Celtic Bard: Blog

As the title suggests, I have just submitted the next chapter to Enter the Darkness. It should be up by tomorrow. I finally worked it around to a cut-off point and edited it. At just over 15 pages in MS Word, I think it might be the longest chapter thus far. The next chapter is either going to be just as long or fairly short, depending on how I decide to break down the rest of the story as it gets written. Given that there are probably only going to be another three or so chapters, I am leaning towards the next chapter being on the short side as a transition between this latest chapter and the climax chapter. Either way, I think that I will be trying to polish off Enter the Darkness before working on anything else. For those of you waiting for the next chapter in Anomaly of the Fates or Future Distorted, sorry. Unless my muse gets uppity, I am hoping to finish up this story before working on other stuff.

That's all for now. Enjoy the new chapter of EtD!

All right folks, I know it has been longer than I thought, but the final chapter of An Abridged History of the Order sort of got away from me. I thought I was going to be writing a quick, five page short, short story and wound up writing just a regular twelve page short story longer than most chapters I write for the novel-length works I post. I just submitted it so it should be up by tomorrow, later tonight if the Webmaster is rocking his magic today.

Chapter V of AAHotO is the finale of this work and I will now endeavor to get back to finishing up the next chapter of Enter the Darkness, which has also gotten away from me and will be quite long. I could have broken it up into two chapters, but I could not find a convenient and satisfactory place to break it, so you get to wait and then revel for longer on this one. As I told a reader who recently wrote me about finishing Enter the Darkness, I figure another three chapters or so and EtD will be finished.

For those of you now bawling your eyes out and screaming, "NOOOOOO!," relax. I have already started the sequel to Enter the Darkness. It was never meant to be a stand alone story but more of an origin story to lead into a series of novels about Alexandra McKiernan and her life as she battles the forces of Darkness. I already have a title to the next book, In the Darkness Falling, so be patient on that one and it will be forthcoming.

After wrapping up the next chapter of EtD, my plans are in the air. I would really like to wrap up the whole story but I also don't want to leave other stories languishing with the "In Progress" label too long. My best guess is that, as always, it will be up to the temperamental muse I have been assigned and whether her anvil logistics are running smoothly.

That is all for now, enjoy the finale of AAHotO (those of you who are reading it) and as always I welcome your comments, so long as they are constructive.

I recently got near complete silence in my house, hours and hours to myself. And with that time, I sat in front of the computer and looked through the things that have been languishing unfinished and BAM! Bloody muse hit me right between the eyes with the jones to finish An Abridged History of the Order. I know, right? The thing that has been unfinished for well over a year due to the fact that I have not been in the mood to sit in front of the computer for hours and hours, switching back and forth between writing and research web pages. Not the nearly completed Enter the Darkness, not any of the long-unfinished Am'mortal stories I have unfinished, not Future Distorted or Anomaly of the Fates, not even some of the stuff I have started but have not decided what to do with yet (to post or not to post). Well, that said, I finished two more chapters of AAHotO and decided I will end that one like I started it, with a short, short story. The short, short story will be about the Order's preparations for the coming of Alexandra McKiernan, so that should round out that project nicely. I have not finished it yet, hopefully I can get that done in the next day or so, but I am submitting the two new chapters of AAHotO tonight, so they should be up by tomorrow.

On a related note, the next chapter of Enter the Darkness is going to be rather long. I would have ended it already and posted it, but it has sort of escaped my control and I think it will wind up being one of the longer chapters when I finally finish it. This chapter will be setting up the finale, so I was loath to break it up into two chapters, which is why it is still going. I am hoping to wrap that chapter up in the next few days as well, so check back in any announcements on that end. That is all the news for now, enjoy the posts and thanks for reading. I truly appreciate the support.

As I mentioned a few days ago, I have completed the latest chapter for Anomaly of the Fates. My outside editor finally finished the read-through and so I submitted it for your enjoyment tonight. It should be available sometime tomorrow.

I have also reposted the Prologue for AotF to include an Author's Note. Said note is my foray into local political editorialism and comments on my alma mater's recent name change. As the note says, if this really interests you, you can use the internet to peruse the coverage of this idiocy.

Additionally, I will warn readers that I used this latest chapter to vent some irritation and frustration on my current locale. Since the protagonist comes from a similar place as far as his setting changes goes, I think my ire and his are fairly compatible within the framework of the story. I am sure many, many people find the Augusta, GA area pleasant and a nice place to move to from northern cities. I, however, grew up in West Germany in my formative years and aside from my sojourn in Georgia, New Jersey is the place I have lived the longest in the United States. This makes Georgia, particularly in the summer, unbearable. Those of you from the South, please forgive my venting on this subject in this chapter.

And finally, I have also used this chapter to highlight a part of Southern life that caught not only myself but many other Northern transplants to the region by surprise: race. In this chapter you will find my clumsy way to express some of my irritations, confusion, and fatigue about how consuming race/racism is in the South. Nobody in my family was on this continent during the Civil War, not having arrived until around the turn of the twentieth century or later. As such, we don't really have much stake in the issues fought over with such fervor over the first century and a half of this nation's history. We have only had to deal with its aftermath. Growing up in the military as I did, it was not until I came back to the United States shortly before high school that I realized there was a Deal about race in America. My first best friend that I have memories of was a kid named Quincy. The fact that he was black never really registered to me. He was just Quincy, the dude I spent most of my days with until I left West Germany for New Jersey. My best friend when I got settled in New Jersey was a kid named Eric Valera. I am pretty sure he was Hispanic, but again, since it never registered that I should care, I really can't recall. My best friends when I moved back to West Germany a couple of years later were a good ol' boy from South Carolina named TJ and an Indian kid named Michael. Indian as in Native American or Indian as in subcontinent I really couldn't tell you because he was just Michael. Looking back, based on my memories of his father's features (my memory of him is sort of like a younger, more Indian Pervez Musharaf), I would guess subcontinental Indian. All of this is a long winded way of saying it wasn't until my teen years, when I moved to Missouri for a year and then to Georgia that racism became a pervasive enough force in the society in which I lived that I took note of it. I was shocked to learn the KKK was still around. Not only still around, it had an office down the street from the high school I attended in Missouri and marched down what was called main street the year before I got there. It struck me as somewhat anachronistic the way people in Georgia dealt with race in the modern world. But then I guess I have not only lived a rather sheltered life growing up in the military, but my perception of the world is viewed through lenses that don't see what is really there. I look at a "brown" Hispanic man and see someone with green skin or a "black" African man and see purple or dark, dark green or a "yellow" Oriental man and see orange or brown or green. Nothing most other people see. Even my own supposedly very pale white skin looks pink and orange to my sight. So hating someone because of what they "look" like has always somewhat confused me. My philosophy has always been that there are far better reasons to hate someone, just give them a chance and they will give you one if that is what you are looking for. Or if you are a more tolerant sort, they will give you a reason to like them. More than anything else, the ignorance that surrounds race in America, not just on the side of the bigots but on the side of those who pander and race-bait, make me sad and weary. Sad that such energy and inventiveness is not used for more constructive purposes that will advance us further together, and weary at trying to carry people who want nothing more than to either stay where we are or are trying to drag us backward. Bigots and race profiteers both.

Anyway, sorry for the soapbox performance this time around but I thought this latest chapter of AotF needed some explanation as to my thinking on it. I welcome your thoughts, as always, so long as they are constructive and don't include examples of what I was talking about above.

It was a busy last few weeks and so I have not had time to post anything. I have a few things either partially or wholly complete . . . in hand-written form. I have handwriting so bad that it will take me a while to wade through it all and get it in the computer to post, so bear with me. The first thing that will appear for your reading pleasure will be the next chapter of Anomaly of the Fates. It is already transcribed, it merely have to edit and submit it, which I hope to have done in the next day or so. After that, it will be whatever I get to first so keep an eye out, something new comes your way soon.