Hi Everyone!
Last week was a heck of a doozy. Work (employment) was overloading and burning me out with frustration. I was also eating a terribly unhealthy diet and living relatively sedentary, so my energy was all but spent. But Thursday, I started working out again and improving my diet with healthier options. After a day or two, I felt much better and able to work on my own projects. Self-care is vital in these troubling times, so please take care of yourselves!
My second book, The Legend of Nariko: The Goddess Prophecy, is still on track to be released this August. Editing is almost done. I’ve learned a lot of concepts that will make it easier to follow. I’m working on writing character bios for each of the notable characters from book 1, The Legend of Nariko: The Mark of Silverfrost, so that anyone who read book 1 can get a good refresher before jumping into book 2. I’m also working on a kind of family tree for each part of book 2 so that it can help readers understand the connections between the various characters. I know that keeping track of all of the relationships between the various characters and I’m hoping this will make it easier.
Last week I saw drastic development for the game my friends, and I are creating. I started the concept art of the main character, which helped to visualize what we’re doing. I’m hoping to complete the piece by the end of the week. I’m hoping to learn pixel art and animation. The pixel style has been surprisingly more difficult than I imagined. The amount of detail conveyed with so few pixels is far more impressive than I expected. I have tremendous respect for pixel artists now, doing so much with so little.
I’ve also completed the first draft of the storyline for our game. It’s a science-fiction game with a character-driven story that is exciting for me to work on. Science fiction was always something I’ve been interested in writing, as I’ve wanted to explore the genre more. The difference between fantasy and science fiction was grounded on a loose basis of science (hence the genre name). Thankfully I’m working with some pretty smart cookies who can look over what I’ve written to see if it stays consistent with science-fiction standards.
While I’ve made some significant progress on the book 2 release and the game development project, I’ve been struggling with writing the rough draft of book 3. Book 3 is a radical departure from how books 1 and 2 have progressed. While Nariko is still the focus, there’s a new major POV character being introduced and, funny enough, trying to write how the two interact with each other has been surprisingly tricky. They’re very different personalities, and writing the two while keeping true to the overall arc has proven to be remarkably difficult. I’m still hoping for a December release of the novel, however realistically, I imagine it’ll be released early 2021 instead.
Next week I plan to return to the regular posting of Book Reviews. However, I need to adjust the schedule and content of what I post so that I can contribute to my team’s development of our game while also writing book 3 and publishing book 2.
Thank you all for sticking with me all this time! 😊
– Raphael
Raph's Cozy Musings 