Oh, hey guys. How’s it going?
Good. That’s good. Oh, yeah–me too. My knee hurts, I wrote some semi-legible words, but life’s good.
What do you mean you want more than that? It’s 2025. You have to keep it short and sweet; people don’t have the same attention spans that they used to. That’s what they told me anyway, that and I need a better, more engaging title than “Writing Update September 3rd, 2025”. What are you doing with that journalism degree, man? You want a headline? Something eye-catching and attention-grabbing, fine.
The First Draft of Bards & Bargains is Finally Done.
That’s ok, but it’s a little wordy, and what about the people who don’t know what Bards & Bargains is? It sounds like a poorly thought-out DnD campaign. You’re not entirely wrong. How’s this?
Stories of Emre Book 2 Coming Soon!
That’s a little better, but it’s a bit deceptive. I don’t know how long all these edits will take. Also, do people even know that the series is called The Stories of Emre? And wait? Isn’t Emre just your son Remy’s name in Pig Latin? Well, yes, but also not exactly. Fine. Third time's the charm.
First Draft of Tales & Treasure Sequel Finished
Wordy, again, but at least this audience should know what Tales & Treasure is, I mean, I’ve been talking about it for almost two years.
I could throw in a colon and make the title something like “First Draft Finished: Tales & Treasure Sequel.” We authors use colons in titles all the time. Ah, that still doesn’t feel right, but you’ve heard enough of my rambling. Get to the point. Right. I stink at naming things and headlines–hold on, that’s not it.
The point is: I finished the first draft of my novel. (That could have been a decent headline) Bard’s & Bargains finished at just over 128,000 words. It took a year and a half to write, but most of my work came in 2025. To be honest, I didn’t think I would finish the first draft this year. Man, I still can’t believe I actually got it done.
It took me three years to write the first draft of Tales & Treasure, and the sequel is longer and way more complicated. Editing might take a while, but finishing is a huge relief.
Going Forward
I’m going to put Bards & Bargains away for a couple of weeks–let it simmer. That should give me some more time to read and write short stories. We’ll see. The literary world is my oyster.
After that, I’ll dive into edits and then send it off to beta readers.
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So after the edits, beta reading, more edits, more edits, hiding in a hole, climbing out of said hole, celebrating, more edits, formatting, and the inevitable last-second edit, where are we? Ah, yes, the Bards & Bargains release date. Truth is, I don’t know.
When’s a good time to release a book? Probably after it’s completely finished, Rob–stop thinking about marketing. Yup, right. I’d like to publish Bards & Bargains in early 2026. That should give me enough time to do it right. I’ll have a better idea once I get through the first round of edits.
So, yeah, that’s it. I finished the first draft of my novel. Now the real work begins.
Thanks for reading.
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