Queen’s Journey is up to ~32,500 words, which has me very pleased with how the book is coming along. I’m not entirely sure on how long it’ll be at this point, but with how much ground it has to cover before the end, I’d be startled if it isn’t over 100,000 words.
I also have gotten back the edited version of Dusk Gate, and at this point I’ve uploaded it to Amazon. I’ve also moved the release date up to October 26th, since I’m sure that it’s ready! I’m really looking forward to it being out, so everyone can see what I was working on.
Beyond all of that, I’m working on refining other ideas in the background, so that when I get to Through the Fire again I can do the story justice, and I’ve got still other ideas that are churning in the back of my head. If anything, I have far too many ideas competing to be written, but that’s the price of being an author, I suppose.
I hope everyone is doing well!
Ancient Dreams 
Well, that’s excellent news on two fronts. Now I can say ‘sooner’ instead of ‘soon’ while waiting for Dusk Gate. And I’m looking forward to Queen’s Journey as well. I’ll be waiting with bated breath for the releases. On a somewhat related note, have you ever considered an isekai (i.e., transported to another world) style novel? I think it would be interesting if say, someone from Lilith’s world were to suddenly drop into Sistina’s world or into Joy’s universe. (Having an enhanced human meet Joy just tickles my fancy for some reason.) Hoping all is well, and continues to be for you.
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Hopefully you enjoy it! Xandra is… special. I love the description of her that a friend gave: “She’s like an over-worked retail worker who is out of f***s to give.” I also love Nef, who came very close to stealing the show when she finally appeared.
As for isekai… maybe? Sort of? I did one consider (jokingly) the idea of Emonael fleeing to another universe and ending up with one using game mechanics like Beesong Chronicles. I think she’d be /very/ miffed. The other is a story I call Succubus in the Server (which has not been shared publicly because I’m not sure what to do with stories with erotic content, personally), where a demon ended up shunted from her own world to an ‘alternate, near-future Earth’, but without a body, and decided to build a VR system with a massive adult superhero game so that she could feed without getting in trouble. She’s not the main character, though, so calling it isekai would be a bit of a stretch.
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I have no complaints with the level of eroticism in your stories, frankly altogether too many supposed fantasy novels rely on erotic content rather than sound storytelling. The ‘Succubus in the Server’ sounds entertaining though… are you sure that wasn’t Emonael in an earlier incarnation? Won’t lie, I do like isekai for some of the over the top personalities authors come up with, but I can’t consider writing in that genre to be easy.
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SitS is an issue for me primarily because it contains /explicit/ erotic content, which is something I’ve specifically avoided publishing up until this point. As I recall, it’s about 28,000 words, and most of it doesn’t have much of that content at all; mostly because I refuse to have that sort of thing without a decent story, even in stories written for personal enjoyment.
As for the character, I’m /quite/ sure she’s not Emonael. The vague idea was that a succubus was in a war with angels, and a magical explosion punched a hole into another universe that they normally couldn’t access. She was without a body, so she possessed a server, then built an online persona to develop her technology. I had a fair amount of fun with it, and it’s interesting because she tried to give the game she built ‘true’ personalities, and has been more successful than even she realizes.
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Now you’ve got me even more curious to read that story. I do understand your reasons though. I’ll just direct my excess energy to (somewhat) patiently waiting for the release of Dusk Gate.
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Hopefully you enjoy it once it’s out!
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I am not looking for spoilers but… is there rape is Dusk Gate? That is one of my biggest fears about reading books now-a-days.
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No. There are implications of it having happened in the past, and rather… pithy comments about such, but no.
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Okay cool. Thank you.
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SitS sounds like an interesting story. Could maybe try it under a pen name (Jen Minrano? :D) or patreon only or something, should you ever feel more comfortable releasing it. But it would certainly be a departure of your norms, so I can understand the trepidation.
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That’s a possibility I’ve considered a few times. My only concern is that if I don’t continue supporting the pen name, it’d feel… well, almost like a bait and switch. Definitely something I’ve waffled on, a lot. I also briefly shared it with my Patreon, but with limited-time access.
If I do it, I’m not going to hide that it’s me, it’d just be a different pen name so people don’t mix up the catalogs. We’ll see what happens in the end.
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