Leto Armitage: Blog

Chapter 23 of The Pool Girl is almost ready for proofing. I need to give it at least one more pass tomorrow, maybe two. The last few weeks have been ... interesting from a creative standpoint. Honestly, I was burned out. My wife often, correctly, accuses me of constantly being busy. I do it to myself. But I hit a point where I was burning too many candles on both ends and in the middle and I just went brain dead for about a week. I worked but off work I just retreated and did non-creative stuff. I read, I watched movies, I just kind of was. And I sat down to start writing again Saturday and I felt some sparks start to jump again. It felt really good.

Chapter 22 is in sight. I'm at about 6,800 words right now and it's nearly content complete. I'm guessing the chapter will end up about 8k words. I'm trying to power through the draft right now which is hard because I'm restless. So much to do and never enough time.

I'm sitting here working on integrating feedback on past chapters. My intention in the next few weeks is to finish up 'book 1' and then do a massive re-upload of everything. I've had a few folks suggest I upload the story to Bookapy. I know nothing about that process but if I do I will also keep it complete on Storieonline, just provide it on Bookapy for those who want a convenient epub and want to contribute to my writing fund. And by writing I mean rum. I'm drinking an excellent vanilla rum right now. The revisions will also include a few edits for consistency. Officially speaking any failures in this regard now are because of an unreliable narrator, not because the writer screwed up. Unrelated, I have excellent land for commercial real estate development in the Florida Everglades.

Anyway, I'm grateful to everyone. I've had very few trolls. A few missives I disagreed with but I still think they were offered as sincere constructive critiscm. Overshadowing both have been both the compliments and extremely useful feedback. And my proofreader Pertinax continues to be both invaluable and a boon.

So, back to editing. Thank you.

So, I have posted my first non-erotic story, The Day It Rained Forever. In my mind, it's a science fiction story though I suspect some people might consider it fantasy. To me, the extraordinary in the premise is supra-natural not super-natural. It is non-erotic and a bit dark so I'll be curious about what people think. Essentially, it is just me trying to stretch my fingers out a bit in a writing exercise. The premise began as ... what If I was to write a Groundhog Day type of story? This was the result.

It's been a hard week to write. I like to sit outside and write but the weather has been awful. Two friends have come down with COVID-19, both in the hospital. Neither lives near me but my thoughts are with them. Despite all the hard things in the world I enjoy returning to the story. Part of me just wants to not worry about the story and write them having fun, perhaps as an antidote the bleakness in the world. Honestly, I'm lucky. My family is safe and well. I try to think about that.

I've also been working on a non-erotic piece. I may post it here, I don't know if there's interest. It's modern southern gothic with a little bit of supernatural. That's neither here nor there though.

So, I found myself really time-crunched but wanting to finish up chapter 20 for posting soon. I'm having trouble with the end scene, so, I decided to cheat. I had intended chapter 20 to be all of Sunday. Instead, it's going to be half the day as I did with Saturday. The good news then is that Chapter 21 is close to being ready for Pertinax to proof as well. There isn't going to be much sex in chapter 20, a lot more in what will be 21. It's a 'light' chapter but fun character interaction and we see more of Lavi's personality. When I started the story I didn't even have Lavi as a character, now I can't imagine her not with Melissa and Robert.

My plan then is for chapter 22 to be the rest of the week including the pool party. That will wrap up 'book 1' and we will then move into 'book 2' as the school year begins.