Update 17

Just finished the storyline for the third book! This marks the end of the first episode in the Cycle of Corruption series, but don't worry, there are going to be more, many more. I'm going to be spending the weekend re-writing the sample chapter according to the feedback I've received and then submitting it for approval again. Hopefully will fare quite well next time around!

As for current storyline progress, I think I'm going to turn my attention to my second favourite mythological creature, werewolves.

Update 16

Not much progress sadly due to my concentration being off after a gig on Tuesday, the ringing finally went away Friday evening thankfully.

Managed to make some progress on book 3, but it's tricky when the only idea for the book I had was a massive climactic battle, so now I have to fit in as much storyline as I can around it to make the book not dominated by the battle, but ideas are coming along.

Only waiting on one last piece of feedback for the sample chapter, then I'll rewrite it and send it out again, see how it turns out this time, I can take the waiting if it means the rest of the book will read a lot better.

Update 15

Well I've made a start on book 3 of the series and progress is coming along slowly, got a large number of ideas for this book so I'm hoping it'll be full of interesting content. As I mentioned in Myspace I've had feedback from my sample chapter and can start to see where I'm going wrong, but I'm still waiting for some more to come back to me before I can make a final judgement.

The chapter progression is working well, reading other books has really helped me decide where to put chapter divisions in, got 13 chapters on book 1 so far, so I'll see how many I have by the end and see if I can add or lose some chapters to make for a more appealing number, don't really want to end up with hundreds of chapters.

Update 14

As you may have read on the Myspace blog I didn't get much chance to write a whole lot due to getting some really bad news. My writing has been jarred a bit and it's also the reason this update is a day late.

As for actual progress on these books I've been working on ideas for book 3 and for the next group of books in the series. I'm really determined to make this book series into my main work, putting my best ideas and the largest amount of work into the storylines. The ideas have come in quite well and I think I've got enough concept material for another three books to the series, there may be more later on, but for the near future I'm focusing more on the works at hand.

The feedback I've received on the sample chapter has been good so far with only a few small criticisms, but I'm still waiting for a bit more feedback to come back, hopefully there will be some criticism in it.

Update 13

Well, definitely had a lot more progress than lately with this project, the sample chapter from Heart of Corruption has been completed, proof-read and sent out to a few people. Hopefully I'll get some feedback on the chapter to see if my direction is true or not. Good and bad feedback would be best really, so I can see where I went right and where needs improvement.

On another note, I've finished the storyline for Book 2 today! Wasn't expecting it but I got to an excellent finishing point, ends on a nice cliff-hanger to keep interest going for the third book. Speaking of which, I'll begin the storyline for the third book later on, there are a few more projects in the mean time that I would like to finish before this, besides which, I have a lot to keep me occupied on this project.

Update 12

Been quite productive this week, managed to get the first chapter almost finished, just need to flesh it out a little more before getting it approved. At least I've had a lot more time to write since getting my laptop and coming to Germany. So hopefully I'll have time to work on it and have it completely ready before I head back on Wednesday. Haven't had much of a chance to work on Book 2 storyline though, most of my free time has been taken up with relaxing or writing Book 1.

Update 11

As I mentioned in my Status update, I might not be able to do an update next week due to time constraints while in Germany, I'll do my best but at least you'll know what's going on if you don't see anything next weekend.

As for the status of Cycle of Corruption 2, it's coming along very well, I've even managed to surprise myself, while writing I created a character on the spot and even named them immediately, something which I usually have great difficulty with. On the subject of names I've now gotten a name for all characters involved in the book, granted I borrowed some nice-sounding names from foreign languages but they sounded fitting. ;)

As far as progress is concerned I think the storyline is about 80% or so complete now, which means it'll soon be time to shift my focus to another storyline. Thankfully I'll be taking my laptop to Germany and all the spare time I'll have will allow me to work on the actual writing of Book 1. Which means I'll have that sample chapter ready very soon.

Update 10

Well this week hasn't exactly gone as planned, I've pretty much gotten nothing done apart from advancing the storyline of book 2, mainly due to feeling so terrible starting Sunday and only just started recovering on Thursday.

The sample paragraphs didn't get written sadly, but there's nothing to do this weekend so I'll make a load of notes to myself to create those samples to be posted so as to keep fans interested, I know it's probably very boring to just read updates all the time, but as soon as my laptop (eventually) arrives I'll be able to produce a lot more work in a shorter time.

I'll make it my upmost priority over the weekend to get those paragraphs finished, after all this time of following I think my followers deserve at least a small preview of what's to come.

Update 9

As mentioned in the Myspace update, I'm very tired and had a lot going on at work. This has two effects, firstly it means this post will be somewhat short, secondly most of my ideas for the storyline are still on my PDA as I haven't had time to transfer them over in all honesty.

But the storyline for the second book is going along strongly, new ideas coming at me when I least expect it. Usually as I'm trying to sleep, but that's why I keep my PDA close-by at all times, for those moments of inspiration!

I know you'll be wondering about the chapter, I am too, it's coming along quite well, but with the slow progress I think I'm going to have to whip up a few sample paragraphs in the mean time to act as tasters until my laptop can help me power through the chapter itself. The paragraphs will (hopefully) be finished this weekend as I don't have much planned apart from a trip to Homebase and getting things ready to transfer files off the PC.

Once the sample paragraphs are finished and proofed a lucky few will receive them in their inboxes. I'm hoping for detailed feedback but really I'd be happy with knowing if it was good or bad.

Update 8

Well the progress on the chapter hasn't come along (yet), but that's because I haven't had time to sit down and work on it yet, which I'll get to once I finish updating my blogs.

HOWEVER, I have started to work on the setting and storyline for the second book in the series, mainly getting characters straight and worked out, not to mention trying to think of names for all of them.

I'm very hopeful I'll get the chapter finished and ready for a few people to preview as soon as possible, progress is slow currently due to me only really having time to write it Friday nights, and sometimes Saturday nights, depending how my weekend goes. At the end of October that will all change though as I'll be getting my laptop! :D Hooray!

I'll be dedicating most of my free time to working on the second book now, and trying to work out where to go with Rin's Crime, maybe if that starts taking off it might get somewhere. But I also have to fit in learning guitar and getting more knowledge into the various languages I'm learning. I'll get there though! ;)

Update 7

Well as mentioned in Myspace I've received demand for a sample chapter, so I shall deliver. I'll try and dedicate more time to getting that one finished, might take a while though, plus I'll get it copyrighted but that's not a major hassle.

I've made a start on Chapter 1 and I'm pleased with it so far, but part of me is worrying if it will be well-received, the last thing I want is to pour my heart and soul into this project only for it to fall flat. I suppose if that does happen at least I'll have the memories of the wonderful (in my eyes at least) world I created from my own imagination.

I suppose it's all down to me putting my very best effort in and hoping it succeeds, at least I know the idea sounds good to the people I've told about it, so that's a boost at least.

Update 6

Still in a bit of a buzz from having finished the storyline in all honesty, I'm really excited about this project beyond belief!

As I mentioned on the Myspace update, I'm going to set a time to sit down and read through my entire storyline as I'm sure there are a few inconsistencies I need to clear up, perhaps some things I've mentioned in the beginning and forgotten about or some things I bring up later on but haven't mentioned at the start.

That kind of thing, always annoys me when I read a story that's full of ideas that lead nowhere, and I doubt many people like reading books with loads of loose ends throughout. So by proof-reading the storyline I'll be ensuring everything ties up the way I'm wanting it to.

Also need to get the troublesome start out of the way, need to get a really good beginning going to captivate readers otherwise it has a danger of flopping.

Update 5

What an eventful week this has been, absolutely astounding!

Last weekend the map received some more work and is now taking a more defined shape, most of the regions have been outlined at least and some more detail has been added, it's still quite a way from being completed, not to mention the close-up maps for the individual books. But some progress is always better than no progress, and there'll be plenty of time between now and the end of the writing to get it finished, not to mention some cover art drawn up too.

Speaking of the end of things, Friday marked a very important moment. While on my lunch break I finally finished the entire storyline of Book 1, meaning that it is now completely ready to be written in full! I haven't been this excited about writing in a very long time, it does bring a small challenge though, all my work is on the PC, the notes were kept on my PDA and transferred to the PC usually every day. But I'll have to do all the writing on the PC, and I don't get much time at present to get on the PC, not to mention it takes ages to boot up and all, so the main writing will be progressing very slowly until I can get my laptop, enabling me to write on the go wherever I am.

Now that the storyline is finished I'll get to work on writing up a synopsis and getting it copyrighted before posting it up for everyone to read, I'll hopefully have that done before the next update or very soon after.

Update 4!

Things have been going very well for this book I have to say, I've pretty much got everything down for the storyline, just a couple of major events to get through and I'll be at the end of Book 1, all the ideas for the events are still in my head, so I'm just needing to pluck the best ones and put them to paper. It's looking like my next update will be saying that the book is ready to be started or has already been started. Here's hoping!

Now, something I was told was that I don't have any information on what this book is about, so here you go, a little taste of what to expect.

The Cycle of Corruption is a series of books currently planned as a trilogy but if I develop more ideas then I can easily add more books to the series. The setting is somewhat of a traditional fantasy world, the swords and sorcery kind that is. The book focuses heavily around dragons rather than humans, centred largely around a single dragon's life and the journey he goes through, from his birth to some very significant parts of his life that may just change the fate of the world.

Update 3

As I mentioned, now we'll have my proper update.

Over the week there have been many new developments in my book, I've got names for all of the major areas concerned in the books, so the map itself can get completed without problems, but the map hasn't shown much progress yet. There's also been a new character implemented, not to mention a new bunch of storyline twists and alterations this character brings.

I've been making huge advances with the storyline itself and even gotten a few future ideas, as well as brought in ways to explain certain things in the book.

So really everything is going very well, as always, feel free to leave comments or ask me any questions, I'm always happy to get to know people interested in this project. :)

Also over the coming few days I'm going to attempt to set up blog sits for my other projects, so keep an eye out on my Myspace hub site for the links to those. :)

Bye for now!

Bit of a change around and previous updates

Yeah, there's been a slight change of plan with the blogs. Rather than this being my general writing blog, it's now entirely focused on the Cycle of Corruption books. The Myspace blog is now the hub of my writing in general, my aim is to have several blogspot blogs, each of them solely focused on one of my projects.

For the benefit of new followers, I'll include my previous two updates before writing a new one.

Update 1:

As it stands I have all of my characters named for the book, I also have a book title (at last), which is “Heart of Corruption” and a series/trilogy (depending how many I decide to write) name too! Which is “Cycle of Corruption”. Seems to be a bit of a theme here…

As far as the actual writing progress has started the book hasn’t even been properly touched yet, I’m getting together the basic plotline to help with the writing process and try to minimise instances of writer’s block. As far as the plotline goes I’d estimate I’ve got a solid plot for about half (or more) of the book, as well as ideas to happen later on in the books, not to mention an ending. And there may already be brief storyline ideas for another two books somewhere in my home computer.

Update 2:

Progress on the storyline is steadily evolving, at the moment I’m facing a bit of an idea gap, I’ve gotten ideas all the way up to this point and an ending, so now I’m having to push myself to think of events and storyline to go between now and the end of the book, I have one small idea for future use but that’s somewhat minor. It’s a little tough but I’ll persevere.

I’m also starting to compile a list of fantasy publishers so I have an idea of the market, if either of you have any suggestions for publishers you’ve seen around, feel free to send them to my hotmail address.

Also, I’ve started work on something that no fantasy book is complete without, a MAP! Or rather, a series of maps. I’ve gotten an idea for the ‘world map’ and that’s down on paper (but subject to alteration). As for the other maps, they’ll be more detailed sections of the world map that the individual books deal with. My overall idea on the maps is to have to world map at the start of every book and then in the first book have a second map which shows the areas the story deals with, same for the following books.

Breathing life into the blog!

Not really an actual entry, more an announcement that this will be the primary location of my book series blog. I'll post up links to the other locations of it to keep things together, but juggling so much currently (as well as having to clean the house up) that it's all work in progress so far. Check back often for the first official book update!