a slightly depressing update

Well, August is here—already?—and I still don't have The Wizard's Heart ready for publication, even though I last said it would be ready no later than July. Well, it's not even remotely close to being ready. Beta-reader feedback was mixed, and I have since been working to address all of the issues they had with the book—everything from characterization to plot and everything between. It's been a labor of angst, frustration, tears, and cursing, but I am making progress, if slowly.

However, as a result of all this, I really do not know when the book will release. Once I finish the current draft, I'll have to read through the whole manuscript and make additional changes for clarity and consistency, and then I plan to send the book out for a second beta-read. It will likely be months from now before I receive feedback from a second round of betas, no sooner than the end of September. At earliest (assuming that I actually have a better book after this draft), I might—might—have the book ready by December. Maybe. Gosh, that's depressing. But it is what it is.

In other good news, I will soon be able to make a super awesome announcement regarding a super amazing thing happening next year. But until then, we can all be sad about the delayed release for The Wizard's Heart.

In other other news, Dark Lord in Training is coming along nicely. I'm really enjoying the change of pace and coming up with ridiculous situations to put my characters through. It is a nice distraction from the seriousness of The Wizard's Heart, and it's a lot of fun to write. If you want, you can read snippets week to week on Google+ at the #DarkLordinTraining hashtag.

a little bit about Dark Lord in Training

I was tagged in a little questionnaire exercise, and I thought why not? Something fun to do in an otherwise dull and unproductive week.

Because I’m not really in the mood to talk about The Wizard’s Heart right now—edits are beyond exhausting right now and me and the book are just not on good terms at the moment—I’m going to answer questions about Dark Lord in Training, the middle-grade fantasy that I am oh-so-slowly drafting.

1.    What is the name of your character? Is he/she fictional or a historic person?

Alden Millard. Fictional.

2.    When and where is the story set?

The story is set in the Kingdom of Erilea, but most of the story takes place inside the Evil Lair of Ryxik Hathmor the Blackhearted. It’s a standard fantasy setting, upgraded slightly, because apparently they have decent plumbing and gas stoves. So, I don’t know. Maybe it’s like a weird mid-1800s tech-level fantasy world. That works, I suppose.

for those of you wondering what i'm up to...

I’ve been rather quiet as of late, but I’m slowly getting back into the swing of being social with people again. I’ve been swamped with freelance editing work in addition to working on my own stuff. I’ve edited five books since the beginning of the year, totaling approximately 265,000 words. I’ve run The Wizard’s Heart through another draft and have started the revision notes for the next based on beta-reader feedback. And, on top of all that, I’m taking care of a six-and-a-half-month-old full-time. So, you know, I’ve been busy.

But, as an update, I wanted to let you all know where I am on things.

Some of you will recall a bit of desperation when I received beta feedback for The Wizard’s Heart. I received a lot of negative comments—flat characters, predictable plot, dull setting, clichéd concepts, subpar writing, outright boring to the point that a good number of beta readers didn’t even finish the book. You know, happy stuff. I was angry. I was upset. I wanted to just burn the book and forget I ever wrote it. I’m tired of working on it. I’m tired of it not being good enough. I’m tired of trying to make it better. All of that led to a particularly whiny post that basically said ‘fuck it, I’m just going to publish this stupid thing and get it over with’. But with some distance and perspective, I realized that I can actually tackle the seemingly overwhelming edits to make this a good book—maybe even a great one.

in which i make up my mind about publishing a book

It’s a two-packets-of-sweetener-in-my-tea kind of day.

tl;dr: I have no idea what to do with my book and I just about want to give up on it completely because obviously, it’s not ready to be published, but… ::whine:: I want so badly to publish it, even though I know it’s likely to get a bunch of bad reviews if I do.

The long version:

So, I’ve received beta feedback for The Wizard’s Heart from all but one beta reader, and the commentary is very… divided. Some of them loved the book and think it would be perfect if I tweaked a little bit here and there, and others didn’t like it at all, thought it was boring or just meh. My editor and a couple of betas think it needs a complete overhaul, but they all have different issues with it. Two of my beta readers purposefully stopped reading because they just didn’t care. ::sigh::

And though there were beta readers who loved it, I can’t help but focus on the negative.

Of all the mentioned problems, there is no consensus. The character that some of the betas hated is the same character that other betas loved. Some people thought the romance was perfect, and others thought it was forced and unrealistic. Some loved the beginning, others thought it was slow, and so on so forth. No one really agreed on anything.

This leaves me with next to no idea how to improve my book for publication.

Just about the only thing that most of them did agree on was wanting more of the setting and mythology and how the magic worked, and those of them who enjoyed the story wanted to know more about the villain at the end. So, at least I know of a few things I can improve for the betterment of the book.

But when I think about working on my book, I’m immediately exhausted. I have worked on this book in one form or another four the last four and a half years now. I’m ready to be done with it. But I also want it to be the best book it can be. I don’t want to release a crap book. But I’m not sure I have the time and energy to put into it anymore.

The truth is: I don’t want to work on it anymore.

I could. That much is certain. I could address all the issues my beta readers had with the novel. I could really dig in and work my ass off to make this a five-star book. I really could. I know I could. But it would take me at least another six months, maybe a year, maybe longer. That’s another book or two or three I could write. That’s another six months I could be improving my craft instead of trying to rework this novel to death.

So, really, I need to figure out what is important to me.

Do I want to rework this novel into a five-star book? Sure. But do I want to spend the time it would take to do it? Hell no, I don’t. So honestly, I probably won’t. And part of me hates that. I would knowingly publish something that isn’t the absolute best I can make it. I would be publishing a four-star book… again. And, I don’t know, maybe that’s okay.

I have to look at things pragmatically.

The Wizard’s Heart is not a bad book. It’s not like I vomited out a first draft without putting any effort into it. I put my fucking soul into this book. I have cried over this book. I have cried over the characters. I have agonized over plot and reworked certain chapters four, five, six times over. I have put more effort into this book than anything I have ever worked on in my entire life, and honestly, I’m not sure I have much more effort to give.

And honestly? I love this book. I absolutely love it. It’s the story I wanted to tell four and a half years ago, when I first started. And maybe that’s all that really matters. No, not everyone will love it as much as I do. I can’t please everyone, but I can please myself. I can be proud of this book. Even if I released it today, I would be proud of it.

I’m willing to work on it a bit more—better describe the setting, explain the magic system, set up the characters better in the first chapters, show the villain’s motive, and fix a problematic scene in the middle. Those are fixes that I can do and still maintain the integrity of the story I wanted to tell. Those would be true improvements, not just change for the sake of change. Anything else, and I think I would just be trying to please other people instead of myself. And if I’m proud of the book, then who gives a shit what anyone else thinks.

So maybe this whole thing has just been me making my mind up on what to do. I can’t let doubt and fear keep me from publishing a book that I love, a book that I’m proud of. I can’t let other people make me feel that way, whatever their intentions. I won’t let myself fall into the trap of endless revisions.

No. I’m going to publish this book.

And I’m going to publish it next month. That’s my deadline. Come July, I’m done with The Wizard’s Heart. I’m moving on. I’m letting it sink or swim on its own, and I’m not going to look back.

So, take that, Doubt.

evolution of a book cover

Since I’m both cheap and somewhat skilled in graphic design, it comes as no surprise that I design my own book covers. I wish I made enough money from book royalties to justify paying a professional cover artist to design my covers, but I don’t. Instead, I fiddle around for several hours in Photoshop Elements until I have something I would be proud to display on a bookshelf. I’m lucky that I have the skills to do this (hooray for taking art classes throughout high school and college!) because as we all know, most writers don’t. They don’t really have a choice but to hire someone to do their cover art or purchase premade covers (which may be an option for me in the future too, if I don’t think I have the skills to pull off a certain cover). Anyway, lucky me for being so darn talented at things and stuff.

So, since I’m not paying anyone to do my cover for me, I have to spend several hours doing it myself. This post illustrates just how I go about that.