A Pleasant Surprise

Deadlines worked again! I cannot legally disclose the exact date the editing project was due, but rest assured I did get it done comfortably ahead of time.

I finished my first passthrough on Wednesday and was finished with the structural edit by Saturday, much to the line/developmental editor’s delight. Despite having misgivings about the story itself, I went the extra mile on this one, and trust the primary editor will give it the justice it deserves.

I was tempted to do some line and developmental editing myself. And to be honest, I probably overstepped the bounds of my contract more than once. But I provided multiple documents which highlight the changes I made, and I hope the dev/line editor doesn’t get too upset at some of the liberties I took. As I’ve mentioned before, I LOVE editing, and I guess there’s just some things I can’t easily let slip past my gaze.

After I was finished and submitted my work, I got paid the other half of the payment. It feels indescribably rewarding to earn money for this kind of work. I mean, getting paid for database administration is fine, but it’s not exactly what I’d call fun. This, however, felt worth it in the end.

And when one project ends, another begins. In this case, fate conspired to where I’m now helping a buddy work on a collectible card game that I’d already put a lot of work into, from design, to card concepts, to playtesting, to having done some of the actual artwork depicted on the cards themselves. That project has been stalled at about 90% completion since around August/September of last year, and it seems that if I’m not fired up about the project, neither is everyone else. I somehow ended up spearheading the project, and it apparently lives or dies depending entirely on me. So I decided to get fired up about it again and write a pep talk to all the playtesters, developers, frontrunners, artists, the IP holder, and other people involved.

Yes, I realize tradeable/collectible card game design is not exactly writing, but it’s turning into a pretty kickass game, if I do say so myself, and I feel it’s a more than worthwhile endeavor. (I’m not sure if I’m allowed to share any of the cards or details about the game on this blog–I’ll have to check and see.)

On the reading front, I finished Robert Jordan’s Wheel of Time series years ago, but the other day, I realized I somehow never read the prequel, The New Spring. Considering that Wheel of Time is one of my favorite series, I was extremely excited to get back into Jordan’s familiar universe.

As far as my Chronicles of Narnia read-through is concerned, I’m now at the last chapter of The Silver Chair, and intend to proceed to The Last Battle, finishing out the series. Then the wifey wants me to read The Magician’s Nephew with her (she read it before we were going through the series together), and we may move onto the Screwtape Letters, but not before reading something else … probably written by someone other than C.S. Lewis.

I planned on posting this update Monday, but unfortunately I was feeling sick. Feeling lots better today, though! Missed you guys, and I’m glad to finally be crawling out of my editing cave.