Sage Mullins: Blog

Maybe it was a form of unintentional foreshadowing when, in the later chapters of Lightning in a Bottle, Lisette was declared the runner-up in the Miss New Jersey pageant. I had no way of knowing that the story itself would finish in second place in three Clitorides Awards categories - Best Erotic Story by a New Author, Best Do-over Sex Story, and Best New Author 2014.

All kidding aside ... that's far better than I had a right to expect. Lightning in a Bottle was, more than anything else, an attempt to try my hand at constructing a tale in a genre that has given me so much reading pleasure over the years. I got over half a million words out of that attempt, and no matter what I come up with from here on in, LiaB will always hold a special place in my heart.

I'd like to offer sincere thanks to those who voted for LiaB, and give another shout-out to those who provided editing and content assistance - Seattle22, LastCallAgain, mcguy101, Tendertouch and Bandit IRA. Congrats to all the other winners, most especially rlfj for "A Fresh Start" and G Younger for "Stupid Boy." There's certainly no shame in finishing second to either of those outstanding stories.

Yeah, that couple that showed up at the very end of the story looked kind of familiar, didn't they? :)

I heard from more than one reader that when the story was in the early stages, it was difficult to gauge where I would be taking the story. This was probably partly due to the fact that it's a very different story from Lightning in a Bottle. However, I'm pleased with how it turned out.

I'd like to give one more shout-out to those who provided editing help: to B4Lurker, who provided top-notch grammatical editing; to Lupusmag, who gave me some much-needed input on cultural matters; and to mcguy101, who offered the same invaluable plot and character feedback that he provided for LiaB.

Looking ahead, I'm about to get very busy in RT for a few weeks, and I'm glad I was able to wrap up AUA before the crunch hits. My posting schedule is, and probably always will be, erratic. However, I'd like to think that once I start something, I do eventually finish it.

With that in mind, my first order of business is to finish Song of Adelita. You will likely see a new chapter of SOA appear in the not too distant future, to ward off the dreaded yellow-stripe status. I plan to keep writing, but to hold off on posting subsequent chapters until I have the story almost finished. Then, I'll put up the chapters at a rate of two or three a week, until the story is complete. There are probably between 12 and 15 chapters to go.

Further down the road, I'm still allowing the story I mentioned in an earlier blog post to percolate in my mind. It's a time-travel tale involving travel to a post-apocalyptic future.

Anyway, as always, thanks for reading, and I'll post occasional updates here as to how my writing is coming along.

The epilogue for An Unwanted Alias is finished, and has been sent for editing. It should be up soon.

It looks like I'll be able to reach the goal I set a while back - to finish the story by the end of March.

Chapter 17 of An Unwanted Alias is complete and has been sent for editing. Look for it to be posted in the next few days.

After that comes the epilogue, which will bring the story to a close.

Chapter 16 of An Unwanted Alias is now complete, and is in the able hands of its editors. It should be up on the site in a few days.