Shamefully Delayed Updates

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I guess I've been a little busy with everything, all things considered. Sorry, poor neglected blog!
But, things have been happening.
I have completed Viral Heart, which to me is a massive achievement (forgive the probably unattractive narcissism?) It's strange, but when I set out to write this collection of shorts, it was this story that I could  never see myself completing. It was as though it was too big for me. I knew what I wanted to happen in it, but I didn't know how to link it together or even how to write it. It was always this far-away thing, off in the distance, 'yeah I'm totally going to do this after everything else' thing.
I've never been a completer-finisher, not really. I get bored of old ideas, get new ones, start those, then never finish them. Perhaps that's why I made this blog. So that if I didn't finish this damnable project I'd have all this to feel guilty about.

Viral Heart was always going to be the 'event horizon', and I've passed it. I'm finally on the home straight! (Three months after my original deadlines for myself, oops) Inspiration strikes at the strangest times. There are three more stories left to tell, and they are all about 50% complete at this point. I'm currently working on Shadows on a Wall, the final story, because it leads chronologically on from Viral Heart (yeah, I guess it's pretty complicated.) I am now extremely excited for Quantum Entanglement, as it's taken a far darker turn. Think Joseph Mengele and the mentality behind the Nazi soldiers who had to work at the concentration camps. It's going to be equal parts fun and horrific to write, I think.

Viral Heart numbers exactly thirty-nine A4 pages, size ten. Thus, I have dubbed it the longest short story in history. I can't think of one off the top of my head that is longer, and I'm not counting novellas here ;> Sssh, let me have this one?

So, left to do, I have:
Finish: Shadows on a Wall, Quantum Entanglement, Tears Become Raindrops
Edit: We've Lost Our Moral Compass (ew),Viral Heart, the above.
Final edits/copy-editing: the entire collection. This is going to be fun.

I've also been having vague ideas for a novella series after the collection/written as relief alongside my trilogy. Based loosely around the seven deadly sins (fully aware this in itself is not the most original concept, but what I've got planned for it is going to be.) It wasn't even meant to be based off the sins, it just sort of turned out that way. The main two ideas I have going on are Burnout/Little Grey Box, which would qualify under 'wrath' - and Narcissus, which is obviously going to be 'pride'. They're set in a near-future Britain, specifically London, where unemployment and mob violence and youth gangs are rife. Basically, the way Britain's going at the moment! Burnout stars a young, unnamed female anti-hero with a penchant for arson, uneducated but definitely not ignorant, and doesn't end well at all. Bit of a comment on the demonisation of youth, I suppose, as well as the way society likes to fit everyone into neat little boxes. Narcissus, on the other hand, stars a handsome young man with delusions of grandeur, who ultimately finds that he cannot match his imagined reality and can never become perfect.
It also doesn't end well.
But then, none of my stories ever do. :>

I'm totally aware of what I said at the top of the post, and this will not be started until COTD is complete. Scout's honour.

Will try to post more often with updates. It's getting exciting now!