyager. I worked through a crucial scene in Caledfwlch and got another 2000 words done. I came up with an idea for a short story/novella that takes place in the far future. Earth is a penal colony and humans live off-world. Radiation from deep space turns humans on the off-world colonies into monsters, severing contact with prisoners left on Earth. The prisoners without communication or supplies from off-world, escape and must defend Earth from the mutated humans who are coming back to eat them for food. Thus begins a war that pushes humans to the brink of extinction.

2-1-2013 -- I emailed chapter 17 of Assassin's Apprentice to Nifty for publication. It should be up late tonight or tomorrow. I hope you readers are excited. Still no word on HV. They updated their website to say they still have 1700 to read. Mine is probably somewhere in the slush of 1700 so the fact that it's February, and I've heard nothing means nothing.

1-26-2013 -- I'm working on Chapter Five of Caledfwlch today (that's about 20,000 words into the project for you word counters out there). I may be a slow writer, but I'm not George R.R. Martin slow. And besides, this gives time for Oculus to maybe catch on with readers seeing as my book tour just ended anyway.
If you visit their website, you can see hundreds of comments from people who are also
still in the slush along with me. Some of them get to be quite pretentious and/or
sanctimonious. I've no idea why authors act that way toward other authors. It's like 
they have a collective inferiority complex and want to put on airs of being humble
when in fact, they aren't humble at all. I guess that's human nature.
1-26-2013 -- Still hopeful since I'm still in the running for one of 12 spots in the Harper Voyager slush pile (of which there were originally 4500 entries). I guess we'll see. From the forum on Absolute Write, it looks like Harper Voyager consistently sends out rejections Monday through Wednesday with the rest of the week being silent (perhaps readying for the next batch of rejections).

1-25-2013 -- Thought about trying the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award pitch thing which is now in full swing. You can find the information HERE. I think I'll skip it this year and see where my slush pile submission of "Assassin's Gambit" lands.

1-8-2013 -- I saw that Harper Voyager is sending out rejections on their huge slush pile they received during the open call in October. I haven't gotten one yet.

10-2-2012 -- I submitted an unpublished story called "Assassin's Gambit" to the open call hosted by Big Five publisher "Harper Voyager." An open call is something that publishers do when they are looking for new voices that may have been unable to secure representation from a literary agent. Literary agents are usually the only route to get traditionally published by huge houses so they are called "gate keepers" by some. The thing with literary agents is they either judge you on a pitch that you do for them live at a conference, or they judge you by a query letter. I've never understood how either is an indication of how good a storyteller you are. But that's just their process as there are more writers than ever trying to get published (some 12 million alone in 2012). Everyone, it seems, is a writer, and it's something everyone can do.

4 comments:

  1. I love this page. I didn't even know about it until seeing your menu at the top looked different.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thanks, Brinda. I designed it to keep my readers apprised of my progress.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Oooh, Michael, I was exploring your blog since I haven't been a very frequent visitor as of late, and I love this page. I may steal this idea from you...

    ReplyDelete