The Marshmallow Ranch Gazette (Patreon)

Howdy, patrons!

Well, here it is, another two week gap between chapters of THE CULT OF MAXIMUS. I'm really sorry about that, folks. I could make all of the excuses in the world, but it comes down to the fact that I screwed up with another underestimation.

The next scene in the story is (as you might have guessed by the way the last scene ended) a straight-up action scene with six people all doing things at once. I'll be honest with you here; action scenes with stakes and all that are something that I haven't done a lot of, but this is one of those scenes that you write towards when you sit down at the computer. I've had this one in mind ever since I started part one, and it's finally here. Hopefully by now you have a good understanding of just about everyone involved -- well, except for the two people you're meeting just now -- and why they do things the way they do them. One of the real advantages of writing serialized fiction this way is you can really take the time to set the pieces on the board, follow their movements through the story, and be really engaged when something major happens.

But the problem is I should have given myself a lot more time to write this; there's so much going on that just describing the physical action is a complicated task, but making sure that the emotional beats are covered and that the consequences spinning out of this scene are well-seeded makes it that much more of a beast. Ideally, each scene should be doing a number of things -- and this is one where I think my reach my have exceeded my grasp.

The reason I started the Jackalope Serial Company, though, is to make sure that I power through the difficult bits of my writing and stick to a deadline. It's to shift my thinking away from the idea of perfection and more towards the idea of completion. I'm trying really hard not to let perfect be the enemy of done, but in this particular instance I failed. This scene is really important to me, and I want it to land well. That desire has paralyzed me a little bit and now my schedule is broken because of it.

I'm sorry about that; but I also wanted to be honest about the writing process and my struggle with establishing a decent, consistent practice. So there you go. I'm working on the next part right now, and hopefully it will be ready to go by next week. I'll try to do something a little special this month to make up for the delay.

In the meantime, I hope all of you are doing wonderfully! Happy Pride Month! I hope they have an awesome parade wherever you are!!