I Hate How Long This Process Is Taking

Well, here we are. Another month has gone by and I have still not finished the book.

This pisses me off to no end.

Time is not my ally.

I am starting to really see how my self-imposed deadline to finish this book before the end of May is not happening. I had grand plans of writing two books in my series before the end of this year, and who knows, maybe that will still happen… Who am I kidding…

Anyway, this last month has been busy. We recently went on a trip to Denver, Colorado, and that allowed me to spend a couple of days writing. It was great.

I am well into the draft of Act 3 and I know how the story is going to end. That feels a bit crazy. I had a rough outline from the beginning, but it is interesting to see it continually get dialed in as the story develops. I am just hoping it is not a pile of shit when it is done. That fear has been creeping in lately. There is certainly a bit of vulnerability in all of this writing stuff.

Writing is so much fun when I get into the flow. I don’t know how to explain it, but I have noticed a pattern for how I can get myself into it when I sit down at the keyboard. Since I don’t write every day I have to spend a bit of time getting myself back on track.

It flows like this…

I start by looking at my ever-evolving outline. This helps orient me to where I am in the overall story and what waypoints I need to get to. Then I pick up the current draft and read over the last few sections. This puts me back into the place. It really helps me to just start channeling what happens next and get it on the page. Sometimes I feel like a conduit of what is coming out, sometimes I feel like I am forcing it a bit. When I start to feel like I am forcing it too much I typically walk away for a while and come back to it. Things often loosen up then and I can write a little.

Like I said earlier, time is not my ally. I wanted to be so much further along than I am, but it is what it is. I am very happy with what I have created so far, and love learning all of this. I love the art of it all.

So let’s talk about the story a little bit. Right now the working title is Humanity Shattered Book 1, I know it sucks, and it will evolve into something better. I wanted to finish the first draft before I titled it. I have been researching an entire methodology for creating titles for books in a series like this. It’s a whole thing. There are entire deep dives I have taken into the best way to title a book that will make it searchable and relevant for people who enjoy the genre.

The story picks up after the events of VEHO: A BACKSTORY. I talked about the creation of that in my last newsletter. The main characters are not the same, but the events of VEHO lead to the introduction of the main characters for the book. The story focuses on a military special forces team that is sent to the WO 9127 Solar System in the deep reaches of the galaxy to investigate the fallout from the events of VEHO. All communications and traffic from the system seemed to have stopped and it's time to figure out what is going on in there. I don’t know that I want to say too much more about it right now, but I posted the sales copy a while back and will include it here again…

A Special Operations team is sent to check out the loss of communication to an entire solar system. What they discover will change everything…

Senior Chief Petty Officer (SCPO) Jackson has built a life on keeping his team safe.

Can Jackson protect his chosen family as they give it their all to save humanity? Can he lead his team through the end of all that he and everyone else has ever known?

Join the hair-raising adventure of a lifetime as Shamon takes you to a future where the vastness of space can bring anything… and it is all wrapped up in the horror of the collapse of civilization.

So there it is, would you buy this book?

Shamon

P.S. The image above is concept art for the cover of the book.