rlfj: Blog

I got lots of responses from readers about changing the sign from coyotes to wolves. Many reported about changing predator habitats and migrations and ranges, even about the growth of coyotes and crosses with similar canids (wolves and dogs). As for other predators and scavengers that would eat up any carcasses, one suggestion definitely amused me. Feral hogs would certainly be happy to eat any miscreants. I used to watch Deadwood and I loved when Al Swearengen would send his victims over to Wu's hog pen for disposal. Said hogs would soon show up as pork chops. Talk about recycling!

Anyway, time for another couple of chapters. Now we learn some more history of the Culverins. Enjoy!

I just learned something truly fascinating. There were no coyotes east of the Great Plains before the 20th Century! I had always thought that coyotes and wolves coexisted, though they occupied slightly different niches in the same ecosystem. Asiaticus informed me that coyotes didn't move east of the Mississippi until after the larger wolf was hunted out of the east at the end of the 19th Century. I verified this through some research.

Why is this important? Because Lizzie Smith could never have put up a sign saying, 'Coyotes Have To Eat Too!' There were no coyotes! She wouldn't have even known what a coyote was! She would have put up a sign saying, "Wolves Have To Eat Too!' Coyotes never showed up in North Carolina until the 1970s. In the interim, other predators would have picked up the slack, eating any crooks and thieves the Culverins left out in the woods. So, I had to do a minor rewrite, switching out coyotes for wolves.

It's time for another few chapters. Enjoy!

I just want to send out a thank you to all those who catch typos, anachronisms, and scene errors. I try to set a high standard, but I'm as capable of screwing up as the next guy. Sometimes they are simple spelling errors that snuck past the spell checker, but occasionally it's a big goof up like when the laundry room is both on the first floor and the basement! That needed a rewrite! Oops! Keep me on my toes, guys.

And the results are in! In my last blog post I raised the question about changing the numbering on my chapters, in a situation where multiple sections had multiple chapters. I had been numbering the chapters in each section starting with 1 and working up, so that if there were five chapters, there would be five Chapter 1s. The suggestion was to make the chapters sequential, so that if Section 1 ended with Chapter 4, Section 2 would start with Chapter 5. Here's the results:

Keep it the same - 10

A modified version of keep it the same. Number the chapters 1.1, 1.2, 2.1, etc. - 4

Sequential numbering - 18

Don't care, do what you want, or I simply couldn't understand the response - 10

Sequential numbering won, but that's not the only reason I changed the numbering. It turns out that when you are uploading new chapters, the system asks for a new chapter number based on the last chapter number. If you are uploading Section 4, Chapter 3, it simply reports the next chapter is 4. There is no way of knowing which section this is for. It's a bit confusing. Going to a sequential system avoids this.

PS: I committed an anachronism in Chapter 9. Thank you, starfiend, for the help. Fixed.

I had a reader comment on my chapter numbering. This story is made up of multiple sections, each of which has from 3 to 7 chapters. Currently each section's first chapter starts at 1. He requested I renumber them so that no matter which section, the chapters increase sequentially, 1 to 21 so far. So, let's vote! Keep each section's numbering the same, or renumber 1 to whatever? Thanks!

In any case, here's the next two chapters. Enjoy!