The first book I wrote is called Halon-Seven.  I sent my best effort to my editor on August 5th, 2013.  I refer that that as my best effort because, at that point I had read the book several times.  I had already completed 5 full edits on my own.  These included massive editing contributions from my wife, family, and a very good friend.  In an effort to put my best foot forward, I had logged dozens of hours on those 5 edits before ever sending the manuscript to a professional editor.  And did I have to show for all of our collective time and effort?

The edits came back from my editor on January 27th, 2014.  Yeah, he had the manuscript for a really long time— but that’s beside the point and an entirely different story.  What is important is what my editor found… and how much of it it he found.  We’re talking a lot of corrections!  There’s just no point in sugar coating it.  For every bit of effort I put into the edits on my own, and all of the amazing contributions made by friends and family, a mountain of mistakes, typos, and corrections still managed to survive my best efforts to squash them.

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I’ve finished work on the first draft of what I’m calling book #3.  It’s titled, The Beta Praxis.  While something of a unique name, and praxis is a fairly unfamiliar word, it’s quite appropriate considering everything that is happening in the book.  Title’s always kick my ass.  That, and cover art.  The need to reduce the essence of hundreds of pages of story into a few simple images or a single phrase seems to have detrimental effects on my mind.

The Beta Praxis is shorter than my first two books.  This was a primary objective when I started the project.  When I started book #1, I didn’t know if I have enough plot for a short story, a novella, or a novel.  Judging by feedback from my editor, that book is longer than what is generally considered typical for my genre.  Still, the plot warranted it, so I believe it works.  Then when I wrote book #2.  The intent was for it to be shorter than the first book.  I blew it.  Book two was significantly longer.  That’s one of the reasons that it’s still sitting on my desk and awaiting its first revision.

Keep Reading!

I posted about this on Facebook this morning, but I thought it was worthy of a quick site post of its own.  I finished that last chapter of Project Lamplighter last night.  This is my second novel and the prequel to Halon-Seven, which I hope to release by year-end.  Written entirely in my spare time, the first draft of Project Lamplighter was started July 1st, 2013 and finished on October 30th, 3013.  It’s 182,000 words and took me a grand total of 170.23 hours to pen.

While I hope to shorten the overall length of the manuscript as I work on draft #2, there are a few small elements than actually need to be added to an early portion of the book.  So I hope to cut more than I add before all is said and done.

Keep Reading!

As I prepare for the release of Halon-Seven, book #1 of an as of yet un-named series, I’m getting the web site ready for prime-time.  My social profiles have been live and active for a while, so I hope folks have found me on Facebook, Twitter, and Google+.  I’ve been trying to post notes as regarding my progress on books one and two as work through the various pre-release stages.

The good news is that Halon-Seven is getting closer to release.  It’s been with the editor for longer than I anticipated, but that’s not such a big deal since it has left me more time to finish work on the first draft of book #2.  Beta reader feedback has been amazing.  Honestly, nothing short of breathtaking…  I’ve been blown away.  And the initial notes from the editor have been very encouraging.  It’s just taking him longer to get through my book than we originally anticipated.  Other projects keep diverting his attention.  Still, if that’s the downside of having a pro give my manuscript a good going over, it’s worth the extra time.

In the meantime, I can get some work done on book two and get the web site ready for launch.