I Am Coming Back

Hello, little people in my computer.

I have decided that it is time for me to give this another shot; and this time, I'm hoping I can do it right. Yes, I am planning on writing stories to publish again. It's been a while since I started this whole mess, and a lot has changed since then. This time, though, I think I know how to handle this. In this blog post, I'm gonna talk about what's happening next. For those who just want a quick update: my current plan is to release a new version of Of Machines and Magic, with an updated story and structure. I don't know how long it will be until I have anything substantial to show for this, but my goal is to at least make something that is complete.

First, just for the sake of closure, let me give a *very* brief summary of what's been going on with this story. I've tried to write this story multiple times before; two of those got far enough to have published chapters. The first attempt, which was the very first story I wrote here, was the longest; but it had a lot of problems, and wasn't nearly as good as I was hoping to make it. I didn't know what I was doing, and kind of rushed into the project. Even so, I think what I wrote wasn't horrible, but I wanted to try again. So, I cancelled that story and started a new one. This one didn't get nearly as far, and eventually it became clear that something wasn't working. I tried writing other things, but I didn't publish any of it. I was having trouble staying motivated, and life tended to get in the way. I never gave up hope that I'd come back some day, but it seemed more and more distant from where my life was.

This brings us to where I am now. Lately, I've been more confident in myself, and I'm ready to give this another shot. However, I feel like something should be done about the earlier versions. To be honest, I'm not entirely sure what. I've thought about unpublishing them; they don't reflect what I want for the story now. However, I'm also afraid that doing so would be some sort of admission that those earlier versions weren't worthwhile, and that might mess with my motivation to continue the new version. So, for now, I'm leaving them up; however, I want all of you to give me your opinions on this. Anyone who's reading this, let me know if you think the old versions should stay up or go down. Either way, I'm gonna keep a copy of the story, so if I really wanted to I could make it available again in some form.

But, on to the new story. I've got a better idea of what the structure of the story will be, and I think that'll help me work on it. I'm dividing the story into arcs; each one will act kind of like a season of a tv show. There will be a story told across all of the arcs, but each arc will have its own sort of story to tell as well. This has the benefit of making the story far easier to plan and write; I can focus on one arc at a time, working slowly towards the resolution I want the story to have. It won't be completely improvised, like the first version of the story, but I'm also going to try to prevent myself from over-planning too. I have a decent idea of what the story will end up being, and following an arc structure will make it easier for me to turn that idea into a reality.

As a final note, I don't actually know if any of my original readers are still around, but if you are, I want you to know that I am sorry it's taken so long for me to get this story done. Thank you for sticking around, if you're there. I hope that one day, I can finally give you a complete version of the story I started writing years ago.