The Release

After finally getting my domain name (epicofold.com) and getting the paid version of the website, I've more or less completed the publishing process for the first book, which is now live on Amazon and a few other stores (some still have yet to release it). I also updated the website a bit to look more modern, and added some extra detail to the page with the world maps. I also updated the trailer so that it has the website link at the end as well as credit for the music. I'm not sure if I need to add that trailer to youtube to improve distribution, but I'll leave that for another time. I still have accounts elsewhere that have to be updated for marketing purposes.

At the moment, I'm editing the physical copy of the book that Amazon will sell. I believe I'm finished with the Word document that I'm converting, though I may need to increase the font size in a few places. The main task is to create the picture that will serve as the template for the front and back cover, including the book's spine. It shouldn't be too hard to put together as long as I get the dimensions right. I downloaded an Excel document that calculates the right size for the image after inputting the book's dimensions and page count. Once the physical version gets submitted, I'll order myself one to check the quality.

I am worried about potential edits should I find reason to work on the story months from now, but I've already gone through the beta reading stage and cannot find anything else to change for now. I'll just have to keep track of the edition number and make sparse updates when needed.

Preparing to Publish

Progress with book 3 has been a little slow overall, though I have improved the outline for a new arch in the story and have filled in some chapters that desperately needed more content. I've mostly been focused on making new pictures as well as improving old ones. Essentially, I wanted most of the dreamscapes to be represented through an image to help with immersion. Since I'm nearing the completion of Talmanus's arc, there aren't too many dreams to cover unless I go to the other books. That being said, I drastically improved Rhinesvelt's first image in book one, and am adding a new image for the Giant's Chessboard.

I'm also working on final edits for the first book so that I can submit it to a wide range of publishing sites. I plan to use Draft2Digital overall, but still need to make use of Amazon separately so I can produce physical copies. For the ISBN, I'm just going to use the free one that is generated by Draft2Digital and then attach that information to the Amazon version (assuming that works). This process could actually be completed by the end of the week, but I have yet to do any announcements about the release. Basically, I need to be able to take my time to get the publishing process correct on the different platforms so that I can streamline the process in the future.

The New Arc

From what I've gathered so far, the third book is going to have at least ten new chapters, if not more. I'm well underway writing one of the new arcs featuring Talmanus, the professor, which shows him utilizing student volunteers to map out areas in the World of Dreams. Talmanus is on a quest for the root of all knowledge that may very well be hidden in a dreamscape somewhere. His journey ends with a grand adventure through various dreams on his search for the truth. His dream map is heavily connected with the Dream Dweller's work one thousand years ago, making the Archive more important to the story. I've also made two map pictures for the book and one new gif for the website.

Book 2 Done...More or Less

As far as I know, the main edits and proofreading are complete for the second book. At long last! I've also updated the website with new pictures and completed my main edits to the fourth book as well. Tomorrow, I plan to work on my major revisions to book three (The World of Whispering Strife). I've long dreaded having to work on this book again because of how challenging it will be to edit. Aside from the fact that I need to add two new arcs for side characters (meaning five or six new chapters), a lot of the narration needs to be completely altered. What's worse is I have yet to create a proper outline because my notes are disorganized. It's going to be a long day.

Evolution

A lot has happened since I last posted an update. Though I've still gotten little feedback on Omen of the Ancient, Plight of the Gods is nearly done with its extensive edits. I've added a brand new arc with new characters. There are other new chapters near the end of the book as well, bringing it to over 100k words. These new chapters have also been through the proofreading process. All that is left is one more chapter that I am halfway done completing. I've also made a large group of new pictures for the series, as well as possible back covers for the printed versions of the books.

I'm tempted to release the first two books before I finish everything else. I might even release the Dream Dweller Archive early with the first two books, which would give readers something else to look at while I perfect the Planet of Whispering Strife. The main obstacle is marketing, followed by figuring out the best way to obtain ISBN's. I'm still hoping to find more beta readers for the first book so that there's a bigger chance of it succeeding, but the main focus has been writing.

New Format

I'm still waiting for beta reader feedback for Omen of the Ancient, but what I'm hearing in just the beginning is basically what I feared: the inclusion of the poetry interrupts the flow of the story. While I can't do too much to fix this, I have reviewed all of the poems in both Omen of the Ancient and Plight of the Gods, and removed/altered what I thought was more or less unnecessary. I only scrapped three so far (going by memory), but it should be a slight improvement nonetheless. I'm also adjusting the formatting of all of the poems so that they don't have titles, they are all italicized, and they will have a center alignment on the page. This should improve the way it looks immensely, and the titles for the poems are still going to be presented in the anthology. I'm also attempting to alter how the stanzas work in a few of them so that more text can fit on the page at once, making it seem like the poetry is shorter. This isn't always possible, but some were formatted to be shorter. I still have 2 more books to go through for this process, but I suspect I'll finish this work today. 

Next Phase

After a long day of writing two days ago, I managed to get the second book, Omen of the Ancient, ready for the beta reading stage. I also have one reader right now, and plan to get a second one when I can get my first round of feedback. I noticed with the first book that even just two beta readers at once can be redundant so long as the same issues are brought up, and I'm not constrained by time, either. Having one reader at a time should be enough so long as improvements can be made after each read. This is doable since the second book will end up being the shortest in the series.

I'm also considering making Omen of the Ancient the first book, Plight of the Gods the second, and The Planet of Whispering Strife the third. Though I originally wrote it so that the events would not need to be in exact sequence, this would improve the introduction of a few key characters and plot points. Essentially, the intro book to the series would not be bombarding the reader with new concepts so early on, and important details in Final Exodus would be more likely to be picked up when transitioning straight from The World of Whispering Strife. The main barrier to this is making sure enough from Omen of the Ancient is understandable and interesting when it becomes the starting point for those new to the series.

Another important update has also been made, being the fact that I'm now about two chapters away from completing the expedition arc in Plight of the Gods. Right now, there are about ten new chapters all lined up together that I built from two or three shorter ones that only summarized the events that transpired (and not in a good way). Once the arc is complete, there are about three more chapters to complete in different spots of the book, and then that too will be ready for the beta reading phase. Plight of the Gods is now the longest book, currently sitting at 81k words, and likely going to 85k. That being said, the future changes to The World of Whispering Strife are so extensive that it might surpass that. For instance, I've written parts of a whole new character arc for Talmanus, ending his quest for the fountain of knowledge while simultaneously sharing key information about the Surveyor (eliminating a really crappy chapter that just has the Surveyor giving a monologue for no good reason). This new change had me so excited that I basically wrote the whole conclusion on a whim. When the writing happens so easily like that, you know it's a good sign.

A Spurt of Progress

I finally had a good day to get writing done and finished making my additions to what is now the second book. The opening is far better than it was, the poems are distributed better throughout the first half of the book, and there is now an extra chapter. There might still be some pacing issues in the story, but that could just be due to the book's short length. Not much I can do about it at this point until I get more beta readers. I basically realized that working on the third book is kind of silly when I still have some changes to make to the second one, and since the book is a prequel, it might read well enough on its own without the first book for context. I basically need people to read and critique it while I go back to editing Plight of the Gods.

Moving Along

Things have felt rather sluggish, but quite a few changes have occurred since the last post. The major piece of news is that I have shifted jobs, so that has been my primary focus these last two months. As for the series, some new changes have been made to the combined books to improve their readability. The beginnings and endings of the two stories have been synced pretty well. I wouldn't say it's perfect, but it's looking a lot better. I've also adjusted the story's timeline quite a bit to improve the flow of events. There are also some new chapters and scenes I intend to write to fill in some major gaps in the timeline. There is also still the issue of creating a final scene with one of the story's villains, but that has been put on hold.

Most of my recent work has been on Plight of the Gods. I've completed the whole journey of the expedition team to Tritus, so now I'm working on what they're doing there. I know most of what happens there. One of the chapters in this section is halfway done, and another has already been started. The problem is just accurately describing all the manual labor that is being done while not sounding boring or summarizing it too quickly. Once I get this done, I'll feel tempted to revisit the previous book and rework the opening, but this may require the help of more readers.

The other thing I've done this past month is create more pictures, both for the books and the website. This includes some landscapes, the planet of Atmos, and the final climax of Plight of the Gods.

A New Format

I've once again considered the merits of combining the first two books, and am currently putting together a new book that combines the stories. The first two parts of the series cover the same timeline, but show different characters and events. Each book has a different focus and theme. It works pretty well, but it also has a price. The first story introduces too many characters while remaining a short read. The plot is simplistic and doesn't offer many surprising elements outside of the events themselves, at least when compared to the second book. Combining everything will add immediate depth to the characters and would also address some important pacing issues.

As I'm stitching together this document by combining everything in the right chronological order, there are a few distinct issues that I will need to fix. The opening to the two books do not work together. I would essentially need to rewrite the beginning of the book. Second, the endings also don't fit together, either. The same event is shown twice, but with different scenes. There is also quite a lot of poetry stuffed around both climaxes, which would look clunky if pasted together. Lastly, I like both of my book covers and don't really want to change them. Now, I can split this new story into halves and put a cliffhanger in the middle, but the second book cover would still need to be edited with at least a change of title. The second book primarily revolves around the Surveyor and the humans interacting with the World of Dreams. Now, this is present from the start, so the cover no longer seems relevant even if the title better matches the new content.

This updated story also needs to be edited within if all the parts are to flow together, and this will have to come at a later date. I'm still working on the new content in book four, which will still take some time to finish since I barely did anything over the holidays. However, even if it does mean extra work, I think the change is a positive one. After all, it will be a lot easier to get input from beta readers once the two books are combined.