Posts Tagged ‘Pure Escapism’

A New Story Finished and a Writing Update

Posted: April 13, 2015 in fantasy, Peregrine and Blade, writing, writing update
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It has been a while since I have last updated what has been going on writing wise.  Probably about time I did.

I have today just finished off the rewrite of a brand new short story, in the Peregrine and Blade series.  It comes in at around 11,000 words and is titled The Oasis of Broken Bones.  The series has been the main focus of my writing as of late.  There are currently 16 stories completed in that series, ranging from 2000 to 25000 words in length. Between them they number some 166000 words, which is a fair amount.  Only seven of those have ever been seen so far.  In addition, 8 more are in various stages of planning.  All of them will be coming to light soon I hope.

In addition, there are some 24 other short stories and novellas in other collections gathering dust, with a number more planned.

More news on what is going to happen to them all should happen soon.  At least that is the plan.

 

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Re-Editing Update

Posted: September 8, 2011 in Dawn of Wolves, fantasy, Pure Escapism, writing, writing update
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Just an update on the process of re-editing all the old stories – so far two have been done. The Tomb of the Tagosa Kings and The Adventures of Ray the Robot have now had a go over trying to fix any errors that fell through the cracks previous times. I also gave The Adventures of Ray the Robot a new and slightly improved cover.

The other stories will slowly get the same editing process.

Also, the next two Nhaqosa short stories are getting close to being finished, and after that it will be time to finish Dawn of Wolves.

An Upcoming Shakeup

Posted: September 1, 2011 in General, Pure Escapism
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Shortly I am going to be starting a bit of a shake up of the site – and the stories. That’ll be starting with a thorough re-edit of all of them, the first being the short stories. I will also be de-linking a number of stories from this site, leaving it just for the stories from the Mist and Shadows setting. The rest (including those not yet written) I’ll be listing on another site at some stage.

There may be some construction work in the meantime in case you stumble across anything broken.

Update

Posted: July 19, 2011 in writing, writing update
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I noticed I haven’t posted for a while so it is about time to fix that. I recently fractured my right collarbone which hasn’t helped matters, and slows down writing given I am right handed.

I have actually finished the rewrites of the next two Nhaqosa short stories and at some stage need to get around to polishing and editing them. I am considering keeping them waiting until I’ve finished the others I’ve planned and releasing them – and the currently released ones – as a single compilation.

It has also come to mind that I’m not getting as much done as I should, and that is because I am spreading my time too thin between too many stories. I need to focus on just a few. Besides the Nhaqosa stories, the other one I’m working on is the Dawn of Wolves novella (currently up to 21K). Only once I’m, done with them will I consider which of the numerous other projects to work on – and I have a few. On the short list is actually sitting down and properly mapping out the maps and timelines for the setting. A lot of it is only rough at the moment, and that really needs to be fixed.

The Pit Reviewed

Posted: May 21, 2011 in fantasy, Pure Escapism
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Over on Book Brouhaha, a site dedicated to the short story, The Pit got reviewed, receiving 4/5 stars, which is high praise indeed given most short stories reviewed there seem to get a lower rating.

The Future of the White Bull

Posted: May 5, 2011 in fantasy, Pure Escapism, writing, writing update
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I’ve been doing some planning on the future of The Chronicles of the White Bull collection of stories and have come up with a bit of a outline.

In all, including the four stories written so far, there are going to be ten in total. The next four will be written and released in pairs, like the first four, and then I’ll read a prologue and epilogue story, the start and the end of Nhaqosa’s story, and release them all as an anthology, comparable in length to a full novel. Hopefully I’ll even be able to get some proper artwork for the cover. Of the remaining six I have plans or have started writing four of them.

While doing all that I’ll also be working on the Peregrine and Blade stories, but once the Nhaqosa series is done I’ll be starting on a new one – The Halir Ashford Expeditions. Halir Ashford, professor, explorer, historian and adventurer, was just meant to be a bit character to help the plot in a story that barely got started before it was set aside but Halir survived and thrived, and is a central character in two novelettes (The Tomb of the Tagosa Kings & Gifts and Sacrifices) and both novels (Tears of the Mountains & Winter Wolves), as well as being in an unfinished novellas (Dawn of Wolves). The collection he will be in will help flesh out the history, both past and present, of the world of Sharael.

Now just to get it all written…

Yes, I Am A Pulp Writer

Posted: April 10, 2011 in Pure Escapism, steampunk, sword and sorcery, writing
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I have written two novels of what I like to think as serious fantasy, and have plans for more, but I have come to the realisation that at the moment I am a pulp writer – and I like it.

Those big, epic, world changing bookstopper fantasy series – they aren’t me. It was hard enough to finish off the two novels at novel length. It was after doing so that I realised that I prefer the short versions of stories – shorts and novelettes and novellas – and more importantly, prefer writing stories in the pulp style; action, adventure, larger than life characters etc. Nothing too serious, nor high literature, but fun to read.

I find myself even preferring to read the shorter style stories – I haven’t read one of those mega series in a long time.

For the time being I am going to be concentrating on writing pulp style shorts, working on four series mainly; The Chronicles of the White Bull, Primal Tales, The Sir Richard Hammerman Adventures and Peregrine and Blade.

The Chronicles of the White Bull and Primal Tales both have stories already written and available in the Pure Escapism collection; Primal tales is fantasy set in a primeval, low-tech world, a place of wild forests and prehistoric creatures. The Chronicles of the White Bull follows the exploits of an escaped minotaur gladiator, travelling a dying world in the search for home.

The Sir Richard Hammerman is steampunk pulp; currently with a novella and novelette half-written. Sir Richard Hammerman is a gentleman adventurer who travels with his companions who travels an Earth similar, but not exactly, to our own, a place of weird science, of pterodactyl riding pygmies, airships and odd contraptions.

Peregrine and Blade is pure pulp, inspired by the likes of Robert E Howard, Fritz Leiber and their ilk. The first novelette has been written up in rough form – and can be read here – the first of many.

Pure Escapism Page Update

Posted: March 21, 2011 in Pure Escapism
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I am currently updating the Pure Escapism page, which means for the moment there are some broken links.

Try not to trip over them as I work on getting it all completed.

Progress and Plans

Posted: January 14, 2011 in Tears of the Mountain, winter wolves, writing update
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The year has begun and we are already a couple of weeks in so I thought it time to take stock of what has happened and what I have got planned.

Firstly I have managed to write everyday of the year so far, and not insubstantial amounts. If I am rather liberal with my definition of ‘written’ then I have written 58,000 words in 13 days. The best day was yesterday, with 9,500 words done. Of course a large chunk, read most, of those words are rewriting old drafts into newer drafts. It is much easier and faster doing it that way, but of course the rough drafts need doing first.

Some of those words are on rough drafts, of which some have already received some rewriting, which seems a rather fruitful way of doing it. Scribble up the rough draft in the morning and in the evening get stuck into a rewrite of it.

All of that has been spread over a number of projects I’m busy working on to try and finish off, ranging from novels to short stories. The quick they are done, the better.

In addition to all that, I have finished the editing and polishing for Tears of the Mountain (or at least that is the theory – I have probably missed half the errors in it.) To celebrate I have put it up on Smashwords, and plan to make it available at more places (such as Amazon), as well as pushing it around the traps – but more on that later.

So that is what has been happening. Now for what I have planned.

I do at some stage need to give the old website an overhaul, updating the statuses of various projects, stories, collections and the like to reflect changes that have happened.

Short term plans are to complete the last part of the initial book of Cara’s Choice – the rough draft is getting close to being finished – and also to finish a rewrite and update of an old novel, Winter Wolves. Winter Wolves was sitting on around 60K of its rough draft when I left it but finishing Tears of the Mountain inspired me to return to it, given it takes place in the same setting and features one of the same characters. Since I wrote it there have been a number of changes to the setting that need incorporating, as well as it needing a complete overhaul of the ending; it didn’t work at the time and works even less due to various changes. But in a day and a half I’ve done 13,000 words of the rewrite of it.

Longer term is a goal to increase output, that being a short story every two weeks, a novel/novella every two months. An audacious target I know, but if I keep up my current output then it is entirely achievable.

I even had the short list of what those projects will be;

Winter Wolves (gunpowder fantasy novel)
He Stands Between (epic fantasy novel)
Hammer of the Skies (steampunk novella)
Cara’s Choice: The Awakening (urban fantasy novella)
Primal Tales III (fantasy short story)
Nhaqosa V (fantasy short story)
Cahuac and the Fisherman (fantasy short story)

Between all that I should be busy for a while.

Meet Professor Halir, The Unexpected Character

Posted: January 3, 2011 in fantasy, Pure Escapism, Sharael, Tears of the Mountain, winter wolves, World Building, writing update
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Professor Halir Ashford. Historian, Explorer and Adventurer. One of the favourite characters I’ve written so far. And a character who really shouldn’t have existed beyond a minor mention. It happens from time to time; characters take on a life of their own and demand a bigger say in things.

His story starts back with a novel I was planning (but never got around to starting). I needed someone to introduce the main character (Heric ‘Harry’ Ban, likewise a character that came about unexpectedly) to the adventure, and so I came up with Halir. he had been a friend of Harry’s father back during a war and was now a professor and historian. The novel was abandoned and the character would have been forgotten except for another novel I started sometime later, Winter Wolves.

Winter Wolves was my first serious effort at plotting and then writing a novel, and was designed to be a showcase for the setting and for Harry Ban. I even managed to complete a round draft. There was a need for a character who would draw Harry into events, and for that I went back to Halir and brought him along.

Though I finished the rough draft, I never got around to fleshing it out, instead, as is my want, I moved onto other projects and suddenly Halir took over somewhat. He got himself two lengthy short stories, Gifts and Sacrifices, and The Tomb of the Tagosa Kings, and then he got himself a full novel in which to star – Tears of the Mountain – which is the first novel I’ve completely properly.

It won’t be the last that Professor Halir is seen either.

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