July Updates

Hi everyone, I felt like I need to get this out of my brain and into the world. I've been writing Incremental Torture for almost half a year now. When I started I had no plans, no outlines and little idea of what it was going to become - save for the fact it was going to be based on an idle game, set in a tower and the main character was a tenacious woman called Evelyn. I've loved writing the story. I think 'book 1' or perhaps the first 60 or so chapters are incredible, I wrote them fairly well and with a lot of care and attention. The story made sense, the characters had natural growth and development, and clear goals. Things started to slip after that. Don't misunderstand - I still think it's an enjoyable read, but without a plan, or an idea of where I wanted the story to head, it started to develop a life of its own and get out of control. It's begun to feel like a chore, rather than a project of love. Many writers say that your first novel is always terrible. I agree, somewhat. I know this decision may upset some of you, and now that I have a patreon I have a responsibility to provide your hard-earned money's worth. I appreciate the support you've shown greatly! I will be ending Incremental Torture once this current story arc ends. I could keep writing it for another 100 chapters, and it might be readable. Enjoyable, even. However, I don't think it would be worthwhile. I may revisit the story in future, rewrite it and continue onwards with a better foundation, but I'm not sure. As for the future, I am still writing! I don't plan to quit. If you wish to cancel your patreon membership or stop reading my works, I would understand! However, I have a new story to share. Starting this weekend I will begin to release the earlier chapters of this story on Patreon, and plan to have a full release of the novel in August once the patreon backlog is up.

Book 1 is almost completely written, and I planned and outlined the entire thing beforehand. It flows well, and the story makes sense. I have also planned the entirety of Book 2 and will begin writing it shortly. There will be 20 advance chapters available on Patreon from the moment the story releases on RoyalRoad, with the full backlog available to those of you in the Decadent Donors tier! I think one major issue with Incremental Torture was that I didn't figure out how the system worked before writing the story. I shoehorned a bunch of features in as I went and it started to get messy. Here, I went simpler. The system is less bulky but far more beneficial to the story as a whole. As for the story itself, it's a LitRPG Fantasy Adventure about a girl who dreams of becoming a legendary pirate, in a world where there are terrifyingly huge oceans that dominate the environment. She runs away from home and goes on many adventures as she tries her best to achieve that goal, earning skills and traits along the way and meeting a medley of interesting characters. I also have another project for the distant future. I wanted to build a system that just worked. Not just as a story piece, but one based in mathematical formulas, where levelling, stats and everything was truly controlled and not just decided on as I write. I'm getting there, and I'm quite excited about that too. In terms of Incremental Torture, expect about 5 more chapters. That's almost 2 weeks of content remaining. I have really enjoyed this journey, learned a lot about writing and have met loads of awesome people who actually enjoy what I've created. I love you all, truly! Deciding to kill a story is really hard, but I think it will be for the best in the long run. Have a fantastic rest of your week, and keep being awesome! Muffin

-As of now, I have posted Chapter 1 of the new story, Salt and Blood. Give it a read and let me know what you think!