In many ways, forcing myself to note what I've written over the month helps with the occasional bouts of self-doubt. It also gives a chance to let others know what I've done since I rarely post duplicate announcements on my various network feeds. So, here here is how my February went.

... terrible.

Sadly, me and my kin ended up being sick most of the month. It started when my little one was diagnosed with Influenza B. That naturally spread across the family because children love to share their diseases. Then, we got to see Sonic the Hedgehog (very enjoyable) and I found out that one of the kids there had Influenza A and strep. So when I got sick, well… let's say it was fun.

Unfortunately, that also meant I didn't have as much writing time as I wanted and the words that were coming out didn't flow well.

I'm still maintaining my weekly chapter posting, though I'm only working with a buffer of about a day. February covered consecutive weeks 241 through 244 of my weekly chapter goal.

• Allegro 7-10: We are now getting into the inciting event of the book, with our first murder, an introduction with the “baddies” and further animosity between Linsan and Brook.

I stopped doing the world-building posts for a while. Mostly because of being sick and overwhelmed but I'm finding that I don't have the bandwidth to maintain them with any degree of reliablity.

On the short story side, I had three stories:

• One More Time for My Family was a challenge by the talented Victoria Corva. They have a nice necromancer-based series that looks fantastic. We got into a conversation about the undead in my world and I started to wonder how they would work in my world. The idea of an afterlife isn't defined so I came up with a rather dark, visceral story about love and revenge.
• Have a Heart is a very short story with Karin, my favorite monster hunter. It was for the #FediWorlds online game run by another writing friend, Lyn Thorne-Alder.
• Hard Work Into the Evening is the beginning of a romance between Tsubàyo and Fimúchi. If you have read Sand and Ash, you'll find out that they eventually get married and have children. The villain from my first novel ends up having a (hopefully) rich and happy life before his own bigger story hits. Sadly, Sand and Bone has some references to how it ends for this relationship.

I also planned on doing a writing money post. I don't think I'm going to do it, I simply don't have the spoons and it is a bit painful looking at the final accounting when I gathered up the numbers.

There was also no writing processes post. Maybe next month.

In March, my goals are:

• Continue Allegro and try to get a buffer going. Mainly because I really want to get to the fun bits that are rattling in my head.
• Three short stories.
• An updated post on writing processes.

As usual, let me know if you like any stories or want to see new topics or themes. I'm deeply thankful for my subscribers through Patreon and other places. Your help has been wonderful in encouraging me.

Thank you.