Hello all, it’s been a long time.

I haven’t kept up to date with blog posts as I should have, but I’ve been a busy man this past year. With real life work and the pandemic finally turning around here, it has been a wild ride. That being said, I have made progress on projects; others not so much. I thought I would update progress on a few of them in a bit of a lengthy post.

A Bit of Real Life

Unless you’ve been living as a hermit on the top of the world, the COVID-19 pandemic has been a real test for everyone around the world. I never thought it affected me as such, but it has. I’ve gotten my first vaccination shot; soon, I will be getting my second. As Ontario opens up, we need to be as cautious as ever, but it seems we can finally see light at the end of the tunnel.

My real life job has taken a lot of my time over the past two years. Thus, writing has been difficult, often slowed by other tasks and chores pulling me in eight different directions. Writing, as I sometimes promise things that never surface, often takes a back seat. I’ve learned quick that in today’s time—especially with the pandemic slowing down, only to be replaced by a deadly “heat dome” passing through Canada—giving ETAs on certain projects has the possibility to lead to disaster, maybe even distrust. I still plan on doing the things I said; I just don’t have a time frame when they will be complete.

Not all of it has been bad. When I do get the chance to do some writing or writing-related tasks, I enjoy them. I recently bought an e-reader and give myself another shot at reading efficiently on the road, and so I have a physical representation of an ebook I may soon self-publish. Swings and roundabouts, eh?

The Severis Tales

Since the last time I’ve written anything on this blog, I put up TST 9: Elcra Needs a Dentist. It is rather special to me, because from those I have shared it with, the response to the story has been positive, highlighting how much I improved since the first one.

Aside from that, it is the ninth installment of The Severis Tales, and I am reaching number ten. I estimate that with the tenth installment, due at some point in the future, the word count devoted to The Severis Tales thus far is past 100,000 words. To me, that is an incredible achievement.

For ages, I’ve been tackling on what to do as a project I can really push out. My Elineer project, I’ve realized that there’s much more wrong with it than I realize, and I have to devote time to revisit everything in it. Such a shame, because I did complete a manuscript for it. More on that below.

With my love for TST growing beyond what I intended it to be, I decided to pursue an experiment and intend to self-publish a collection of short stories that is exclusive to this project.

I’ve had much more experience in doing short stories, and I believe this is a good way to get started. It will also introduce the universe to a wider range of readers and reflect on the previous free stories published on the Patrick Rivers Web Site. This will hopefully be the first of many collections or single stories to be published, either through self-publishing or a traditional print press.

Currently titled Random Jobs (it is a work in progress, after all), the book focuses on various jobs during the summer of Algenon year 1104, with a few stories straying out of the time period. So far, I’ve done the first draft for seven of the stories, with an estimated word count (minus markdown comments, which is how I am writing the draft) of around 36,000 words. I reckon I am a little over halfway there in what I want for content. My aim is to give around twelve short stories of various lengths to give a varied spectrum of themes based on the concept of jobs. I won’t give an estimated time of release, but there’s a slight chance it may be at the end of the year, maybe the first half of 2022. It all depends on what there is to do and much I muck up.

I’m also experimenting with a simple but interesting book cover. But, as always, everything is subject to change. I’ve taken inspiration from the 1980s with geometric and shadow designs, including the cover design from the album Music for The Hard of Thinking by Canadian pop band Doug and the Slugs. I just need to put something in the middle to show what’s inside. Cool, huh? I may share a work in progress of it down the road. Or, perhaps I will learn via a kick in the arse that I should leave those matters to others more experienced.

Regarding the general genre of the TST universe, fantasy, an aspect of The Severis Tales I aim for is to keep the “fantasy-ness” to a minimum. It is an attempt to bridge the gap between fantasy and non-fantasy fans and still provide an interesting read. The basic premise? With a few tweaks, I could rewrite much of the content to take place here, on Earth. The reason I chose a fantasy setting was to create a bit of variety, but to demonstrate a point about the potential possibility of other worlds in our universe similar to Algenon. Putting the sci-fi and fantasy mumbo-jumbo aside, The Severis Tales is an attempted compromise.

Another sub-project I will invest time on is rewriting the first eight stories to a higher standard. Not only is the structure and style a little embarrassing now, but I can improve them with another do-over.

I will update the pages with some reformed information and text as I make progress.

Elineer

Ah yes, The World of Elineer, my pride and joy, the world I spent a few years developing and honing the manuscript of the first book into sight, only to discover beyond the grammar and spelling and continuity errors more serious amateur crimes that were committed by me. I still stand by the work that isn’t out there, and I love it to death.

After labouring for hours over the course of a year and a half (maybe more), I came up with a complete story that I had planned to get ready for either testing or publishing. However, creator’s ego and a lack of patience led me to sabotage my own creation, which, in my mind, has been devastating. I don’t plan on giving up. So, I’ve started recreating and implementing concepts that make it better and provide a more fluid experience, especially in writing.

With that said, I’ve shared a few bits over the past few months, namely a work in progress continent and the calendar system I implemented. I’ve thought long and hard about the world itself, and if it made any sense. It turns out it didn’t—not in the fantasy way, of course, but in a continuity and technological sense. I have to go into the bowels of the world and rebuild chunks to make sure it’s tuned to what I envisioned and to something that makes sense to me.

I’ve revoked the web section on Elineer since migrating the website over, and I plan to redo the pages to give better insight and what to expect. I hope I will have an improved manuscript ready in the near future. It’s not much of a date, but it is the best I can give right now.

Where to Go From Here

I’m hoping to do more blog posts on things down the road, but when those will pop up, I do not know. I’m chiselling away at The Severis Tales, and I have more ideas for other short stories I wish to submit to magazines for publication. Paid or not, a published article would give me a portfolio boost and gain me exposure.

Until next time, happy reading and happy writing.