Well, I said I was going to spend the month of June focusing on writing new fiction. Apparently I wasn’t kidding. I produced about 22,500 words of new early-draft fiction in June, for an average of about 750 words per day all month. Pretty good work rate for me.

The new material included the first six chapters of Second Dawn, which is mostly likely going to be the first serialized novel in a series, all published on the Kindle Vella platform. Second Dawn is placed in my new Scorpius Reach space-opera setting, and I’m quite happy with how it’s turning out so far.

I also wrote “Derga’s Tale,” a roughly 10,000-word novelette set in the Iron Age setting of Krava’s Legend. “Derga’s Tale” is the story of how Krava’s parents met. It’s the first short piece in what’s eventually going to be a collection of 5-6 stories, all prequels to The Curse of Steel. Once I’ve written all of those stories, I plan to edit them into a book-length collection, which I’ll then use to practice the new publication and marketing methods I’ve been researching. In particular, the collection will serve as a “reader magnet” that I can use for promotion of the series.

Finally, I also released a minor-version update to the Scorpius Reach setting bible, and published one book review. Not a bad month in all, even if the month didn’t quite go as I’d planned it. Planning is essential, even if you don’t always stick to the plan.

Incidentally, June was also surprisingly successful on the social-media front. I appear to have lost a patron at the beginning of the month, but since then I’ve seen three or four new patrons come in. Welcome to all the newcomers! Surprising number of new Facebook contacts as well, given that I’m not taking any specific action to promote this site. I’m not going to question good fortune.

Now that I’ve gotten some fiction written, I think this month will be spent focusing on pushing Architect of Worlds a few steps forward. Here’s the priority list for July 2021.

• Top Priority (“this is how I’ll judge whether the month has been successful”):
  • Architect of Worlds: Return to improvement and polishing of the Introduction and Design Sequence document, leading to a new minor-version release.
  • Architect of Worlds: Start work on a section describing the structure of the galaxy and of interstellar space, and providing guidelines on how to make maps for interstellar settings.
  • Krava’s Legend: Write a few more chapters of The Sunlit Lands.
  • Scorpius Reach: Finish final editing of the first six chapters of Second Dawn, and post the novel to Kindle Vella so it’s available to readers when the platform goes live.
• Second Priority (“work on this as time permits”):
  • Architect of Worlds: Start work on a section of special cases and additional worldbuilding material that doesn’t fit into the design sequence.
  • Krava’s Legend: Write the second short story for the “reader magnet” collection.
  • Krava’s Legend: More research toward improvements to my release-and-marketing workflow.
  • Scorpius Reach: Start work on a third edition of the Game of Empire rules for Traveller.
• Back Burner (“work on this only if everything else gets blocked”):
  • Human Destiny: Write a new short story for eventual collection and publication.
  • Human Destiny: Write a few thousand more words of the Cortex Prime sourcebook and setting bible.

For my patrons, this month’s free releases will probably include a new minor-version release of the Architect of Worlds design sequence. This month’s charged release, if there is one, will probably be a block of new material for Architect of Worlds, and possibly another short story from Krava’s Legend or a few new chapters of The Sunlit Lands.

As always, I’ll want to complete one or two book reviews for self-published or indie fiction this month. I’m in the middle of a very good candidate right now, so two reviews this month seems possible.

Watch this space for status reports, and if any of the above interests you, please consider signing up as a patron using the link in the sidebar.