You, the voters, have made your wishes known.
Fully 100% of you indicated that you would prefer to have all of the final installment at once, in a big steaming pile nine days from now. While there might be some readers out there who would prefer their Veil War in smaller, manageable doses – it doesn’t look as if they’d outnumber the gluttons in any reasonable voting model.
So mote it be.
Here’s something for you to consider. I’ve just been editing the final chapter – #36 for those of you keeping track at home – and realized that it’s coming in at nearly 4000 words. Over the course of this whole thing, I’ve aimed at 2000 word chapters, and usually failed. Most are in the 2200-2700 range. A couple broke 3000. But 4000 is pretty big. There were a few things I needed to take care of…
So, I put it to you. Do you want the whole big thing next week, or should I break it up into two chapters and post them separately?
Make your opinions known in the comments and I’ll do whatever the majority chooses, almost as if this were a democracy or something.
Typed, “The End” today.
The previous post, the Grand Re-Opening of the Really Big Idea Series, went out in the wrong version. If you read it before around 8:00, please note that it now has an actual introduction and not the enticing, blunt yet but still accurate single word, “Intro.”
I am doing it.
Expect new chapters shortly. I’ve got Chapter 32 written and rewritten, and substantial progress on chapters 33 and 34. Settling into the groove of writing again, and it feels nice.
Two weeks of vacation for the last week of January and the first of February. More Veil War!
When I found out that I wouldn’t be telecommuting anymore, it had been my hope that I might be able to squeeze out some writing. That has, sadly, turned out not to be the case. I need moderately big stretches of time to write, and those just don’t exist in the new dispensation. (Small silver lining – thinking, editing and planning are possible. Fer instance, I now know exactly how to fix chapters 9-17, and I’ve substantially improved 1-8 with some stellar feedback from a friend and former Marine.)
Seeing as we are so very close to the end, those two weeks will be enough to finish Lewis’ story arc at a bare minimum. I also hope to complete the other elements of the story – the ones that have not been posted here, but will make the story a complete novel. It is my sincere wish to be able to type “the end” sometime early next month. To be sure, that will not be the end of it. There is the editing to be done, the rewriting, the proofreading – but the light at the end of the tunnel is getting brighter at long last.
You may have some questions.
Does this mean the end of the Veil War? Not at all. Corny as it is, the Veil War will be a trilogy.
When will the excitingly titled Veil War II start? That depends on a number of things – most crucially, how quickly I can finish the clean up of Veil War I. My goal is end of Spring.
What’s VWII going to be about? Magic, ultraviolence, ‘splodey-splodey, dark forces, suffering and Coleman saying goofy shit. While VWI is set in the first couple weeks of the invasion, VWII will cover a broader range of time about a year in to the war.
Will you keep publishing online for free? Right now, that is in fact part of the plan.
Part of the plan? Once Veil War I is cleaned up, I want to sell it. Moving forward, I will continue to publish parts of the ongoing story for free.
Well, what’s the other part then dammit? That’s the big question. With a complete manuscript, I could submit to an agent/publisher and maybe two years from now you could by a book. Or I could throw it up on Amazon five seconds after I finish it. There are pros and cons with each method. Yet… I feel that traditional publishing is dying.
So what’s the other part then dammit? Right now I’m leaning toward the possibility of a kickstarter campaign, followed by sales on major online distributors.
***
Now, I have some questions for you:
Collectively, you all have been extraordinarily helpful in the writing of the Veil War. Without the slightest hint of exaggeration, I can say that I have been staggered by the level of support, advice, feedback and information that has been showered upon my head. I think that you will likewise be just as amazingly helpful in getting the finished product out there.
More serious, this time. My work is requiring me to be in the office, and as I will not be working from the comfort of my home office I will also be spending a ridiculous amount of time commuting to the main office. This traveling will significantly eat in to my available writing time.
But fear not! I hope to polish chapter 32 for publishing this weekend. And after that, there are only four (possibly five) more chapters before this installment of Lewis’ adventures are complete. Much of that has already been written, and I will endeavor to maintain my weekly publishing schedule as best I can.
Of silver linings, there is not much to say but this: I have been using my long commutes for a lot of thinking and planning. Veil War II is going to be a lot of fun to write.
Breaking news: my work schedule got rearranged a bit this week, and some deadlines were moved up. This will necessitate a Veil War Friday post.
Now, admission time: I could have posted anyway. But as I wrote deeper into battle, I came to a sudden realization. My insistance on maintaining the point of view on Captain Lewis had gone too far. It was a convention, really; nothing more. And most of the story as I’ve related it to you worked fine enough within that constraint; so it was a helpful tool for a neophyte writer to keep me focused on the story and not get distracted. It has always been my intent that in the final novel version, that constraint would be relaxed. I have Lance Criminal Adventures starring Coleman, and small sections told from the point of view of Evans and Pethoukis already written. I had also planned to rewrite parts of some chapters to shift the point of view to another character for variety and dramatic purposes.
So, my realization was that most of the next chapter really can’t be told from where Lewis stands without serious contortions. And seeing how contorted it had become, I decided to relax my rules early and rewrite now. Much of the prose can be saved, of course; descriptions of ‘splosions, booms and chopping are the universal language of love after all. Still and all it requires some effort, and that’s what I’ll be doing tonight.
In the meantime, enjoy this lost episode of Carl Sagan’s justly famed science series, Cosmos:
My work schedule got rearranged on me this week, so Chapter 26 will go up later today. In the meantime, enjoy this:
Chapter 23, revised and completed, will go up later this evening. I got called in to the office, and that’s put a bit of spoke in my wheel.
The Veil War 