Author’s Note
Some books are easy to write. Deadworld Isekai was, despite being the first long-form fiction I had ever done. It was fun, new, and wrote itself. How to Survive at the End of the World was almost as easy, and I really liked the story so it drove itself very quickly to where I wanted it to be.
Demon World Boba Shop was a challenge, since it had to be interesting at all times despite not having any real danger. It was very character-driven and had very few swords, axes, and bows, which meant I had to think really hard about every scene and every plot point to make sure it didn’t get bogged down or boring for the readers. The flip side of that was how very rewarding it was to write, and how much appreciation I got from the readers after every chapter.
This book? It’s hard. Real hard.
That had to happen eventually. For one, I’ve written something like 15 novels worth of words in the past year or so. That’s a lot! I was bound to eventually get tired, to pick a lot of my own personal low-hanging fruit, and to have to work harder to make things work. For me, that was never an if it happens but was always a when it happens proposition instead. And it happened here.
Now, understand: I don’t think that means that this book is bad. I like it, at least, and I think it’s at least close to my usual par for novel quality. But the amount of work it takes to keep it at that level has been much higher than any other series I’ve worked on, bar none.
Stephen King wrote one of the best books on writing I’ve ever read, and a much bigger proportion of it than you’d expect is just him telling you how to sit down at a desk and start writing. He says to have a room with a door that closes where you can retreat, be undistracted, and have absolutely nothing to do but write. He recommends a minimum word count per day and gives some tips on maintaining the writing habit.
I think he has to do this because writing, like all things, eventually becomes work. It’s fulfilling work, if you are the type of person who gets a lot out of it. It’s important work, I think, so long as you think making other people happy and enriching their lives a bit is important (I do).
But it’s work.
At the end of every novel I write, I put down my thoughts on the novel and my current writing process so other people can read them and get a little more behind-the-scenes on my thought process. For a lot of the novels, those notes are pretty repetitive, mostly because the same guy is writing all of them and there’s only so much I change on a month-to-month basis.