State of John and a question for authors published away from the site. · 6:28am Nov 1st, 2021
Okay. Been a heavy week and, in certain aspects it just got heavier. Can't handle that right now so focusing elsewhere.
Just so everyone knows, John is definitely not on hiatus. I've spent a few days looking into something that isn't related to John or the site. That being my main attempt to get a non-fanfic manuscript published. Very much at a crossroad with it, give up completely, self publish it as two separate works, self publish it as one monster work, or do one last shot at a traditional publisher and walk the road of likely yet another rejection.
So that is where my head has been. That and looking at what it could mean regarding boring background things like tax and how it affects my disability pension. Yep. Been incredibly stressful and that is with putting aside other life things and not counting them because, wow life, just wow.
Anyway, no matter my decision on this, John is still continuing. I am looking to fix an issue I had back in the chapter Slice 'N' Dice. I am also working on the next actual chapter in the current sequence, just been distracted by the other life stuff and the non-pony manuscripts. I will be working on John and the non-pony manuscript(s) at the same time so don't think for a second I will sacrifice John for this other work. John has been a good testing ground for a few things. Those tests haven't always worked, but have still been good for me nonetheless.
For anyone who has been published outside of fanfiction before, I have a question I am genuinely interested to know. Would you split a 190k word story in two even though the split is only sort of natural and doesn't exactly cause it to be a clean stand alone story? Or, would you keep it as the behemoth it has become even though the page count estimate would put it around the 550 mark?
I ask because a traditional publisher got me to split it in two before then rejecting it. Personally, I feel it loses a certain effect as a result. The first half could be forced into a stand alone state, but it wouldn't exactly be the end of the story as a whole, it would simply be the closest to the end of the story for those two specific characters. Then the next one starts with their child in point of view. Even though they still have roles to play in the second half (some are very crucial roles), they aren't so heavily the focus then because of the effect of the story itself. The effect is that once a very important secret/truth is known to a character, they "wake up" so to speak and tend to join the cast of point of view characters. Doesn't mean they react well or always in favour of the protagonists, but their view can then be glimpsed through their eyes.
Really difficult to talk vaguely about something only I can currently read but this is me trying to describe the situation I face with this the best I can.
Okay. That seems like enough potential rambling from me for now. I hope the situation makes sense. I'm not a hundred percent sure, I haven't slept easily the past several nights thanks to a depression spiral that I am hopefully forcing my way out of.
Tael.
After reading the above, I'm kind of curious to read this other story you've been working on.
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Unfortunately, not postable here due to it being completely non-pony related. May have figured out a way to keep it in its separate halves, been an interesting 24 hours. Looking to self-publish it in future but need to make decisions and then fix it to those decisions. Would be done as an eBook when complete.
Had my mind running through the whole +80k first section all day looking at ways to thread the changes through. Once that is done and ready, I will be able to switch between it and John as needed because the framework will be there.