Thoughts #13: Taking a Break

1/24/25

Hey y'all,

So this title may seem a bit misleading, but it's also true.

Recent blog posts have talked about my obsession with writing, working myself even when I just wanted some time off. It was all for the sake of productivity.

Thankfully, over the course of 2024, I set myself a pattern of being productive in my normal life. Aka, I started regularly doing my dishes and laundry, rather than letting them accumulate until the last minute. Things never got gross, just left unused for as long as possible.

But even still, I was struggling with finding a break from my writing. I'm pleased to say I'm taking the rest of January off to focus on resetting myself. I might write on my own from time to time, but right now it's mostly personal projects or stories that may never see the light of day. It's just fun stuff with no stress. Almost like fanfictions...

Now, I wasn't sure if this blog should be an Update post of a Thoughts post. I guess I'm going with thoughts, given the subject matter, and less actual updates on the books.

Here's a small update though, Origins II is halfway through "re-writes". That means I'm essentially writing the whole of Origins II from scratch. I did a similar thing with Origins but everything was heavily centered around what was originally online. For Origins II I'm making some faily large changes in storyflow and characters. We'll still see Lila and Liam taking a forefront lead, maybe even more so than in Origins. But some characters added in Origins re-writes had to be added to my original writing of Origins II. This altered the plot too, so I opted to just write everything again, using my original writings as a guide rather than structure.

With that in mind, my perspective towards Foundations II, coming after Origins II, has also changed. I will probably write that one from scratch, using a similar strategy as Origins II. But I'll probably add and flesh out characters, most importantly the main villain Loelle. There will be some similarities between Foundations II and what was originally online. But I don't think a lot of people read that, so I'm safe.

But all of that will be on the backburner for a few days.

As I said, I'm taking a short break. I'm in a fine spot to do it, I think. My schedule might get a bit tight, but I have faith everything will work out. It helped my planned release date for Origins II is pretty late in April. So stay tuned for a release date there.

I've been taking it slow for the last few days, just writing for fun and completely ignoring Origins II, or any other Ngash series. I'll plan to continue that through January, picking things back up in February. But if inspiration hits me, I'll write, just for fun.

Hope everyone's having a great 2025 so far, I know mines already been interesting. Have a great rest of January, I should see everyone again in February!

As per last blog, here's some concept art. This time it's the main street of the Shanty. (Once again, an old image I used, but should be helpful to picture the setting of Origins.)

The Shanty's Main Road (aka. Pilfer's Alley)