Well, my day job is a little less demanding as January turns into February – my two big projects for calendar year 2021 are almost finished and I don’t have any big new projects for 2022. At least not yet. So I’m expecting to make good progress on a couple of creative projects this month. Here’s the main list:

• Top Priority (“this is how I’ll judge whether the month has been successful”)
  • Architect of Worlds: Rewrite sections of the Introduction and Design Sequence segment, based on new research, hopefully simplifying several steps of the sequence having to do with the placement of planets. I may also take this opportunity to update all the worked examples and make all the mathematical notation more consistent.
  • Human Destiny: Finish the novelette “Remnants” for eventual collection and publication.
  • Human Destiny: Finish writing an article for the Cepheus Journal about the game-book project.
• Second Priority (“work on this as time permits”):
  • Krava’s Legend: Write a few new chapters of The Sunlit Lands.
  • 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.
  • Human Destiny: Produce a high-level map of terraformed Mars.
  • Human Destiny: Research and produce a timeline for the terraforming of Mars.
  • Scorpius Reach: Write a few new chapters of Second Dawn.
• Back Burner (“work on this only if everything else gets blocked”):
  • 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.
  • Scorpius Reach: Start work on a third edition of the Game of Empire rules for Traveller (or Cepheus Engine)

The work on Architect of Worlds is probably the top priority this month. The end result there will probably be a version 0.8 draft of the Introduction and World Design Sequence. That new document will be a free update for my patrons.

I’m also considering releasing the new partial for free on this blog site, in an attempt to generate some new interest for the project. There have been a lot of changes and improvements since the version that’s currently available to the public. My patrons will continue to get any further updates to that document as free rewards, until there’s another major overhaul or the book as a whole is about ready for layout and release.

Meanwhile, I should be able to complete the novelette “Remnants” this month, and if that ends up being long enough, I’ll likely make it the charged release for February.