Solar Clipper Diary

Just a quick note and an apology.

I thought we’d have the first draft done by now. It’s very, very close. Perhaps fewer than 10,000 words from the end. The book in its current draft is already about 145k words but will probably get cut down to something closer to 125 before I’m done with the second draft.

I’d really hoped to have at least the first chapters released to Podiobooks before Labor Day and the Parsec Awards, and for that I apologize. I’m still on track to get it released before the official end of Summer (September 21st).

And I still need music. Suggestions are welcome.

Ok, back to the work already in progress.

I had to take a little break from the writing this morning, and I used it to find the image I wanted to use for Captain’s Share at the Hubble Site.

The background image is NGC 1316, The Dusty Galaxy.

The book is shaping up nicely. I was able to start really hammering it at the end of July and managed to do 40,000 words the first week of work. I had a very productive weekend and it’s almost at 60,000 now (58.5k) to be more accurate.

Unfortunately, I had a little medical issue that’s put a serious crimp in my writing. If you followed the tweets you probably know more than you really wanted to. At any rate, I’m more or less up-right today, having slept for a lot of the last 36 hours and gotten the meds going. I don’t expect to get back up to full steam for a few more days but I’m really happy with the way the book is going so far, and the first readers are being very positive.

I was hoping to have the first draft done this week, but with the medical issues, that might be pushed back a week. I’m still hoping for the first batch of episodes to drop at podiobooks by the end of the month…

Assuming I can find music, and get the cover done

Thanks for all your good wishes and keep your fingers crossed for smooth sailing for the rest of this voyage.