Managed to figure out the block I had in SOTM to make that time jump smoothly.  Wrote another thousand words or so of the transition, and have the next couple of scenes ( as well as the chapter closer ) firmly set in my head.

One thing that’s been bothering me is that things are happening too much back-to-back, which felt a little unnatural.  You pretty much saw the start and end of every day since Ch. 01.  I’m at a point now where Zoraster’s schemes are at a simmer point, awaiting the right time, so that gives me the ability to pass some time and even things out a bit.

It also give me the time to make some of the more complicated preprations that Danica and the girls need to get down to in order to stand against what is to come.  Things like this don’t happen overnight, no matter how good Danica, Darkni, and everybody else is.

So, I’m going to hit that final sweep of Secret now, and get it off to MistressLynn for an impression read.  She did this for me on last year’s entry, and the insight was remarkable.  It made the story much tighter and much better than it would have been by orders of magnitude.

Wrote a little bit more on Amber, but I’m just in no frame of mind to write naughty bits right now.  Too much noise and too many distractions.

Instead, I’m musing the point where I’m at in SOTM 16.  I need to make a transition here that’s going to pass some time, and it’s eluding me.  I think I’m on the right track, but it needs a little more stirring before it thickens to where the transition will flow smoothly.  I have several things all about to come to a head, and I need to make sure that none of the revelations feel too jarring from the more daily nature of the story so far.

Hoping to start writing it before too much longer today.

I’ll likely do my final cold read of Secret this evening, in order to get it out for an impression read.  Lowborn 05 is off for the same already.  I’m letting the VR:DQ sit on the back burner for the moment.  Just not ready to dig into my memory and the game faqs to determine what elements of the game I’m going to utilize besides the characters.

Moving into the first ( onscreen ) sex scene of Amber.  The first is actually just a tease and a scene break.  This one is full on.  I’ve established the plot, introduced all my major characters ( at least in name ) and whipped in the magic that puts this one in the Sci-Fi/Fantasy category.

This one is going to be heavy on girl-girl, but there’s a man there taking care of business too.

Should be plenty of stroke value in this one, a few moments of humor ( especially for anyone who knows the video that it’s very loosely inspired by ) and just enough storyline to whet the appetite.

Way too tired to work on it any more tonight, though *laugh*

Not sure whether I’ll work on this, or open up SOTM tomorrow to try moving forward with that.  Just have to see what’s striking me, as usual.

Made an initial tweaking sweep through Lowborn, and ran it through the grammar check as well.  Uploaded it a little while ago for my first reader on that story, so we’ll see what she has to say before going through another pass on that one.

Wrote a little more on Amber.  Initially, this was going to be just a pure smut story, but it’s changing in my head a little as I write it.  The characters were just feeling too two-dimensional, and they were quietly protesting that by developing personalities.  A direct result of that is that the whole direction of the tale has changed.

It’s still going to be smut, and very much a college sex tale, but it just doesn’t end the same way any longer.  Amber and Rachel just won’t stand to be completely generic college sluts, I guess *laugh*

I finally waded into the labyrinth of the back room and located my Word install discs.  I’ve always used Word for grammar/spell checks, even though I write in Wordperfect.  I just don’t like that checker in WP, and giving it a shot today reminded me of why *laugh*

With Word installed again, I did that grammar sniff, and I’m in position for one last cold read before sending it off for first-reads.

Think I’ve been away from Lowborn long enough to give it a cold read now.  I’ll probably do a little tweaking, but I’m just not quite awake enough to call this a full imagery pass.  I’m just going to change the font size/face and look for things jumping out at me that I miss in my normal writing font.

Might write a bit on Amber tonight, but we’ll see.  The young one went lights-out early, and I hate to stay up too late, because he’ll have me up too early in the day, and I’ll have zero chance of being able to close my eyes and visualize later on :p

Steadily getting all my tools and files together, and building up some word count.  Not on a major binge like I was around Halloween, but I’ll take what I can get.  Forward progress at more than a snail’s pace is a positive boon compared to what I’ve been dealing with.