The War of Memory Project

Book 6 update: My alpha reader has finished going over the main draft.  Starting next week, I’ll be doing the final draft tweaks — I don’t have many notes on them, which is nice, but there’s always plenty of unnecessary verbosity I need to assassinate.

The Firkad Sarovy short stories continue with this one, Cold Rage!  This directly follows both The Lay of the Land and Feathered Wolf, so make sure to read those first.

In The Lay of the Land, Sarovy was 14; in Feathered Wolf, he was 17.  This is a year later, putting him at 18 during a turning point in the relationship between Tevestys and the wolf-clans.  The Imperials have taken an interest…to everyone’s detriment.

This isn’t exactly a Start of Darkness, but neither is it a fun time for anyone.

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Still here, still writing (and editing)!  Book 6 is currently knee-deep in the Main Draft edits, with not much further work needed so far — but we’ll see what my editor says about my end chapters.

In short story news, the Firkad Sarovy stories continue with this one, Feathered Wolf!  This one follows The Lay of the Land, which should definitely be read first, as the wolf-clan plot-line continues.

In The Lay of the Land, Sarovy was 14.  This is three years later, putting him at 17 during an escalation of the war between two of the wolf-clans that border his assigned outpost.  But the situation, as always, is never just about fighting, and he has choices to make.

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Time for the third Firkad Sarovy short story.  This takes place during his stint in the Sapphire Youth Corps, at the age of twelve — so it comes after Gargoyle Claws and before The Lay of the Land.

Not a big event, just a window into some of the relationship difficulties inherent in being Tevestyn.

There are probably three more short stories coming in Young Sarovy’s little arc, but my new work schedule makes it a bit tough to write them in my usual productive period.  It might be a while before they come out, alas.

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Here comes my second Firkad Sarovy short story!  This is set well before the series, as it takes place on the eve (more or less) of his joining the Sapphire Youth Corps.  Which would make him six, going on seven.

He was not the most manageable of kids.

The short stories I’ve been writing for him (one more actually written and a few more planned) are part of an arc that’s only partially shown in the novels.  As I was sketching out my plans for post-series stuff, I realized that the character novellas I wanted to write couldn’t include some material, because of the narrators and time-period they covered.  These, therefore (and the Enkhaelen stories) fill in some of the gaps, and if they ever go to print, will be bundled with the novellas for their particular character.

But!  That’s for the future!

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Due to work schedule adjustments, my pace on editing Book 6 has become pretty slow.  (Doesn’t help that it’s 400+ pages, of course.)  On the days where I don’t have a big chunk of time for editing, though, I’ve been picking at short stories — again.  Specifically, Firkad Sarovy stories set before his summons to the Palace and subsequent exile into the west.

They’re surprisingly fun to write.  He’s…an interesting kid, to say the least.

I have two others also written and currently being edited, both with him younger than here, and plan probably two more for after this one, to wrap up its particular storyline.  They don’t include any spoilers for the series, though might raise some questions in the minds of series-readers.

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As I’m still working on Book 6 edits and don’t have a new culture composite prepared yet, it’s time to post my second Book 3 short story!  Again, this is a spoiler-thick tale which requires a lot of foreknowledge to understand, but I’d rather have it out here than languishing in my Story folder.  It’s another That Bastard Enkhaelen one, but I promise that the next short story (currently being written!) will not involve him.  And really, this might be the last Enkhaelen-focused short story that I write for a while, since it patches the few gaps in his timeline that I don’t plan to cover in other material.

Also, I promise I’m putting the read-more in here properly this time, and not a week later.  >_<

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Earlier this year, I wrote two short stories that probably require a knowledge of Book 3, since most of the material won’t make sense otherwise.  While I work on editing Book 6, I figured I’d post them anyway!  This one is the second I wrote, but the most self-contained, so it seems like the better one to read first.  It deals with how That Bastard Shaidaxi Enkhaelen ended up starting his metastatic mage program.  Read on if you know what that means — or if you’re just randomly intrigued.

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