The Notebook
You’ve probably heard the phrase, “If you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all.” Well, after struggling to keep a monthly newsletter afloat for a while, and failing tragically, I decided that my axiom would be, “If I don’t have anything to say, stop talking.” Basically, this isn’t going to be a monthly newsletter anymore. I’m not a fan of monthly newsletters, and I tend to ignore them anyway. I decided, then, that this is basically just going to be a “something has actually happened” newsletter. This will make it more irregular, but more meaningful when it does show up in your inbox or notifications, or that’s the hope.
What’s the news, then, you ask?
Well, there are a few bits of news. The first is that Bearer of Bad News (The Akari-Bearer #1) has seen the completion of its draft and first round of edits. This book follows the twins Miach and MacEoghan through a rather tragic life in Ireland in the 1930’s and 40’s. Now, I’m not normally one for “trigger warnings” since everyone is offended by bloody everything these days, and anyone who has read any of my books knows I pull no punches when it comes to profanity or violence or racism/sexism or sexual innuendos. However, I do think this one may warrant a legitimate trigger warning for child sexual abuse. There is no detail, absolutely nothing gratuitous, but the event and the immediate aftermath may be difficult to stomach, either conceptually (for non-victims) or psychologically (for victims).
The second book, Right to Bear Arms, which is in the process of being outlined, will follow the twins to Poland during WWII. I’m sure they will encounter no shenanigans whatsoever.
Bearer of Bad News is set for release on July 4, 2025.
The second bit of news is that another book, as yet untitled but belonging to the tentatively named Winds of Change, has been sent out for beta reading. This is amusing because it’s not actually set for release for several years. This book was something I started years ago, abandoned and revisited multiple times, and finally decided to make it a NaNoWriMo project. That went better than expected, so I finished it, edited it, and now sent it out for beta. It’s still part of The Timekeeper Chronicles, but it is the first book of the last-released series, so it will not be publicly available for some time.
Winds of Change follows Rifun after the events of Turning Point (The Chivalrous Welshman #9). It’s…not pretty.
The third bit of news came about just last night when I started work on Famine (The Fifth Horseman #1). If all goes well, it will be ready for a December release. It is the spiritual successor to The Chivalrous Welshman, but, ultimately, it will finally tie together all of the TKC series, people, places, plots, and so on.
And as I was writing, it occurred to me that, with that writing progress, those words that I typed and the scene that I wrote, it is the last time that I will start a series for The Timekeeper Chronicles. There are no more firsts coming down the line. There are no more new characters to meet after this, nothing sparkling new to explore. Oh, there will be grand adventures and epic battles a la Lone Wolf, but the end of The Timekeeper Chronicles is within sight. Four more books in The Akari-Bearer, two more for Winds of Change (assuming I don’t cut it back to a simple duology), and five for The Fifth Horseman. And that’s it. No more TKC.
I don’t have any concrete plans for “after” right now, and that’s okay. I may even take a little time off to give my brain a chance to reset. After spending so much time with TKC, anything “new” that I write is going to be heavily colored by it. I’ve definitely learned a ton about writing and wordcraft and everything else, but I want to separate my future work and create a new experience, not just a new costume.
It should also let me breathe and read a little freer. I’ve been able to read a lot more lately, which makes me happy. I won’t bore you with a rehash, so here are the links to my reviews.
Lost Solace by Karl Drinkwater (4/5)
Chains of Honor (series) by Lindsay Buroker (3/5)
Geist av L.L. Haacker (4.5/5 NOTE: BOOK AND REVIEW ARE IN SWEDISH)
Rewind: I, Charlie by Christopher Barnard (4/5)
As always, just one person’s opinion.
And, finally, I’m going to throw out there a little something that I just think is fun and entertaining. Because writers have hobbies, too. Mine just happens to be game dev. Years ago I turned one of my books into a video game, but then the engine broke and I lost my game. I tried to remake it several times, but it didn’t work out as hoped. I decided to scale back and start with the basics. I started out with several smaller projects, including one that teaches brailling a la Mario Teaches Typing.
One thing about me as a game dev is that I don’t want it to just be a copy-paste game, even if it is based on another game I love. I want there to be some unique meaning to it. I don’t mean philosophically or anything, just something more than a standard platformer or whatever genre.
So, my first major project is one that combines Animal Crossing with Wii Sports Resort and a hint of The Sims. Buy a house, hunt, fish, collect goodies for the museum, make friends with the locals, go scuba diving, horseback riding, skydiving, all sorts of goodies. But, here’s the catch. It’s all* in Cherokee. The whole idea is to learn the Cherokee language, and there are activities to promote that end. There is a tiny bit of English, such as dealing with the Tourism Office, but otherwise, all Cherokee. Can you have fun without it? Sure, you can still randomly click your way into asking to fly the helicopter, but it’ll be a lot cooler if you can understand the locals.
Who doesn’t love a beautiful sunset from horseback?
It’s got a long way to go, although it is basically functional right now. Arrive on the island, check in at the motel, visit the museum, buy stuff from the general store, talk to people. It might just be a little generic is all.
My second project is one that actually started out as the previous iteration of the previous project. Unfortunately, something went very wrong and I rage-trashed it (not just trash, but basically a full system wipe). About five minutes later, I realized what the problem was. I was ashamed, but I ate it and decided to just abandoned the project. It wasn’t going especially well anyway. Lots of spaghetti.
Fast-forward about a year, cleaning up my laptop and discovered a backed up folder containing that project. Unpacked it, loaded it up, and it worked. It had been backed up before the catastrophe that got it rage-trashed.
This game is inspired by Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door and Super Paper Mario. It also takes heavy themes from real-world elements, although that would take some time to explain and I don’t want to do that right here right now. I’ll do it later when I have better demonstrations of each element.
You can probably guess a few inspired elements, but it’ll be some time before you can compare them.
So, that’s all I got. This feels like the most meaningful newsletter I’ve put out since, well, probably the first one. I actually had something to say this time.
Next newsletter will likely be in June some time, reminded everyone that Bearer of Bad News is about to come out and you should all buy it.
