Aaaaand we’re done. Pretty much. Except for a bit of tidying and reformatting.
Despite my best efforts at cutting, I still went over 40K, which means From Earth will officially remain a novel.
I thought the revamped ending would require an extra chapter. Turned out I needed three extra chapters–an additional 9200 words. It also means, of course, that I’ll have next to nowhere to market this one. C’est la vie. And really–if I weren’t painting myself into corners, I just wouldn’t be me, would I?(By the way, if you are by any chance comparing Magic Meters from week to week, you have probably concluded that either I can’t add or I’m a compulsive liar. The truth is that I had some extra verbiage in the draft as I worked, some leftovers from the original ending and from my first stab at rewriting it. I hadn’t been deleting that stuff because it would have made keeping track of the new words well nigh impossible. Now that I’m done, though, I’ve cut out the leftovers.)
(And if you have been comparing my Magic Meters week to week, you really need to get out more. Then again, so do I.)
After the cleanup of From Earth, I’ll finally be able to turn to a new novel project, which at this time looks to be a story in the same continuity, but with a completely different set of characters. It might even include the protagonist from my Writers of the Future 24-hour story. That’s the current plan, anyway–but as always, it’s subject to change.
A final snippet:
The flashlight owner came upon him and stopped, looking down. The black shape was too large to be Eaglet.
Then he spoke: "Black Eagle."
The voice was a man’s, ragged but still distinct: Jack Knife.
Of course.
And I’m out.
