The Long and Short of It: Guidelines

The act of creation itself is a form of art. We get to choose what we’re making, and in what manner we make it.

In the current world of publishing, writers get choices. We can make stories with as much or as little filler as we want.

We can do definitive editions of our works to be released later, expanding upon already released works.

I believe there is power in such choices.

I wrote Lowella to set up for its gold edition release in 2025, as well as Numinous, to be a bridge between Auminous and Criminous. I plan on revisiting the stories and reimagining them in a longer format when time permits.

My plan is to get stories out when I can, then refine them with gold editions for the rest of my days as a writer if they need it. Some conventional wisdom says to never revisit a story, but as writers, we can revisit any world we want at any time.

When life impedes deadlines, we go with the flow and do what we can.

For now, my focus is on writing and editing The Last Key of Maestraumus and A Knight Stained Black.

These two works will be on the longer side when they release, sitting around 100,000 to 150,000 words pending editing to tighten up the manuscripts.

I’m also working on a new novel concept called Lost Mythos, the first of which will be out late next year.

My favorite stories to write are the Orchestrylus Odyssey novels. It’s fun exploring a fantasy world that runs on high-technology and musical workings within the different castes of society.

The next novel will explore some more romantic elements that haven’t been presented in the story in a concrete form just yet, with Stanzielle exploring that side of her life with her childhood friend, Lyrician. But I’d like to flip this trope on its head in its execution.

It will also explore the scientific nature of the Nine Golden Masks and introduce one of them with far more prominence in the story than Strumestia Harpscythe had in the last light novel.

And, from this point on, the light novels will not be so light.

With seven spheres to explore and multiple continents with cities, settlements, and mythologies, this story will run out of steam when the spheres have been cracked wide open and every inch of them has been covered.

The rules of writing novels aren’t set in stone.

A story needs to be as long as it needs to be without a slog, and like the pirates once said in my favorite movie, the rules are “more like guidelines than actual rules.”

If a story needs to be around 50,000 words, let it be so. If it needs to be 200,000 words, let it be so. Needs to be a novella? Go for it.

By the time the Orchestrylus Odyssey is finished, it will be millions of words. I don’t think it will run as long as The Wandering Inn has or other stories like it, but why not shoot for something beyond the stars?

Seeing as I can’t see the next ten years, who’s to say? I’d like to wrap up the story by 2027-2029, but time will tell.

All I know is, next year is going to be so fruitful and fun.

I have so many story ideas, so much concept art, outline sketches, titles, and using Clip Studio to mess around with manga panels is fun, too.

But that’s the point of it all.

Writing is supposed to be fun.

There’s nothing more fun for me than making things up and bringing coherence to the things I come up with.

And fun is the ultimate guideline.