We are heading into the thick of summer and before people celebrate Independence Day by blowing up a small part of the country and scaring the bejeezus out of cats and dogs, it’s time to talk about all of the things I’ve been working on for the past thirty days.
From Ashe Vol. 6
I will admit that progress has been a bit slow but I am making progress. The third chapter is in first draft and while I have not yet begun to write chapter 4, I thought about how I wanted to write it. Chapter 4 is going to be a discovery writing chapter where we take a look at our shipped couples so far and how they each deal with Valentine’s Day.
It’ll be a nice detraction from any drama points, writing competitions, etc. while it gives me some time to deepen these relationships and do some character development. With this being discovery writing, anything can happen as I’m just making things up as I go along. I do have to be careful with these kinds of chapters because I could get a little too imaginative and end up screwing up my outline but if I keep everything contained within the aspect of the holiday, it should balance out.
Funny thing is, I wanted to say that I had chapter 4 written but since July 1 falls on a Friday before a three-day weekend where I planned to write it, I just didn’t get to it yet. For those who know, I also write for The Outerhaven and I had quite the massive pile of manga to review…. 13 volumes of it to be exact. It’s been my biggest review pile in quite some time and that ate up a lot of my writing time… but… I plowed through it and having Monday off from work is definitely a blessing. With Sunday and Monday being completely open and free, I really want to push and get chapter 4 (and maybe even start chapter 5) done.
So, why not do writing during the week? Well, another project has taken up those slots which I’m sure you all know about.
My Girlfriend Was Delivered by 2-Day Shipping
Even though the book has been written, it has not been edited. As of the time of this writing, seven chapters have been posted on Honeyfeed with chapter eight coming just two days (lol) from now.
During the week, I am spending my nights editing the chapter that is scheduled to be posted for that upcoming Sunday so, in this case, since I said chapter eight is coming in two days (lol again), I’ve been spending nights editing this chapter.
Surely, a 3,500-word chapter should be easy to edit, right? Well… with this being a contest with a nice monetary prize at stake, I want to make sure everything is perfect (in my mind). I don’t believe I have posted a chapter that hasn’t gone through at least 4-5 rounds of editing. Whether it’s to flesh out scenes, characters, change things up, make sure there are no grammar issues, etc, I’ve obsessed over each chapter as if it’s a full book.
Needless to say, I’m aiming to win and giving everything my full attention. Not only am I editing like a madman, I’m also marketing like one as well.
Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Discord, Anilist, MeWe have all seen me talk about my book to the point where I think people just want me to shut up about it, but I won’t! I even made a press kit and sent it out to news sites, I took out some paid ads on Twitter and Facebook, I’ve done word of mouth locally, and probably a lot of things that I’m forgetting right now. It’s even a pinned post here on my blog so it’s one of the first things people see when they come to visit.
In other words, I’ve been working very hard to put myself in a position to win. I’m even taking in feedback and changing things up on already-posted chapters in an effort to make them better. I just want to tell Daiki and Miko’s story in the best way possible.
And, of course, I’m going to plug it again! If you haven’t read it yet, then now would be a great time to start! Here’s a link: https://www.honeyfeed.fm/novels/7634
Final Hope
So, those with a keen eye have noticed that Final Hope has been removed from Honeyfeed and, therefore, removed from the Buy Books page.
No, I did not discontinue the book.
I decided that when things die down a bit, I am going to revisit this series. I know a lot more today than I did when I first released Final Hope and I want to go back and do another heavy editing pass on the books, maybe add some more meat to the second volume, and commission Alex to get some artwork done.
The original Final Hope’s first volume had no artwork at all. Therefore, can I really call it a light novel?
It had been suggested to me years ago to possibly revisit the series but I just never had an opportune time to do so. I was busy with A.R. Dragonfly at that point and then I just went right into From Ashe because I had this great idea that I couldn’t wait to flesh out. The thing is, though, that by working on MyGF, I realized that I CAN handle two series at once as long as one of them is already written and I’m just editing.
So, once this contest is over (well, the submission part of it anyway) in September, I’m going to shift focus onto revisiting Final Hope while still writing From Ashe. By September, I plan on beginning work on Volume 7 at that point and Volume 6 should be released! (Yes, that was a pseudo announcement for Volume 6’s release date).
When Final Hope DOES get polished and re-released, it will be reposted on Honeyfeed but it will be reposted in a release schedule much like MyGF is.
MyGF has gotten such an incredible response that I think keeping Final Hope as a free option as a gateway to me as an author is a great idea. Plus, since Final Hope is NOT part of a contest and doesn’t have to be exclusive to Honeyfeed, I would post it up on Webnovel, Scribblehub, RoyalRoad, and other places, too.
If people want a physical copy of the revised version, I could certainly offer that up but I would rather gauge interest in it first before I relaunch it in physical/ebook formats. Plus, charging people again for a revamped story they already bought makes me feel a bit guilty whereas keeping it free seems like the better moral choice here.
I don’t have a timeframe as to when I’m going to finish Final Hope’s revamp. Since From Ashe Vol. 7 will be taking precedence at that point, I will be working on it when I am able to so it’ll be done when it’s done. Simple as that!
Until Next Time
Another short update this month from the reader’s perspective but from mine, it has been very busy and tiring. Still, I press forward.
Lots of work still to be done but I look forward to doing it!
Onward and upward!
Until next time,
Ja ne!
Joshua J. Piedra 