My New Year’s resolution last year was basically a double-dare to myself: write a book my girl would actually enjoy reading, and build the video game I’ve always wanted to play. For a guy whose writing career peaked at a college term paper, that was… ambitious.
I started on both, but somewhere along the way the characters in the story yanked the wheel. The game went on hold, and I got completely pulled into this world that had only lived in my head during long traffic jams.
This series is what came out of that obsession.
I didn’t just write a story—I ended up with hundreds of thousands of words of world history, character dossiers, and plot maps. The surprise was that, as I wrote the first book, I got completely lost in the relationships.
This isn’t the story I planned to write; it’s the story the characters insisted on. I’ve spent the last year getting to know them, refining them, and now I really want to see how they handle what’s coming next.
I’m posting this first installment because, after a year of work—and a physical copy I’m giving my girl for her birthday next week—I need to know if I’m on the right track. I’ve poured a lot of myself into this, and I’d really appreciate honest feedback before I spend the next few years finishing their journey.
I also realized I kind of did this wrong. Book 1 is just over 95k words and I dropped the whole thing at once. I probably should’ve respected the serial style you all use here. Book 2 is already in a solid first draft, and I’ve started the second. I’ll be releasing it in the same scene-by-scene format that makes this place work so well. I tend to think in scenes more than chapters anyway (my scenes run anywhere from 1k to 8k words, lol), so I’ll release those on a schedule going forward.
You wouldn’t believe how nervous I am hitting “post” on this.
I really hope you enjoy meeting them as much as I have.
Thanks for having us here,
JayH
I started on both, but somewhere along the way the characters in the story yanked the wheel. The game went on hold, and I got completely pulled into this world that had only lived in my head during long traffic jams.
This series is what came out of that obsession.
I didn’t just write a story—I ended up with hundreds of thousands of words of world history, character dossiers, and plot maps. The surprise was that, as I wrote the first book, I got completely lost in the relationships.
This isn’t the story I planned to write; it’s the story the characters insisted on. I’ve spent the last year getting to know them, refining them, and now I really want to see how they handle what’s coming next.
I’m posting this first installment because, after a year of work—and a physical copy I’m giving my girl for her birthday next week—I need to know if I’m on the right track. I’ve poured a lot of myself into this, and I’d really appreciate honest feedback before I spend the next few years finishing their journey.
I also realized I kind of did this wrong. Book 1 is just over 95k words and I dropped the whole thing at once. I probably should’ve respected the serial style you all use here. Book 2 is already in a solid first draft, and I’ve started the second. I’ll be releasing it in the same scene-by-scene format that makes this place work so well. I tend to think in scenes more than chapters anyway (my scenes run anywhere from 1k to 8k words, lol), so I’ll release those on a schedule going forward.
You wouldn’t believe how nervous I am hitting “post” on this.
I really hope you enjoy meeting them as much as I have.
Thanks for having us here,
JayH