Wander West, In Shadow

Hello!

First off, let me say one thing: I have come to really dislike using these chapters as announcements, so I have started up a mailing list that I plan on using as an announcement service in the future. If you're interested in getting news about this story, please consider signing up for that, or joining my patreon. Even at the free tiers of my patreon, I will be giving news and steering people towards where they can find new releases of this fiction, and I will occasionally share some relevant content through my mailing list, or use it to find people who might be interested in beta reading or going over early versions of the work. So if you like the idea of sneak peeks at extra content or potential early access, please join one of those (links at the top of the chapter).

But anyway, the biggest announcement! I am now posting the final edited version of Wander West, in Shadow, Book 1, on this website:

https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/186919/wander-west-in-shadow

There is a reason why I am posting it as a separate fiction. While the first 8 chapters of the new version are very similar to the first 8 chapters of this version (though I did polish the prose and add some new details), the edits become much heavier in the rest of the story. It still follows the overall same *shape*, but it is, in my opinion, much improved. In addition to making the prose smoother, I cut down on bloat (it went from 184k words in this version to 150k words in the latest edit, and tbh if I had the time I would actually try to cut it some more). I also removed some elements that I felt I couldn't do proper justice within the first book, to give the story more focus. (For example, Ren is gone. And if you miss him, or some of the other elements that were cut, don't worry: it doesn't mean that they're gone entirely, some ideas I decided to simply shift to future books). I also tried to slow down the romance between Martimeos and Elyse a bit, and make them more suspicious of each other at first (it is going to be a long series, after all).

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

Either way, there are enough changes and improvements (or at least I hope you will agree with me that they are improvements!) that I felt it was justified in posting this final edited version as a new story. But a word of warning! I almost didn't post this version at all, wanting to save it for the ebook release! Yes, there will be an ebook release, in December of this year! I haven't decided exactly WHEN in December yet, but if you follow this fiction, take heed: you will have limited time to read this final edited version on this website. Come December, I will be taking it down, along with all other versions of this story, so I can enlist them in KU! The whole story will be released by early October, and it is probably best to assume that it may be gone by December 1st.

In addition, I plan to have the final version of Book 2 out by the end of this year, as well. I don't know if I'll put that up on this website. I might make it an ebook only thing, or give sneak peeks on my patreon. I am sorry for the increased monetization, but unfortunately my current job situation is not very good. I need to consider how to make money doing this. (By the way, did you know I already have another book for sale on amazon, a sci-fi/fantasy comedy called Infinity America? People seem to like it!)

FINALLY, I do have another story currently being released on Royal Road, titled 'A Demon Archmage in New York':