I finished the rough draft of The Obsidian Palace on Friday, and the book came to just under 119,000 words in total, though with the summary and character list it’s likely closer to 117,000 words. The length of my books often grows somewhat during the editing process, which begins tomorrow, so I expect that the story will end up a little longer, or possibly more if my Alpha readers think I need to expound on a couple of sections I’m debating on.

In all, my attempt to write every day in November was a resounding success, and I ended up managing to write over double my usual rate. It was exhausting, and not something I could do every month, but educational. The stuff I worked on included a short story I’m sharing via my newsletter, which I’m working on completing now that The Obsidian Palace is in the editing stage.

Now, with all that said, I think I’d be remiss if I didn’t talk about what comes next, after editing. I’m going to be taking a short vacation, and then I’m going to be re-reading Marin’s Codex, Ancient Ruins, Spells of Old, and Halls of Power. That should take me about a week, and then I’m writing Crisis of Faith, which will be set a few weeks after the Epilogue of Halls of Power. This story will feature many characters from Ancient Dreams, but Sistina and Phynis will not be taking center stage, just to try managing expectations early on. And to accompany this, here is my current draft of what I expect will be the cover (definitely a draft, as I’ve already seen a couple of things I want to adjust!).

2018 has proven quite productive for me, and I look forward to 2019. I hope many of you join me in that.

Oh, and I suppose I should give the obligatory shout-out for my Patreon, since I’m figuring that out at the moment, and sharing the draft of Heaven’s Fallen through it. Ever since I’ve started sharing it, I’ve felt some of my writers block where it’s concerned easing up, so I expect I might be working on that again soon.