Hello friends,

I have been silent since December! For that, I'm sorry. I usually post monthly updates on the way to completion. Not sure how I didn't share anything in January at the least.

So, where are we at? Are we on track for March printing?

Not quite. As a person who likes to own physical copies of things I make, and as a person who had some patreon stories that needed a physical body, AND as a person who never says no, I took this project on to take part in the Book Bazaar collab launch, and give those stories a body.

Then I sat down to look at what that would look like. A thin collection, comprising of 6 stories from my patreon? One bonus story? A final story on top of that to cap off the storyline I had going on the Patreon? I could have done that, and we'd already be printed and shipping out. But instead, I decided those 6 stories needed real companions here-- something special for folks who have already read those older stories.

So let's look at what it's become:

El Roso, a standalone story following a favorite character of mine, The Rat, is going in, even if it's (mostly) disconnected from the other stories in the collection. Just knowing that The Rat is in the book means that he could easily be anyone else in the other stories, and that's a delight.

Juli and Kent, a story following two mages in Chicago taking on a routine issue with abnormal results, that's sticking in. Lightly edited, but mostly the same.

Alexcia and Jimmy, following my two favorite idiots as they road trip around, beating up demons and vampires and such? In almost unchanged.

Jimmy & Lexi short, where Jimmy gets a warning something is wrong with his mage friends in Chicago, still in, and still pretty short.

Kent's Week, the final story I ever did in the "Mages in trouble" story, that has stayed.

But, all new stories have joined the roster and will be why this book is substantial and has meandering paths through other people's stories on the way to finishing that Juli + Kent story. It kind of makes this a novel with chapters that change focus each time, but I hope it helps fill out the world all the more and helps you, the reader, feel like you know what this place feels like, more than just what a few characters go through. There is texture across this space, beyond the Alleyman!

Stacey Deluca invites us to meet a new character, one who at the start is a bit unassuming, but who grows into her role as an underground boss of Chicago. She also has a strange eye, lost in an abnormal accident, that will play into future stories!

Paper asks us to recognize something important about this world and its history, or non-history as it may be.

Caleuche introduces us to a paranormal side of Chicago that carries into later stories, and I hope, is an interesting take on its titular myth.

Geraldine introduces us to a lovely background character. Not Geraldine, no. A cardboard box!

Imports introduces us to the idea of a character who joins us later, and shows us an important location that will be called on in later projects, Baba Changa's Imports & Antiques.

Wickerfolk is our collab story we voted on in updates, and is a nice slice-of-life story about finding fantasy and beauty in the world around you, following our strange amalgam construct that I have named Wember.

Pai Huan, ... is a story that finally brings a long favorite character of mine to my modern stories. You will find she is perhaps more abnormal than any of the supernal beings we meet in our other stories-- and she's just a human! Just a human, maybe, with a storied past.

The Oil Slick Door is a direct followup to Kent's Week, carrying that story forward finally after the last 3 or 4 years!

... the Baba Changa is our final story in the mainline of stories in this collection, and finishes the story carried on in The Oil Slick Door.

I am still working on the order the stories will go in-- that's certainly not locked in just yet. One thing I want this collection to be is an introduction to this world, a world I lovingly call Earth 2, in a way that helps you understand some of its rules. This is not just urban fantasy, there are a few layers to it, and I don't want to be boring and just explain them outright. So I'll be layering the stories in such a way that the main thread through (Kent & Juli, Jimmy & Alexcia) aren't resolved all at once, and so that the lessons you need to learn are shared in the appropriate order.

I am also still writing into Geraldine, The Oil Slick Door, and ... the Baba Changa. I have some more things I want to see completed in them before I call them complete.  I'm also, also topping off the collection with a bonus short story called No Moths Left, which gives Alexcia a chance to share a bit of how she got the way she is.

I have a half-page write-in to a story about Dr. Ala Okoye, but I don't think it's interesting just here, and he cameos (without his name) in another story, so I might save him for the followup book. 

SO! I'm asking for a couple more weeks to be done with these final bits, then I'll spend a day in layout (it's quick with fiction), and get a test print to me maybe even yet this month. This means we will be collecting shipping here by the end of the month and then shipping in the early bits of April.

I apologize for pushing it a month late, but I've had quite an honestly exciting exploratory time thinking about the format of this book and a way it can speak to how I might want to write some other worlds to introduce characters, rules, and strangenesses to my readers. I hope to stop putting out games and things like them without supporting them with stories, rich with information on the world of the game.

And this leads into Secret Halls in October!

So I think I'm starting off alright.

Thanks for your patience, and chat again when I have a copy in hand end of this month!

7DA
your pub gob