Hullo, folks :3

So, I said I would try to have an update by the end of January :P (…probably I said I would have an update by the end of January). Also my last one was not necessarily all that elucidating, so. Anyway.

The first episode of the Dark Horse serial, season 7 is up with annotations for y’all. The final chapter of the second The Trouble With Coyotes is not up now but should, hopefully, be available on Dropbox maybe this weekend if I am industrious (the penultimate chapter, with some Fun Coyote Times, is already there). That has been an illustrative process, I guess. I said over on Cohost that I’d been struck how much more fun my older writing seemed to be.

On further reflection, of course, some of this is just me neglecting to remember how much of it felt like a slog—I’m pretty sure I was writing “Unindicted Co-Conspirators” during the same period The Road to Mandalay was on indefinite hiatus. Still and all! The new Trouble With Coyotes has been fun to write, and that’s been nice. So. Maybe expect more Star Patrol-style stuff and less… uh. Whatever “Leash Law” was.

Crucible, the Hatikvah sequel, is going to take another chapter, I think. I have blocked out in my head what that chapter is, something closer to the front lines before the conflict ends, and if the draft winds up working to my satisfaction that will be the last bit of the novel to be written. If it doesn’t work out I’ll just post it as-is. But I will close that project, which means I’ll try to have the next linear chapter up next week.

Crucible is, needless to say, not especially fun :P But I am going to try to make that it for this year. I was approached by someone who wanted to collaborate on a project that I am excited about and will be more fantastic and scratch the “adventurous expedition” niche that There Shall Be Wings and An Iron Road Running did.

So that is what’s next on the calendar. In the reference materials, I’ve made some minor changes to the Star Patrol encyclopedia and, also, everyone in Cannon Shoals now has a birthday. Now, the problem is—you will understand this is a serious problem—that although I used real-world data to assign them, the distribution is not what would be expected in our world, where most birthdays are in August and September and the fewest are in February :P

(Danny's birthday was last week. I don't know what that means, astrologically)

I leave it open whether this is just the noise expected of random sampling, or if perhaps there’s something going on in the Shoals that produces this. Everyone is just so busy in June buying illegal fireworks for the Fourth that they forget to get around to having kids, for one >.>

Anyway. I hope that you are doing well! I will be back in a couple weeks with either the new Crucible chapter or the edited and marked up next sections of the novel!

Also, what species do I need to write more of? I feel like I don’t write enough cats, and apparently this is a good year for it.