1/18/23 --- More Cowmelot and reviews rolling in...

 Well, today didn't start that great to be honest. I logged into work this morning to a frustrating message from manager. We had a meeting and talked through it, but I feel like we both left the meeting feeling "heard" but still disagreeing with one another. Basically it boiled down to this: the business wants me to stay late when workload demands it and I replied with "the workload demands it almost every single day, we're understaffed, and I'm doing my best". I don't know if anything will come of it, but having a candid conversation helped us both understand what's going on a little better I think. We're in that weird space right now where everyone is laying workers off and people aren't buying things, so that means we're not hiring new people either even though I'm drowning in work most days. At this point, it just is what it is. I can only do so much and once I reach that limit, that's it. There's no more effort to draw from the well.

But enough of that. Work is work and it's not as important as novels and stuff.

I'm getting closer to finishing the initial editing on The Quest for Cowmelot. I've only got about 10 chapters left before I start writing act III of the story. It's going well so far and I'm laughing out loud every single chapter, so at least I think it's funny, right? Seems like a good sign at the very least. My sincerest hope is to get this book out sooner than anticipated, but I'm not going to break myself to do it. However, since it's going well and smoothly thus far, I'm feeling better about the prospect.

And I'm SUPER happy to see the reviews/ratings rolling in for Alpha's Rejection! I'm keeping a decent star rating, which is awesome. AND I got a couple text reviews on GoodReads, which were very helpful. It seems, as always, some of my readers are fully satisfied and for some of them I didn't meet expectations. However, as with any book, I welcome the critique wholeheartedly, especially when people explain why it didn't work for them. A one star "I hate this" isn't helpful, but a one star with an explanation of why they didn't like it helps me adjust my audience targeting and my writing so that I can more fully satisfy my readers. Either way, I'm just grateful people are reading my work, that's the best part :)

Alright, I think that's it for me today!

-Blake