Thanks to all the readers who have taken time to drop me a note regarding 'A New Past'.
The support for moving the plot forward and creating meaningful challenges for Paul has been tremendous. To all of you, I hope the next few chapters won't disappoint.
A handful of readers have stated they won't be reading further, since they feel I have taken a dark turn in what is supposed to be a light, escapist tale. Others feel betrayed that I killed favorite characters off.
Everyone is entitled to read what they want, and to stop reading as they see fit. I respect that. I think they will be disappointed by not reading to the story's conclusion, but I'm not going to further defend my own editorial choices, and hope you can all respect them as much as I respect your own choices.
Now for the update. I am charging toward the conclusion of the tale. I am writing chapter 59 starting this week and will conclude the story by chapter 60, even if the final two chapters exceed the 10,000 work chapter length I typically aim for. That's the good news.
The less good news is that I think I've worn out my editors. I've re-worked chapters 50-55 several times, but not gotten much feedback from the folks that have offered to proof-read. Right now, I think I'm actually okay with that. I've improved my own QA process and will take the lumps for grammatical errors from the critical fans who find more errors than I imagine remain after any editing and revision.
With that in mind, I plan on posting Chapter 50 within the next two weeks and will then post the remaining chapters every other week until the last chapter is written, and then post updates weekly. I reserve the right to change that plan, but would like to have the tale finished and in your hands before the end of summer.
As always, thanks for reading.
-Charlie