April 15th already! Whew! Let’s get these questions out of the way:

When is Pykh 4’s coming?

Expect it near the end of summer. July/August.

Why so far out?

Well, because it’s been slow going, yet my days seem to constantly be filled with new errands and regular life and also a lot of writing. The last two months have felt like I steal writing time instead of making it. My life has been in a bit of upheaval. Nothing tragic. But sometimes you have to put yourself in order before you can come to the desk. Sometimes it’s not as easy as putting on headphones or closing the door.

The good news is that even when I’m taking a week off I pretty much always write two chapters that week. I seem to be incapable of literally taking an entire week off. (Unless I’m done with the project, and then I take about 10 days or so.)

I’ve done my usual rumination, which includes writing scenes that won’t go into the story and changing things around in my head until I like them. Now I think I like them. The last two weeks have probably been the most productive weeks of 2020.

Life has calmed down, my routine is taking shape again, and meanwhile the world is in shambles. Sorry about that. If you are affected by the coronavirus, I hope you’re able to get assistance. I also hope you have some good books to get you through the quarantine.
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I’ll be trying to keep the blog regularly updated again with chapters. This is a really sweet book. I really want to share it with you guys, and I think a happy ending for Carter and the gang is long overdue. They’ve fought hard enough.

​Chapter below!

I got my book in the mail! They sent me two because one was a little damaged. Boy, nothing feels more real than holding the book for the first time and flipping the pages. Saying '150k' or however long the book is is not nearly as satisfying. This is the first time I get to really see it and see that work accomplished!

It's a beautiful book. I love the artsy cover. :) In case you haven't ordered a print book from amazon in a while, they make them with soft matte covers that feel really nice. I just want to rub my book all over my -- Never mind!

Haha.

Anyhow! Give me another week or so on starting the Pykh chapters. I didn't realize how much I needed a break until I started taking one. My birthday is Dec 7th, so I just had Thanksgiving, and soon I'll be celebrating again. With Christmas on the way.

I love my friends and family truly, but I've noticed that when others are around, my creative voice gets quiet for a bit. And I'm honestly enjoying the rest and soaking up the family time. I feel pretty guilty when I put the writing down though, and I've been doing a lot of brainstorming and writing about the writing. Which means that pretty soon it'll be time to visit Carter and the gang again

 Happy holidays!

The underworld needs a king.

Another one.

Seph's family is kind of messed up. His grandfather ate his parents. His father has scores of illegitimate children. His mother grows into a giant when she gets angry—right into the skies!

And all Seph wants to do is get away and be on his own for once. He wants to grow up, which is such a simple thing for mortal men and all the other creatures to do. But when you're the child of Demeter, Goddess of the Harvest, and Zeus, Ruler of Mount Olympus?

Seph is tired of being treated like a child. It's time to leave.

But due to the sparring of his cousins over him, Zeus has decided to marry him off. ‘Disagreements amongst gods cause chaos for mortals,’ he says. All of this because Seph was caught kissing a boy.

Well, nothing will happen at Demeter’s villa.

Literally, nothing. It's run by a bunch of nymphs, who are all women.

All Seph wants to do is find a man like himself so they can explore the world together. But with his mother guarding him and his cousins causing trouble, Seph will have to go on being the 'baby boy' unless he wants his father to marry him to someone awful.

From a chasm in the earth, a dark figure emerges…

Well, I've actually been finished for a little over a week now. I'm over halfway through my second draft! I have a lot to fix because I actually didn't see this ending coming until I was right there writing the chapters. That's why story outlining always confounds me. How the heck am I supposed to follow an outline when I have no idea wtf I'm doing?

Seph surprised me at every turn in the last act, right up to the ending chapters when he returns to his mother. Now I have some rewriting and fixing to do, but no enormous scene changes. If you've been reading on Patreon, the draft is really rough and contradicts itself, but the story there is mostly complete.

So! I'm working really hard to get my self-editing improved. I bought a printer so I can proofread on paper. I also have an editor who's going to help me after my draft is done, but I'll be publishing before that and then updating the e-book later. If you're offended by misplaced commas, you might want to wait until January. In my draft, the words at least should be correct.

And of course, I'm doing it this way because otherwise the book would be another month or two until release.

What I'm up to next:

I'll be starting on Pykh 4 right away, but chapters won't appear on Patreon until November. That's because I need some time to brainstorm and let the ideas fill up in my head again. I need to write out a few chapters also, because with the Pykh books I usually don't even find my story and until I'm about 6 chapters in. I usually just start out with scenes that I think are really cute which may or may not have a purpose once I get going.

The scene where Pykh takes the spying scope from Auk was one of those. I think that was the third thing I wrote for the book. Chapter 1 was the first thing, and the scene where Iethuth and Auk talk at night in the middle of the camp was the second. So I'm all over the place!

I figure it will be extremely confusing for the readers and difficult for me to be rearranging chapters after the fact like I do in my file. So I need a head start.

Also, don't expect the characters to be perfect. Their voices are really unique, and I often need a second or third or fourth or sixth pass to get them right. Lol. Ov'ielk was a nightmare! That scene where Carter meets Ov'ielk was actually the last scene I wrote for the book… It was on like its sixth full rewrite.

I'm going to try to post mostly correct stuff, but some of it might be garbage.

I wrote a lot ahead in my Hades book, so I still have chapters to post there even though I'm finished with it. The book finishes with ~70 chapters (I'm still changing things), and I'm going to let these post to Patreon throughout November while I take my little break. I figure not everybody will rush out and buy the book on launch day, so for some readers the chapters won't be redundant.

I'm almost through my second draft, like I said. And then I proofread. I'm hoping to get the book out November 5… But that might be a tad optimistic. It depends on how many changes I still want to make.

Sometime in early-ish November you should be able to enjoy the exciting adventures of… Hades and Seph!

Well, I wanted to have started Pykh 4 already, but my Hades book has run long. I expected an 80k novel. It seemed pretty simple, having two main characters and a straight forward plot. Somehow I'm up to 106k, and I've brainstormed ideas for an additional 20 chapters or so until the ending. :/

I'm not good at planning.

So expect another month, at least, for this novel to wrap up! I also got a little stuck on it in August (I didn't write half as much as I wanted to) but I think I've got an ending I really like.

Below is another preview. This chapter introduces Minthe, an underworld nymph.