Author J. R. DuBois: Unfiltered

 Hello Conduits. There has been some development in my writing life/the progression of the books. I am all but running head-long into the climax of Book Two when I realized... I want to rework the ending of Book One. Nay, not only do I want to, I must. There are a couple things I realized while writing Book Two, and that is that, at the end of Book One, I made some promises to you readers which will never be fulfilled, given the rest of the story. So I got to scrub some of those. It isn't a big deal, might take me a wee longer than I want it to, but hopefully this back-and-forth gives you some insight into what it really takes to craft a book -- and not just a book, but a well-thought-out, full-fleshed story and characters with a plot and character arcs WHICH MAKE SENSE. So, respect all those books which do just that! Because *that* is the challenge. Anyone can tell a story and hit "publish" on Amazon. But I want to do more; be better. Alright. So, unfortunately, while it...

Heavens to Betsy, is Book Two's progress slowing down because I know I'm getting near the end, getting overwhelmed with all the stuff I need to make happen before the end -- which is fast approaching -- or is it because I want to tweak the end of Book One so Book Two essentially becomes Part Two of Book One, thus making Book 1 and 2 only one book? *grabs head and screams* Yesterday, I was certain that this (the latter) was what I thought I should do. But now... Eeeeuuughhh... As I've tried to plot and draft such a thing, I realize... well. Maybe yes and maybe no. I really could make this thing a trilogy, but I also want to try very hard to make it a duology with trilogy, prequel, and sequel potential, so either way, the stories are connected, but do I finish book two, finesse it as much as I have Book One, and then ram the two together with the neat little sections of "Part One" and "Part Two," and then leave the prologue of Book Two and some of the vill...

  My Backyard Writing Spot. Isn't it gorgeous?! "They" say it takes a village to rear a child, but I say it takes a village to write a book. I cannot tell you the number of times I thought Conduit of Fire was done. Finished. Finito. Fin. I cannot tell you how many times I was wrong. If I wait for this thing to be perfect, I will never publish it. So perfection is off the table. But there is this thing called "author blindness," where the creators of the work quite literally go "blind" to certain issues that arise in the text. These could be simple typos, where we gloss over them because they're minor, and we know what we're trying to say, to larger ones, where we're trying to explain a concept but it doesn't quite come across because we forgot that either a) we didn't talk about that yet, or b) we forgot what we took out that relates to it and we still think it's in there, or c) some combination thereof. Remember, Conduit of Fir...

God said, "Thou shalt have no other gods before me." That's His very first commandment. Oh, but we are so GOOD at creating idols, aren't we? Even with the very GOOD gifts He gave us! TLDR: My priorities have been realigned; Book Two is coming along nicely; I'm about to answer the final major question about what's going on with the priesthood amidst the magic system alongside corruption and resistance (super frickin' hard); my CP Angela is helping me greatly finesse COF; I think I've decided to officially self-publish, though the thought grinds my guts about actually making it happen and marketing myself into a decent author platform; and I went to a wonderful wedding of two good friends over the weekend like a mini adult summer camp. TW: Long ramble about how I see/hear/interact with God in my life. So.. bunch of Jesus stuff, but hey. He's around, so what do you expect? So this last week, I had a hard reminder of priorities. It's funny, this wh...

 One of the ironic things about trying to build a platform online for potential readers is the fact that, in order to do so, I must encourage them to spend more time looking at a screen when I think most of the world's problems come from not looking up. The deeper irony is that, without such things as social media, blogs, etc, our ability to get ourselves out there and known is slim to none. Can it be done? It has, it can, and it will again. But those who know how to do such things -- now that social media has swept the world by storm some 20 years ago -- the way business and marketing is done has changed, likely forever -- or for as long as we have this thing called the internet available to us. So why do I dislike the screen? I dislike it for many reasons. I love it, because it gives me a method of writing my book much faster than I could if I free-wrote it, edits and rewrites and moving parts around in the story are a breeze, and you can connect with people all across the countr...

 One of the themes of A Conduit of Fire is truth vs widely-accepted lies. At the original time of writing -- ten years ago -- I didn't realize this would be a theme of the book, but it is. The book is already written and I am well on my way to completing the second rough draft for Book Two, but I would be lying if recent events didn't impact the development of COF as well as Book Two. This world, as much as I love it, my country, and people (I truly, truly do; many claim to love people but they only like the idea of them, or those who are identical to them in thought, behavior, appearance, beliefs, or otherwise), is going crazy. It is only fueling some of the ideas for the end of Book Two and development of Book Three, which has yet to have had an initial draft (I wrote draft one of Book Two before I even edited COF, and now I've definitely had my work cut out for me). That said, this notion of truth is very important to all of our lives and how we are to live them. One of...

Cuddles with Tybalt. Heavens, how I love this boy. (He purrs with short, rapid purrs, instead of the long breathy ones like most cats; I absolutely adore it.) Happy Weekend, Conduits. How's the channeling going? (Channeling? Still trying to decide if I should call the manipulation of the magic system "channeling." The magic is called Enchantment or, much later, vaguely referenced as "the element." AND, it's a slow, evolving situation with the magic in my world, so most of its use comes at the end of Book Two and all over Book Three. So... Don't know.) I am either about 60-70% of the way through Book Two, or RIGHT UP ON the set-up for the climax. I think it's going to be a lot more challenging to finish Book Two than it was COF (Conduit of Fire; Book One). So many answers are being laid out in Book Two that what might be a simple answer could take pages and chapters of actual prose. Additionally, I'm hoping to not have to cut so many words during ...