TGRF's Writing Updates - December

Progress has been made in my writing endeavors since my last update, so as the year comes to a close, I'll share with you where I'm at, and what comes next.

Novels
Worldbuilding for the novel series has progressed smoothly, resulting in the world being nearly entirely built. All areas are covered and details known. At this point, I'm ready to dive into the story, and start working on the plot and characters involved.

The world doesn't feel entirely alive yet, but that is only due to not having written anything in it. A simple fix for this could be to write some small snippets, playing out known events in history, just to get a feeling for the world. Unfortunately, if this happens, those snippets will not be posted here, as they would reveal the world and possibly characters of my novels prematurely.

For now, I need to finalize some details, and then move on to the story proper. There...

TGRF's Writing Updates - November

It's been a bit since my last update, and with November coming to a close, I feel like it's time to let you all know where I'm at, and what's happening.

Firstly, I can't really continue to call these updates 'Fan Fiction Chronicles' when they aren't really about fan fiction. So I've created a new category, 'Writing Updates', which will focus primarily on novels and writing in general. Functionally they'll be identical to my FFCs.

Fan Fiction
I want to mention Fan Fiction first. There is currently nothing in the works, and I currently still have no plan to release another major story.

The need to stay in 'writing shape' remains, and I would like to find something short I can write every now and then. What form that will take remains unknown, but I'd like to find something soon.

This could be contest entries, personal challenge stories, or simply some sort of Valhalla...

TGRF Reviews: Oathbringer

Yesterday, I finished Oathbringer, book 3 in the Stormlight Archive. Since book 4 is already in my possession, I didn't want to waste much time getting to the review of book 3. So let's hop to it.

Ratings:
5: Amazing, above flawless.
4: Flawless, but doesn't really stand out.
3: Might have some issues, but works fine.
2: Has some issues which might detract from the media.
1: Flawed, bring the media down noticeably.

Title: Oathbringer
Author: Brandon Sanderson
My Rating: 3.5/5

Phase 1
I've opted to forgo my usual summary and my breakdown of the story into parts. The book is so massive that it's almost like trying to review separate books in one. Therefore, I'll break the book into what I see as it's defining 'parts'. I will attempt to avoid spoilers, though this won't be 100% possible.

Phase 1 is - as is becoming typical with these...

TGRF's Fan Fiction Chronicles #112

Dawn of Darkness, or DoD, is now live, and you can begin reading. I posted the story a few days ago, but neglected to actually mention it anywhere, hence this blog post.

The first post in the thread and the introduction cover everything you'll need to know, so I won't go into any of that here. Instead, I want to offer a brief glimpse into what my writing plans are going forwards.

I do not currently plan on releasing another full length fan fiction. DoD is - unless things change - the last long tale I'll be posting here. This is because, while I enjoy writing long stories, they require a ton of time to develop and write, and that's time I would at this point rather be spending on my first novel series.

There could be various short fictions, contest entries, or serial-esque tales. This is not confirmed, just a possibility right now. I want to keep in 'writing shape' if possible while I work...

TGRF's Fan Fiction Chronicles - Entry #111

Dawn of Darkness is now fully written. It weighs in at 148 pages and 70K+ words, although that number might shift slightly as I proofread and edit. Editing might take a few days - for some reason I found myself making a lot of typos and other errors as I wrote, so I expect there to be a lot to fix.

You can probably expect to see DoD posted and ready for viewing by the end of this week or before.

While you wait, I will again highly suggest you re-read Valkyrie. Even if you remember the main events, it's the little details which are referenced constantly in DoD, including one revelation which is hinted at, but never actually told in Valkyrie. It's only 16 chapters. A quick read.

DoD will of course be released with the usual accompaniment of maps, introduction, and post-text author's note. And it will be released on my website, the top of which is rapidly running out of room (it might...