Mailbag #1

I've received a bunch of PMs on my FF.Net account over the past couple of days with regards to my stories. To pacify everyone's burning desire for information, here are some answers that I hope encompass everything you wanted to know:

1)I hope to have edits for The Tigress's Song up next week. Yes it has doubled in size and yes it will include some references to Rebel's Honor and The Dragon's Jewel. It's amazing what you notice when you've been away from a story for five years. New items will include the start of Li's peach tree trips, her friendship with Lady Yang (as hinted in Dragon) and her ability to slip into nobility more easily.

2) Call My Name has not been forgotten. I've finished about a page and a half of the next Rebecca chapter. It will probably be another two or three chapters before the blonde lady and the brown haired man are explained, but the latter will be making a lengthy appearance in the current chapter. I'm not trying to be mysterious about who they are. Savvy players probably guessed it during their first appearances. Remember that I'm writing from the perspective of Claire and Rebecca. They wouldn't know/recognize either mystery character at this point.

3) RoNK is still coming along. The majority of the Wu and Wei perspectives for the first battle have been written. I'm currently working on the Shu majority portion, and after that will be a mixture of the three groups. I haven't planned the Aftermath chapters because I haven't finished deciding what will happen during the Battle chapters. This is the first time I'm completely winging my content (to an extent; it's still based on RoTK after all). My goal is to have the first parts up by the end of May.

4) I think I mentioned this in my last entry, but my rewrite order at the moment is Tigress, Nightmare's Calling, Dragon, and then Rebel's Honor. The last story needs a bucketload of work and I have plans to rewrite the climax and add some more of Ma Chao's perspective on everything. All four are connected, but Rebel is definitely the odd man out.

5) This issue isn't really new to me, but the people who constantly berate my earlier fictions for being historically inaccurate should really lay off the fanfiction. I wrote most of those when I was in middle and high school, before I actually read the novel and really got into the historical part of it. I don't care if I'm mixing up the order of the campaigns and battles. I don't care if certain characters are alive or dead at the wrong times. That's the whole point of fanfiction. If you want accuracy, read the novel and stop looking for ways to justify your OCD through my profile page. I'll be keeping the majority of these features in my rewrites, so get over it.

I'm sorry if I missed your question(s)! Feel free to PM me and repeat what you said. Thanks to everyone who sent me messages and left reviews during this last round!!

Editing assignment

My current copyediting class has a motto: Edit at least one thing every day. My professor doesn't care if it's a story, an article, poetry, or something trivial like an advertisement. She claims that if you practice your craft on something each day, it'll become natural. I don't think she realizes that people like me do this anyway. It makes reading difficult. Honestly, I can't finish a book anymore because I find myself reaching for a pencil and making notes in the margins.

Ladies and gentlemen, if you find yourself doing this, seek medical attention. It is not a healthy practice.

On the up-side, it means I've finally begun doing what I've promised for a good five years now. I've pulled out my old stories and started editing them.

I'm finishing the first chapter of The Tigress's Song as I type this (yay multitasking!) and I have notes set aside for the second chapter. It's still not wonderful and it's not going to turn into a full-blown story like its sequel, but it'll be worlds better than before. I plan on starting Nightmare's Calling shortly after that (during which I will address the naming issue that grates on my nerves to this day). I'm not sure if I'll redo Rebel's Honor. That one needs some very serious work. I'll probably finish the first two stories and then turn my attention to The Dragon's Jewel since it plays off of those. New Kingdoms fans can relax, as I haven't stopped working on that story either. Writing is moving at a steady pace there.

I also randomly wrote another Prince of Persia one shot last night. It'll probably go up on Thursday as usual. My group of gaming friends had a very robust debate on romantic couples in games and I spent a good 10 minutes arguing that there was no romance in The Two Thrones. Infatuation, maybe, but no romance. I think that's what spurred the creative juices. Plus I've wanted to write a PoP story that's from the SoT trilogy for a while now. I started a Deadly Premonition one shot about Nick and Olivia as well, but that one's not finished. No word on when I'll get that one posted.

RE and RoNK Updates

I had my interview with Highlights for Kids yesterday. I must say, that was the most fun and exciting interview I've ever had. Everyone there was super friendly and eager to tell me about what they did for the magazine. It goes a long way towards hiring good staff members. If it's obvious that they want to be there, why wouldn't anyone else? The hiring manager told me that I would hear back from them sometime in May. Keep your fingers crossed for me!

In writing news, I posted the next chapter for Call My Name today. It's shorter than I wanted it to be, but the transition between that chapter and the next Claire one was going to be awkward otherwise. I apologize for its tiny length. I also apologize for delaying its release one week. My computer is still making strange noises and is having problems connecting to the Internet. It's difficult to get anything posted when you lose your connection partway through the process.

I am also halfway through writing the Yellow Turban battle for New Kingdoms. My pattern at the moment is to write some kind of introduction, a focus on the preparation of each kingdom participating in said battle, the battle itself and an aftermath portion. I'll probably also include "interlude" chapters for the various side stories. That way readers can read the whole story or just focus on the major fights (sort of like how Wikipedia talks about the noteworthy fights on its RoTK page but leaves the side stories for the different bio pages). As far as posting goes for that story, I'll probably stagger it. Once I have all the appropriate chapters written for each battle, I'll post weekly until the aftermath chapters are up. I won't leave off in the middle of a battle that way. So when I'm finished with the Yellow Turban stuff, you'll know because you'll start to see them.

This story is still going to take years to do. I'm not even going to try and sugarcoat this one. I'm also still unsure if I want to continue through to the end of the book and include Jin or stop off at Wu Zhang Plains. This is still more DW related than RoTK. Yes, I know Jin is in the new DW game (and wtf is up with Sima Zhao getting half of the stages?), but I'm not as familiar with that part of the story. My knowledge pretty much wanes after the Battle of Cheng Du.

I think that's all for now. No word yet on when the next RE chapter is going up. I'm only one page into it. I'd like to blame DW for pulling my attention away, but that'd be silly. I'll have a better idea about that one once I get through next week's homework.