As of last night, the second draft of Aetheria’s Daemon is complete. Smug self-satisfaction levels are at an all-time high, though no other super powers have yet developed.

In all seriousness, I feel I’ve come out of a bit of a battle.  This book did some serious ballooning in length from my original plan of 100k words, and ended up a bit over 152k. That might not be a lot for some people, but it was for me, and the sheer amount of work to get it into its proto-complete state was grueling and may have even left me with some lingering health issues.

But still, I finished the revision. The ending was even better than I remember when I first wrote it (of course, adding some foreshadowing and callbacks during the second draft may have helped with that). The book is ambitious, a sprawling but intimate adventure fantasy with elements of science fiction and steampunk, in a world unlike any you’ve seen before. I’m proud of what I’ve accomplished, though that could change depending on whether the early readers say I’m a deluded fool or not :-).

So, I’m handing off Aetheria’s Daemon to said beta readers for now, and turning my attention to other things until they’re done with it. I have a short story which needs polishing, and I need to help edit my father’s next book (you didn’t know my dad writes books too? And my mom also! What a family). I have some reading to do, including research which might influence which project I undertake next. And most of all I need to take it easy and recover from the  pace of editing so many words in a relatively short time. And eat some celebratory cookies. Many, many cookies.