It's a marvelous life! (WIP Wednesday)

Over the last three weeks, I've fought two head colds but still managed to get a decent amount of work done on the ongoing projects that have been debuting as part of Patreon. I clocked about five thousand words in the last week on Shockwave and Lightweight. Lightweight is just about done while Shockwave currently sits at four chapters of a planned six in the first book.

Next month will be my twice annual Camp Nanowrimo month, where several of my writing friends and I get together and push each other forward on writing projects. My plan is to complete the next three chapters of Quadrant over that month of writing. That will bring me right up to the finishing line with that one as well.

My big goal is to wrap all three novels by the end of May and set out on the next writing journey, which will include a short story or two plus the next phase of Lightweight!

I'm also working on a new scheduling format for Patreon releases, one that will see all the ongoing books update about every six weeks. That one will depend a bit on how things go as I move into the second half of 2019 however.

I went with my wife and the youngest to see Captain Marvel over the weekend. The family and I loved the very different take on the mythos of Mar-Vell and Carol Danvers. A lot of the negative reaction is confusing to me, as I felt it was the best use of Carol since the Brian Reed Ms. Marvel series of the mid-2000s. It gets a thumbs up from me, yet another in a solid string of really great Marvel movies in the last two years.

Today's image is of Carol in costume, drawn by the always amazing Sana Takeda, taken from a variant cover of Life of Captain Marvel. Character owned by Marvel.

The roller coaster ride of the writing life (WIP Wednesday)

February is done and March is here. It feels as though 2019 has flown by so far for this writer. I've published five stories so far with twenty plus still coming later this year. It's been good to bring new material out into the world once again, something I didn't do nearly enough of in the previous two years. I still have a lot of publishing ahead of me though, so other parts of the last month are a bit disappointing.

I managed just under 29,000 words for the month, shy for the second month in a row of my 35,000 word monthly target. It is still ahead of my January count however and probably would have came much closer to my goal if I had the three extra days of the previous month.

So I'm starting out March with a goal to pick up speed again. I've been working hard to start producing more content across the internet in the next few weeks as I start to stagger things a bit in the coming months. One of my goals is to make sure I'm releasing something new five days a week across my various sites. This site will remain an aggregate for where my current projects are coming and going however.

Right now, those projects include the final draft checks of Quadrant 7 and Lightweight 18 in preparation for their release later this month on Patreon. Like the previous stories, they will be up for pre-order at the same time with release dates about seven months from now.

I am also toying with a story idea to start out a new serial to be published on my Medium account. So far it has mostly been used as a hub for talking about the art of writing and deep dives into the world of comics. But I have a new narrative that I might test out as part of Medium's paid service, but more research will have to take place before a final decision is made on that one.

Sometimes the challenge feels like I'm staring up at a skyscraper that is the future. But much like King Kong, I'm going to make that climb.

So work remains in progress. I'm currently working on a future installment of Shockwave, one with major implications for the future of the series. Next up will be the final chapter of the current Lightweight saga plus the final three Quadrants for the next year. From there, I will start on some of the bonus stories I haven't even started to talk about for the second half of the Patreon in 2019...

Photo by Devon Divine on Unsplash.

Four stories and the man that loves them! (WIP Wednesday)

I've been publishing now for over ten years. It feels so much shorter than that as I type this. While I've published a lot of works of which I'm incredibly proud, I feel like I haven't done enough in that time.

Thankfully I still have the wherewithal to make up for lost time. Which is why right now, I've got four different works I've alternated between in the last few days.

The first is a short story for an upcoming charity anthology, which features the first meeting between Lightweight and the four brothers of Quadrant. That one was on an ultra-short deadline and clocks in at just under 2000 words, so when I say short, I'm not kidding. It will also likely see publication much sooner than a lot of my other works. It's set after the current volume of Lightweight and the upcoming volume of Quadrant, so it does feature an interesting glimpse into the future of the Quadrant Universe.

The second is the final pieces of Lightweight 17, which will debut on Patreon in one week. While the stories been in the books for months, I made a few final revisions and wrote the afterword that I include in all of my serialized stories. It's ready to go up next Wednesday for patrons and will be available in just over six months to everyone else. I'm very proud of "Arcana" and I hope my readers will enjoy it as much as I enjoyed writing it.

I'm hard at work on a future chapter of Shockwave in the scripting stage. I'm working hard to wrap the final chapters of the first arc as the mystery behind Noah's powers is finally revealed. Not a lot I can say about this one, but stay tuned for a lot more as Shockwave's adventures play out over the rest of the year.

Finally, I'm back at work at a long in gestation project featuring a seventies era superhero. It's one of the most fun and weird tales I've worked on, but I'm on a strict deadline to get this one in to the editor. I'll share more about it when it's wrapped up and contracts are signed. For now, we will simply call it by the code name DOGHOUSE.

So I am nothing if not busy at the writing game, even if my production levels aren't quite at the level I had hoped for so far in 2019. There's always time to get back on track though and start pumping out a lot more words for you to read as the year continues!

Today's featured image is a classic Jack Kirby illustration, one of many in a catalog of Kirby and Kirby inspired images I turn to when I need good reminders of how to design the worlds of Shockwave. Image copyright the Kirby Estate.

Catching up is hard to do! (WIP Wednesday)

You might have noticed my complete disappearance from blogging in the second half of January. It was not without good reason as I struggled to get things up and running with Patreon stories through a seemingly never-ending fight with sickness and general malaise. I used the time to get closer to back on track with all my projects so that I hopefully can keep steady releases throughout 2019.

A lot of focus went into making sure the next month's stories are ready or close to ready to go for their impending release. The Patreon site now comes with a handy image to let everyone know the release dates for the next couple months and this will update once a month to keep the schedule out in front of me.

It's nothing fancy, but it does let everyone have the dates for the impending releases of the next two Lightweight chapters as well as the first stories in Shockwave and the second volume of Quadrant.

I also used that time to wrap up a story for the new Pen & Cape Society anthology due in just a few months. I'm not going to reveal the nature of the new anthology or the story until the book is officially announced, but I will say it continues to develop the Secret Life of D.B. Cooper series without featuring Coop himself.

Right now, I've got a couple super-secret projects in the works, one on a tight deadline I'm not sure I'll be able to finish and another long in production and looking to finish by the end of the month. Plus I'm continuing edits and writing on the upcoming Patreon stories as I work to keep well ahead new of my new biweekly schedule.

Hopefully, this blog will be back on a semi-regular schedule for the foreseeable future, so you don't miss out on what's happening out there in the fine fine world of the Quadrant Universe!

A December to dismember! (WIP Wednesday)

Blame Extreme Championship Wrestling for that punderful title, as they gave us the original event of the same name in 1995. WWE pretty much destroyed the relaunched ECW with a pay-per-view of the same name a decade later. (It was a whole lot of not good.)

It's been a tough few weeks. Health issues kicked my depressive tendencies into high gear and familial situations ramped up my own need to retreat from a lot of the world. I've focused a bit more time into a few games instead of putting a lot of it into writing, either here on the blog or on books.

But I am continuing progress on Lightweight. I hoped to finish the last two chapters before the end of the month so that the first drafts would all be prepped for the January launch of all new stories on the Patreon. While I still have months and months to get them done before they would actually debut, that doesn't mean I don't want to make sure readers can know they will see everything come out in a timely manner with work done months in advance.

My plans for the final two weeks of the month consist mostly of getting the last few rewards for December sent out on Patreon, then to make sure everything is up and ready for January and February on the Patreon. From there, I plan to wrap up the fourth book of Lightweight, then move on to completing the first full year of Quadrant and Shockwave. After that, I'm in the free and clear to start on 2020's slate of stories for the site!

Not much news otherwise as I ramp up for the Christmas holidays. Next week's posts will likely be light on content, so you can expect to see your next WIP Wednesday after the first of the year!

The First, but not the last! (WIP Wednesday)

It's mostly been a weekend of relaxing here at Super Powered Fiction Central! This has been on purpose as I cool off from spitting out 50,000 words in thirty days as part of NaNoWriMo. The First: Hero's Dawn isn't quite finished yet, but it will rest for a bit as I make sure I've got the first three months of stories set for the huge roll-out of twice monthly (or more) new fiction on Patreon.

I'm also getting things prepped for the roll-out of another top ten wrestlers for the year ending 2018 over at the Wrestling Deep End, as well as writing about recent independent shows I've attended.

Next up on my docket is the wrap of Lightweight Book Four, more Shockwave and then finishing up The First: Hero's Dawn. From there, I'll then wrap Quadrant Book Two before pulling out a couple older works to finally bring to an end.

So I have lots of plans ahead... but not much to talk about for them right now! I'm sure I'll have more in the near future however, as things get ready to launch for the next wave of Lightweight tales in just a few short weeks!

Today's image is of D'Compose, a great villain from the classic cartoon Inhumanoids, by artist Kelly Williams. I've had giant monsters from beneath the ground in my head for awhile lately, so it seemed fitting to share this one here!

A series of fortunate events! (WIP Wednesday)

It proved to be a good week of writing in the past seven days. Another Shockwave chapter done, a new Lightweight chapter under way, and a heck of a lot of Atomic Werewolf 2000 in place. I'm just slightly behind on par for my 40,000 word goal but it it still easily in reach as I get ready to ramp things up for next month's 50,000 word novel.

I've also put effort into defining the four characters that will star in Project TEAM, as well as the supporting cast that will surround each of them. I'm pleased with how each character is developing, even as I continue to work towards yet another Lightweight chapter finished in the next one to two weeks.

I do have some doubts I will wrap Atomic Werewolf 2000 before NaNoWriMo starts. I do generally keep one open project and one side project even in National Novel Writing Month. As I writer, I often find the easiest way to avoid a stubborn block in my brain is to switch things up with another work. I'm not sure yet if the good Werewolf will be that side project or if I'll return to Quadrant or Shockwave. I'm leaving things a bit up in the air right now. I do hope to wrap the Werewolf story by the end of year however, along with the rest of the current arc of Lightweight.

Newsletter readers know I already have a few irons in the fire for several more projects to continue into next year. If all goes well, I will have no less than six book releases in 2019, with at least three of them debuting as part of the Patreon.

If you haven't started backing the Patreon, never fear. I'm currently reprinting every installment of Lightweight and Quadrant at the site as we head towards the debut of all new tales in January. These editions will stay in place for a couple months, but not forever. So if you're interested in playing catch up, now is definitely the time!

Writing local (WIP Wednesday)

This will be a quick one. I finished about two thousand more words on Atomic Werewolf and the first section of Project SUPERNATURAL.

SUPERNATURAL gets put away for a bit as I work on the third chapter of Shockwave. If you remember from last week, that's the name of the upcoming third series I have planned. I referred to it as the local hero project, because a key component of the series is my own city, Cedar Rapids, Iowa. My goal is to give an honest representation of a small city in modern America, even as I unravel the tale of Shockwave and his supporting cast.

Finding this picture of Cedar Rapids, I realized we really need more post-08 flood pictures.
(Photo by Colleen Hepner, licensed under CC BY-ND 2.0 license.)

Of course, the book will have cosmic ramifications for the Quadrant Universe, so don't expect it to spend all its time just in Cedar Rapids. I am not going to detail a lot of those ramifications until after the book starts running on the Patreon, but I will say that I started reading the comics that lead to Newer Gods because of this project.

Dino Force edits are also underway and I just submitted the final manuscript for Teel James Glenn's Gunmaster novella, which launches in just a few more days!

That's all this week, but stay tuned for a focus on some of the horrific heroes I created as we continue our Halloween theme for the month.

Wake me up when September ends! (WIP Wednesday)

Thirty thousand words written. That was my target for the month of September as I pushed to raise my regular writing schedule to the level I feel it needs to reach to really know I can fight back the inner demons that want to derail me from my regular writing projects. So how did I do?

I finished the month at 30,621 words.

Photo by Hafidh Satyanto on Unsplash

This month, the goal raises to 40,000 words as I prepare for NaNoWriMo and its 50,000 word challenge.

My writing schedule for the serial fiction I produce has long been to continuously switch from one to another as I go. This keeps me from burning out with the various projects I'm working on. My brain generally goes in just too many directions to not bounce a bit between tales. Right now Lightweight and Project Supernatural are both in great places as I continue their narratives. My focus is back on the local hero project, which is now tentatively titled Shockwave.

Like so much of what I write, Shockwave is a labor of love. I built it to both explore my own local community but also to open a few different corners of the Quandrant Universe at the same time. I've hinted at corners of the cosmic landscape in the pages of Lightweight: Beyond, but Shockwave will start to reveal some of the connective tissue that binds things together.

In addition, I'm continuing my work on Atomic Werewolf 2000 and my edits on Dino Force as well, but I'll talk more about those in time.

And since it's October, NaNo-prep means I've started to lay out the basics for my project come November. I will share more about it in my next newsletter, so be sure to subscribe if you to get the first peak on the new title.