Reluctant_Sir: Blog

In the most recent chapter of 'Magic 101', there is a section that was stricken and was supposed to be removed.

Yeah, well, that didn't happen.

So, when you get there, feel free to just, you know, skip it. Pretend it is not there.

<strike>I'll get it fixed, promise.</strike> (<-- This worked in Preview, but not when posted... weird.)

Update # 1: Okay, I am attempting a thing. I have staged a repost of the current chapter and I hope this doesn't have an adverse effect on the rest of the chapters held in abeyance by the automated process.

Updated #2: It worked! The chapter reposted. So, if the next chapter posts as scheduled, at least I will know that I can edit already posted chapters without waiting for the rest of the story to post first. That is nice to know for future gaffes.

Cross your fingers.

I thought I had written about this, but the evidently I haven't, based on the number of emails I have gotten so far.

Just before I posted Magic 101, I noticed I had been inconsistent with whether or not I capitalized the word Mage. Since this was a story about magic, I thought it appropriate for it to be always capitalized.

Can you guess what I did wrong? Yes! Exactly! That is why I like you folks, you are smarter than the average picnic basket, or Park Ranger, or bear or... something.

I did a global find and replace for 'mage' and substituted 'Mage'.

Et voilà! A quick and easy fix!

Yeah... um, except for words like daMage and iMage and, well, you get the picture.

Proper

Planning

Prevents

Piss

Poor

Performance

** No, I didn't forget Prior, it is redundant and people who use it as the seventh P smell of bacon. Bacon is for sycophants, products of incest and people who steal gags from video games.

Now, in the past, when I had scheduled multiple chapters to be posted, I would have to take the time to load each individual chapter separately and, since I did it that way, I could then replace or update each individual chapter before it actually posted.

With this new setup, which I absolutely love so far, there is a slight drawback in that I don't have the ability to pick and choose, interceding with a specific chapter mid-process.

This means I cannot fix this globally bad idea until the whole story is loaded. It also means that I get a LOT of emails about certain issues because people think I either don't know yet or am ignoring the issue.

Small price to pay, but there you go. I don't want to discourage folks from writing in, or from offering corrections and suggestions as needed, but on this one, can we say I have been suitably chastised?

Humbly yours,

--Reluctant_Sir

I have been getting a lot of great feedback on this story so far, something I enjoy a lot. Folks asking questions, offering advice and so on.

There have been many people saying they hoped this story carried on and got finished, so I think I might not have been as clear as I could have been in the past.

This story is complete and queued up.

The entire story, from start to finish, already in the hopper and being posted at the rate of one chapter every three days. This will continue until the 29th, where you will get 2 (TWO!) chapters to end the book on Leap Year.

I will not publish a story that is not complete. No partials, no on-going serials. Every story I publish will have an ending. You may not like it, you may want a continuation, a sequel, a series, but each story can stand on its own (I hope in quality, as well as in structure)

So, no worries, okay?

Dark Days 2 is with the editors! It is. Really. Truely. It is done and being fixed to make it readable. It will be posted unless I die first. Probably not until sometime in March. Maybe April. Depends on how bad it is and how long it takes the editors to translate my meanderings.

I have a couple other stories in the hopper as well, one complete except for editing, one well on the way, so I will continue pushing out work as long as my muse sticks around!

Thanks, everyone, for your support. I literally would not, could not, do this without the support of the readers.

Our wondrous overlord has set up some new codes for those of us who like to post stories over time. They allow us to dictate the exact date or relative date (Today + 3 for example) for each chapter.

[Edit] IT WORKED!! I will never doubt our overlord again. I am stoked about this because, whether you know it or not, it is was a pain in the butt to schedule posting ahead of time until now. This is AWESOME!

I planned this so the chapters drop every three days, with 13 chapters in total and end on February 29th with a Double Chapter posting (AM and PM) in celebration of leap year.

Anyway, happy reading and I hope you find this as entertaining as I did writing it for you.

Even if you don't do that sort of thing. Good wishes, like a motion to adjourn, are always in order.

For those who haven't given up, thanks. I have not been ignoring you folks in particular, I have just been ignoring everyone.

I know, what a dick, right? I won't offer lame apologies because they are worth what you pay for them, just know it was not something I could blame on others in any case, it's all me, baby.

NEWS AND UPDATES

I have a new story out for editing and I think it will be fairly popular if you like my other stuff. Not a ground-breaking subject or treatment, but something I wanted to write someday anyway.

Some will be happy to learn that, despite my inexcusable tardiness, Dark Days 2 is complete and out for editing. No ETA on that, the other story was finished first and was put in the pipeline first, but DD2 does exist.

So, lessons learned so far?

1) Never start a serial story if you don't have a good outline and know where it is going before you start. You write yourself into a corner and, if you do manage to finish it, the ending is not something anyone is really happy about. (Empath)

2) Never promise a sequel unless it is COMPLETE before you open your trap. That just guaran-damn-tees the muses will enlist the fickle finger of fate to goose you. Those bitches went on a vacation and didn't even send a post card. (DD2)

I am sure there are more to follow. I am still relatively new at this writing thing, despite having been on here a couple of years now, and am learning more with every story I manage to get down on paper.

Thanks to those that hung in there. My apologies to those that lost faith, I can't blame them.