Stories I Found
May 12th, 2026
I Just Don’t Know What to Do With Myself
Dear Readers,
Church softball has started! As I mentioned in the last news letter, we had our first practice as a team and now we have played two games! The team is a great community and I really enjoy getting to be outside for some friendly competition. Perhaps more importantly, the sun is out regularly and I have been spending more time outside.
Work has been picking up as I have had several meetings to discuss proposals for a couple different companies. I also attended the Maine Association of Manufacturers’ summit this past Friday. It was a really great opportunity to network with business owners and meet several colleagues who I had previously only met on Zoom.
Chapter 24 is under way, and, now that I have started it, I believe that it will end up being the second to last chapter. The writing processes for these final chapters has been a little bit more laborious than others. There are some very important character interactions that I really want to make sure I get right.
This Week’s Chapter
Chapter 19 was one of the most interesting chapters for me to write as it is primarily narrated by one of the characters in the story. Rather than having a third person perspective, we as readers are told the story of what happened by Tilsitar. I waffled back and forth as to whether to use this approach when writing Chapter 19 but ultimately chose to write this chapter and Chapter 20 predominately from this perspective.
We move solidly into the rising action of our story in this chapter. From here, the narrative builds to what will ultimately be the climax of our tale. Tilsitar is our perspective character and we get to learn much about her internal state. She is in chaos. She leaves the new heavens and is immediately directionless. So she returns to what she knows best: forge craft. Little does she know that this serves as an invitation to what will eventually be her downfall.
Please feel free to share these newsletters with other people you think may be interested, and leave comments on the chapters!
“Once Coraadrin and Colthan had completed the settling of those who left Irrkengrond with the Olta, they continued their wandering, traveling all through the lands north of the Toltinth Mountains as far north as Lor Ogr. They spent many years in Lor Ogr, for the dreaming fever of Acretia was still a great torment among the Astrugar. Though the disease was not as dire as when it first came to Irrkengrond, the Astrugar who returned from aiding Irrkengrond, those who did not settle with the body of their prince to watch Kilkretha, returned with the fever. Thus Lor Ogr had been greatly diminished in its peoples. In time, Coraadrin and Colthan taught the people of Lor Ogr how to treat the disease so that its course did not run to death…”
Something Extra!
If you love the intersection of sci-fi and fantasy, then I have the perfect novella for you! Elder Race by Adrian Tchaikovsky focuses on two characters. In the far future, when humanity has colonized the stars, anthropologists have been sent out to see how humans have changed and developed across the great distances of space. This is our first character, the scientist. Our second character is a princess, royalty on one of these colonized worlds. She longs to be a great warrior like her mother and grandmother. When a strange disease begins to wreak havoc on her world, the princess seeks out the wizard who helped her grandmother, who just so happens to be the anthropologist.
