It’s the start of summer (well, a teacher’s summer) and I was hoping at this point to have finished revising Can Stuart Henry Zhang Save the World? But no.  I am far from it.  And now that it’s summer, I’m going to take a break from that to (hopefully) finish the draft of Love is not free.  The price is 99 cents.  I think I’m about half way through, and so it’s possible.  However, I also thought that CSHZSTW? (that really looks confusing… I think it might just be better to write the entire title) would be finished in 2012… and then by the summer of 2013… and now sometime in 2014, probably.  But, like I wrote in an earlier post, there is no need to rush this.  The world is not in urgent need of another choose-your-own-adventure ebook.

Reading through what I’d written of Love is not free… last autumn, I’m generally pleased, which means I feel confident the draft will be completed.  That shouldn’t be nearly as time consuming to revise as a choose-your-own-adventure, as so I still hope, although it’s faint hope, that it can be ready by the end of the year.  I just know how many eager fans there are hoping to have it for the Christmas holidays.

That last sentence was meant to have a sarcastic ring to it.

Anyhow, it’s summer, and I’m looking forward to writing something that doesn’t involve the protagonist getting mauled and torn limb-from-limb every few pages.  That sort of stuff is for the gloomy, winter months.

Also, I was interviewed by a young lady from a local university press a week or so ago and it should be online soon.  I’ll have the link when it’s ready…

Just finished the first draft of Can Stuart Henry Zhang Save the World?  It took about a year and half to get to this point, with lots of breaks for other things, such as completing A Dream Apart and writing The Most Boring Book Ever Written.  This will likely be the last work that Daniel and I will complete together for some time–Daniel has been just too busy these last couple of years.  In fact, he would be the first to admit that he has not had much time to put into our last few works.  But really, it’s probably for the best if we lay off the adult choose-your-own-adventure comedies–there are only so many knock-offs needed in this world.

What’s it about?  Nothing of substance, of course.   However, unlike any of our previous works, Daniel and I sketched out a rather detailed plot before we wrote a single word, and so it’s more focussed, for better or for worse.  It’s about aliens and zombies and realtors and turkeys.  If that’s not an enticing tag line, I don’t know what is.  It’s long–more than 150 000 words, which is 50% longer than either Whatley or Sturlubok.  That’s a lot of words about essentially nothing at all.  There are 72 endings, of which perhaps 4 involve the protagonist actually saving the world.  So, the chances aren’t too good.  Sorry Stuart.

As I progress through the revision process, I’ll start to give more details.  I’d really like to have it finished by the summer so that I can focus on Love is Not Free.  The Price is 99 Cents.  And then it might be a long time before Daniel and I release something else together.  When I first published The Adventures of Whatley Tupper in the summer of 2010, there were many just three or four other adult choose-your-own-adventure knock-offs available for the Kindle.  I do a search right now, I see more than a hundred.  I guess we weren’t the only ones with that idea!

Well, again the posts on this blog grow about as quickly as dust on a windowsill.  Maybe slower.  But considering it is a new year, perhaps I should give a quick update here.

First of all, the choose-your-own-adventure Can Stuart Henry Zhang Save the World? is nearing completion (well, the draft).  Unlike Whatley and Sturlubok, Daniel and I have been taking this on in big shifts, and now that his wife has just given birth to their second daughter, it’s going to be my turn to finish it off.   If all goes well, a published version of our latest inane choose-your-own-adventure should be ready by late summer or fall.  I spent a lot of time on that story in the summer and look forward to coming back to it.

And over these last months I’ve been working through the draft of a solo piece of work, tentatively titled Love is Not Free.  The Price is 99 Cents.  Can a title have two periods in it?  I’m not sure.  Anyhow, I’m also hoping that this can be published before the year is out, but I’m not sure if that’s realistic.  No need to rush anything.  There are millions of ebooks out there.  What is haste going to accomplish?

Just stumbled upon an interesting article from the Huggington Post which mentions The Most Boring Book Ever Written…

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-gaughran/the-death-of-literary-fiction_b_1892006.html

The Most Boring Book Ever Written is currently FREE at Amazon.com for… I don’t know.

http://www.amazon.com/Most-Boring-Book-Written-ebook/dp/B007Y0P18K

So very few updates in these last months, and that’s because there’s been so little to say.  I’d really rather avoid writing posts just for the sake of writing posts.  There’s more than enough of that stuff online.

But, now in the middle of these lazy summer days, there are a few things to say.  First, after taking several months off, I’ve been actively working on Can Stuart Henry Zhang Save the World?   I’m now confident that the draft should be finished before the end of the year, although the final release will have to wait.  It’s turning out to be a lot longer than either The Adventures of Whatley Tupper or The Redemption of Mr. Sturlubok, and being a choose-your-own-adventure, it’s hard to tell just how long it will go.  But it will be finished.  Eventually.

And I’ve been planning my next solo novel, which I’d like to start by the end of the year.  I’ve already had a couple of false starts with different ideas, which always happens, but now I feel more secure in this new idea.  It seems that for every novel I finish, I start another two.  But, I also need to be honest.  My wife is expecting our first child in these next weeks, so I have a feeling much will change.  I have a feeling some things will not go as planned.  We’ll see.

There.  A post.  Complete.