092 Announcing: Merry Chestnuts and a Happy New Fleur! · 12:22pm Dec 24th, 2017
092 Announcing: Merry Chestnuts and a Happy New Fleur!
The month of December is, without a doubt, a very special time of the year. Christmas, presents, Mariah Carey on the radio, snow if you're lucky, all that jazz. It was particularly interesting four (!) years ago when I was halfway through the original Of Lilies and Chestnuts, a story which tackled the adoption trope and challenged one mare regarding her social role of a mother.
I'm happy to announce that there is something new in the works. Let's see the cover first!
Ta-dah! It's a sidestory that takes place three weeks after the events of the original, so we'll have chance to observe Chestnut's "second" steps among the Canterlot Elite, and see how Fleur now see things around her! I wouldn't go as far as to calling it a sequel, obviously - more like a "Christmas special" the purpose of which is, as in all such specials, to show the characters we know engaged in seasonal activities, such as Dreaming of a White Christmas, Roasting Chestnuts on an Open Fire and finding out if Santa Hooves Is Coming to Town. See the pattern? What it means for the story is that it will be a multi-chapter box of Hearth's Warming-themed motifs wrapped with a neat, narrative bow (but the main focus is still on those individual song-inspired chapters).
The catch is that it's not ready yet. Between handling new responsibilities at work, enjoying some video games with friends, your regular Christmas matters, and realizing that by writing one chapter you've accidentally created two, I'll be taking my time to finish it. Once it's done (mid to late January I guess?), however, you will be cordially invited for at least a week of daily chapters about Fleur, Fancy Pants, Chestnut and several other characters you've met in Of Lilies and Chestnuts - both canon and original.
Until then I'd like to once again thank you all for you support and wish you all the best - may this late December be filled with joy, luck, love and bring you good health and an opportunity to rest before the new year (as to the New Year's wishes, we'll probably get to it sometime next week). In other words: Merry Chestnuts and a Happy New Fleur to you all, and asap!
~Prane
YES. HAVE ALL MY YES.
FINALLY A SEQUEL
all I have too say is...
Looking forward to it
Nice! Looking forward to it!
omigosh, I loved Of Lilies and Chestnuts! So excited to see a sequel coming out.
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Thank you for choosing Starcraft - now I can go full Blizzard and tell that the story will arrive "when it's done"!
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I'm looking forward to it myself! Of course I will be a little behind the times when releasing a Christmas-themed story in those couple of weeks, but I hope you'll all welcome a little late holiday magic that it will hopefully bring.
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Indeed, this story takes place after the original, but it's still not a sequel in how I understand it. Just a little side story that happens to be a follow-up to the events of the first one. Quite honestly, I think I'm a bit afraid of the word "sequel" and of what it implies! While I have a good idea for a proper sequel to write one day, I'm worried I won't be able to recapture the spirit that made the original so special.
So for the moment I'll just keep to "side stories" format. Let's see how that next one goes, shall we?
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Sequel. We need a sequel.
YAY! Looking forward to it. Have a merry Christmas!
Hurrah! A new story in one of my most favorite settings! Really looking forward to it.
Hooray!
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Wow, your enthusiasm is so precious, it's the best present I could have asked for this season! Thank you so much!
Hoping for a progress report! I keep checking.
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Hello Trump, thanks for dropping by!
So, the work is progressing (which is good) at a slower rate than I'd like (which is bad) mostly because I've fallen into a trap of producing more content than I originally intended (which is... good?). For example, I've had a chapter in mind that was supposed to be made of two small scenes, but those scenes grew bigger and eventually became their own chapters. And it happened not once, not twice, but three times!
The story is now projected to be twelve chapters summing up to a little longer than Operation Wonderbit's 30-ish thousand words. I have a feeling that we'll be celebrating Hearth's Warming again in March - and since it's always a smart thing to blame something/someone else when you're not delivering content when you promised, this time I'll blame Blizzard's Overwatch and how fun it is.
Nevertheless, below's the necessary proof that it's happening!
image.ibb.co/eqjFTH/previews.jpg