Work in Progress: Earthright

Last time looked at: 2/26/17

Last actual wordage added: 7/30/14 (not counting minor revisions)

Pages added, 2/26/17: 0 (but see below)

Current page count: 53

Estimated final page count: 300-350.

Deadline: None. Purely speculative.

Comments: I got chatting with an editor on Facebook on Thursday night, and he said he’d love to see an SF novel proposal from me, so I suggested Earthright as a possibility, and he thought it sounded interesting.

So I pulled it out of mothballs, and over the weekend I wrote a ten-page outline of the whole thing, completing it about 3:00 Monday afternoon. The outline includes details I hadn’t worked out before that will require a few minor tweaks to the four and a half chapters I’ve written, but that’s not a big deal.

I never had a working outline before, not really; I had the story in my head, but not on paper or disk anywhere, not as Earthright. It was cobbled together from two other stories, “Legend” and Labyrinth. “Legend” was a complete story for Marvel’s Open Space #6 that was never used because the series got cancelled after #4. Labyrinth was intended to be an Amelia Hand novel, but all I ever wrote of it was a four-page opening scene that got incorporated into Chapter Three of Earthright. I knew the premise, but never wrote it down.

Oh, and the title concept of Earthright was originally a separate idea.

Anyway, I wound up merging the three into Amelia Hand’s origin story. I initially tried to use the comic book script as an outline but diverged from it so quickly it became useless even before I got to the Labyrinth part, and other than that, until now I never had an actual written outline.

Now to clean it up and send it to my agent.

13,207 words. (The difference from last time is almost entirely because this is a WordPerfect word-count and the previous one was Neo Office — WordPerfect always runs lower.)

Work in Progress: The Wizard’s Key

Progress report:

Last time looked at: 12/7/16

Last actual wordage added: 12/7/16

Pages added, 12/7/16: 2

Current page count: 14

Estimated final page count: 250-300.

Current word count: 2,846

Deadline: None. Will probably be self-published.

Comments: Finished Chapter One, started Chapter Two. Sirris has just received news she dreaded, but that she never thought would actually arrive.

Work in Progress: Eleven Blades

Progress report:

Last time looked at: 12/4/16

Last actual wordage added: 12/4/16

Pages added, 12/4/16: 5

Current page count: 8

Estimated final page count: 250-300.

Current word count: 1,810

Deadline: None. Will probably be self-published.

Comments: I had another story idea a couple of days ago, and couldn’t resist writing the opening of the novel. Or first novel, if it turns out to be a series.

What I’ve written so far has Lerruit’s father telling him, on his sixteenth birthday, the family secrets, and explaining the legacy of the eleven blades.

I should probably give the father a name. And maybe rename Lerruit; that’s a Walasian name, but the story isn’t set in the Bound Lands.

(I thought it might be, but it works better if it’s not.)

Work in Progress: Scattered Sparks

Progress report:

Last time looked at: 2/19/16

Last actual wordage added: 2/19/16

Pages added 2/19/16: 2

Current page count: 26

Estimated final page count: About 300-400

Deadline: None. Purely speculative

Comments: Tav has stopped in to check on Uncle Potch, and has just been informed that there’s a danger he had heretofore been completely unaware of.

Word-count: 6,448

Work in Progress: The Innkeeper’s Daughter

Progress report:

Last time looked at: 1/17/16

Last actual wordage added: 1/17/16

Pages added 1/17/16: 3

Current page count: 50

Estimated final page count: About 300-400

Deadline: None. Purely speculative. It started out as just a whim.

Comments: The page count incremented by four because I didn’t report a previous one-page effort.

In Pulder, Marga and Aloran are talking while Dremm and Faldren are running an errand; Marga is trying to get a better handle on Aloran’s motives.

Word-count: 11,798

Work in Progress: Veran the Fair and the Thieves of Borgran

Progress report:

Last time looked at: 10/29/15

Last actual wordage added: 10/29/15

Pages added 10/29/15: 4

Current page count: 49

Estimated final page count: About 300-400

Deadline: None. Purely speculative. Started it on a whim.

Comments: Okay, it’s really only three and a half pages, because I finished Chapter Four and started Chapter Five and Chapter Four didn’t end at the bottom of a page.

Veran is following Shalar and Dhalar out of Oak-Alder toward Borgran; they’ve spotted her, but she hasn’t realized it.

Once upon a time, this story was called “Bait.” It mutated.

Work in Progress: The Multidimensional Adventures of Victoria Jane Nesbitt

Progress report:

Last time looked at: 9/3/15

Last actual wordage added: 9/3/15

Pages added, 9/3/15: 1

Current page count: 4

Estimated final page count: I’m not sure it’s ever going to end; it may be an ongoing serial.

Deadline: None. Purely speculative.

Comments: Vicky’s trying to get everyone organized, even though she has no idea what’s going on. The cast has added Tanner, Shelly, and Aidan J.

Work in Progress: The Siege of Vair (title may change)

Progress report:

Last time looked at: 9/2/15

Last actual wordage added: 9/2/15

Pages added 9/2/15: 1

Current page count: 7

Estimated final page count: 400?

Deadline: None.

Comments: I missed a progress report on this one somewhere.

Mirit got renamed Virit. The two Surushalla elders are bickering; the mountain elder, Turunis, thinks the whole concept of a siege is just stupid and wants to go home, while everyone else recognizes the seriousness of the situation.

Work in Progress: Three Days Late for the Hanging

Progress report:

Last time looked at: 7/11/15

Last actual wordage added: 7/11/15

Pages added 7/11/15: 3

Current page count: 14

Estimated final page count: No idea at all; don’t know if it’s a short story or a novel.

Deadline: None. Purely speculative. Started it on a whim.

Comments: Julie and I got talking about this story, and wound up completely changing where the story was going; I like the new version much better.

So much so that I’ve stayed up much too late working on it. Finished the first chapter/section/whatever, though. Nick and Dan are on their way to Rawlinsburg, leaving Tom and Al in Osborne.

Excerpt:

“Deputy, do you really think the Devil would come riding in here on a mule, wearing a dirty old Stetson and boots with the heels worn down? I’d heard Old Scratch was a snappy dresser.”

Dan gave me a dirty look and made a sort of whinny; he never cared to be called a mule, and never mind that to all accounts and purposes he happened to be one just then.

Work in Progress: Swordsmen of the Fallen Empire

Progress report:

Last time looked at: 9/6/14

Last significant wordage added: 9/6/14

Pages added 9/6/14: 1

Current page count: 8 at the start of the main narrative, and 1 from the end.

Estimated final page count: Maybe 300-400.

Deadline: None. Purely speculative.

Comments: I presented Second and Sixth with a bit of a puzzle. Which will also teach the reader something about the magic these people employ.