Well, another week passed and the book still isn't done.
What book am I speaking about?
Storm Spells, obviously.
Am I still lingering on the edge of the spinning black cloud the orbs created when they smashed together?
Nom I moved on from that, but now I'm defying death in a whole other way.
Why am I doing that?
Because I’m the son of a curse-breaking earth mage? I’m Ran, Sarn’s son from the Curse Breaker series.
And I have to do all the exciting things before the book ends. I need to get in as much magic, mayhem, action, adventure, and fun that I can possibly stuff into the book.
Why not save some for the next book?
Because I don't know if they'll be another story based on our newsletters or in our newsletters after this so I must do everything! You know me and my checklists.
Speaking of checklists, my scribe has one too, and she's trying to check it off so she can end the book. So that's where we are right now.
If you're a long time fan then you know whenever we get into the third act of a story, a tug of war starts.
We, the characters, pull the story in whatever direction will give us more action and more fun and usually more danger. I'm not sure why they always go together, but they do.
Meanwhile, our poor scribe tries to tug us towards whatever we have to do to conclude the story and resolve the story problem. We promise to do that too, but after we make sure we did all the cool things we possibly could.
You know how much Melinda likes to tie up loose ends—except for the ones I won’t let her tie up.
She wants Storm Spells to end so there can’t be more books in the series, but you know my methods.
So I’m fighting her on that. I want to visit your world and sometimes, I want to fight dragons in Times Square or chase enchanted trees in Central Park.
New York is a fantastical place anyway, and it’s practically a fantasy world all on its own. So why can’t I bring a little more magic and mayhem to its streets?
We promise not to invite any space aliens or cause extensive destruction like some superheroes have done in recent movies.
Wait a minute—I’m getting a message from our Newsletter-Dragon. She says we can’t promise not to cause lots of property damage because [redacted for spoilers].
But we can promise not to bring any green aliens to the party.
So that's where we are in Storm Spells. Melinda wants us to solve the problem meaning we have to save her, stop the orbs, and defeat the villain. And we'll do that, but I want to do it in a way so that we can have more stories. I think I've found a way to do that.
I can't really complain that the story isn't done because it will be the longest one in the series. Melinda is writing like crazy. She wrote 8 chapters last week. In all fairness, the previous five books (Catch the Scribe, Book Battles, Rogue Characters, Dragon Spells, and Rogue Spells) left a lot of story threads hanging so there’s a lot of tie up. So we had lots of ground to cover.
Storm Spells will probably end up about the length of a typical Curse Breaker book. So between 400 & 450 pages unless I need more space to set up some fun stuff we'll have to revisit in a sequel!
If I get my way, there could be spinoffs, and I could get cameos in them! But I'm getting ahead of myself.
There's just one downside to this game of cat-and-mouse. You might not get your hands on Storm Spells or the three new prequels that complicated its completion (Catch the Scribe, Book Battles, and Rogue Characters) until January.
Melinda wanted to run the Kickstarter in December, but I just don't see how that's possible when it's already November, and the last book isn't done yet. Edits aren't instantaneous. They take some time, and that time expands as the book gets longer.
There's also the formatting. That takes time too. Yes, some of the art was made while Melinda wrote the book, but some still needs to be made, and that takes time too.
And we don't launch anything until it's completely done and we have the proofs in hand. That takes time too. The printer usually takes 3-5 weeks to print, ship, and deliver copies to us.
But January is definitely possible. I'll keep you up to date on the developing situation. Right now, that's how I think things will go.
But I might need a side quest since I didn't get one at the end of Rogue Characters, book 3 in the Tales of a Curse Breaker in NY series. A dragon got that one. So I'm owed one.
Will Storm Spells end so I can get one?
Come back next week to find out!
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