[LIKE] - [COMMENT] - [SHARE] NOTE: these links point to Substack!

Greetings from the Xen’in Universe!

I have a lot of news to report this month, but let us begin with the traditional word count recap.

While September was a high (76,390 words) October was a low (25,640). The main reason for this was that I spent two weeks prepping Book 2 of the Dragon Dice trilogy I’m writing for TreeShaker Books.

I ran into many issues while writing Book 1 that made the process both painful and unnecessarily long, so I knew I needed to find a way to counteract that. My main problem was related to distances on the world map and traveling time. So for Book 2, I decided to create a timeline of events, mapping out every scene so that I’d know exactly where and when each took place. This made me realize the story would have to be told over the course of 7-8 months, meaning I’d have to take into account the change of seasons (a little detail that’s way too easy to overlook).

The good news is that I completed this timeline on October 28 and I’ve since written 22,730 words! So Book 2 is well on its way and I suspect November will be another high.

In other news…

I have a new book out! This was sort of an impulse decision and I scrambled to get it all ready yesterday. It helped that it’s a novella and that it was already edited. I’ve mentioned this one before, last year, when it was published in TreeShaker’s space opera anthology “Laser Cannons and First Contact.”

The title of the story (and book) is The Battle of Braxia and I absolutely love it! It’s a mix of space opera action and philosophical themes. The main character is a young woman from a patriarchal society who finds herself tossed in the middle of a war between the Imperials and the rebels who fight them.

Here’s the cover:

Incidentally, this is a prequel to my serial Through the Stars, Darkly, though it can be read as a standalone.

I’m also thinking of releasing another collection of short stories before the end of the year—fantasy ones, this time.

The other big news is that I’ll soon start reading and reviewing short stories. This is following a thread on a private forum where a fellow writer had this brilliant idea and I thought I’d do it as well—though a bit differently.

But first, here’s the reasoning: authors write to be read; but very often, when we publish a story, it feels like throwing it into the void. It can be very frustrating. Admittedly, Substack helps mitigate this (and it’s one of the reasons why I’m reluctant to leave the platform) since readers can leave comments and let the writer know they liked the piece by clicking that cute little heart under the post (hint, hint).

But too many authors don’t have anything like this. I mean, even publishing in a professional magazine (or anthology) can be frustrating. You know the editor liked your work, but then everything goes quiet once it’s published. Did the readers like your story or was it just a fluke?

So anyway, the idea is to extend some much-needed love to fellow writers. Not indiscriminately, mind you, it’s more about being selective. Humans often have a tendency to only speak up when they don’t like something (you know what I’m talking about!) so here it’s about doing the opposite. If I don’t like a story, I’ll just move on. If I like it, though, I’ll say it. Mind you, it won’t be anything overlong, probably just a paragraph or two.

The way I plan to do this is start by posting a condensed version to social media then, at the end of the month, compile the full versions into one message and post that on Substack and Kit. I’m not sure yet however when I’ll start doing this—could be this month or in December, we shall see. In any case, you’ll know when that first compilation drops in your mailbox :D

And speaking of social media, I recently started a bluesky account and reactivated the one I have on Mastodon. I plan to post those mini-reviews on there as well as Substack Notes and Facebook. If you want to see those early (or just, you know, follow me for laughs) you can do so here:

​https://bsky.app/profile/asgwriter.bsky.social​
​https://writing.exchange/@asg​
​https://substack.com/@xenin​
​https://www.facebook.com/asgauthor/​

I’ve also created an itch.io account. I’ve heard so much talk about that website—including from authors who managed to sell short stories or novels on there—that I thought I should give it a shot.

And finally, the last bit of news I wanted to share, is that I’m throwing my books at two contests!

My novel “Everlife” is already submitted to SPSFC (the Self-Published Science-Fiction Competition) and the Indie Ink Awards.

What’s cool is that both of these are specifically designed for indie (ie self-published) authors. The first uses other authors and genre reviewers as judges, while the second is, uhm, more of a popularity contest, I guess you could say, so I probably won’t go far with that one :D

Note that the Indie Ink Awards are organized by the Indie Story Geek community. Authors can add their books to that community’s database but cannot nominate them for the award—that needs to be done by readers like, well, yourself ;) So if you already have an account there (or would be willing to create one to help a fellow out) I’d appreciate if you’d nominate my books or add your voice to the mix (the more the better—remember, it’s a popularity contest!)

To nominate my novel, just click on the banner below!

Sorry for the length, but I warned you I had a lot to share this month!

See you in December.

Coming up this month

Sadly, we’re back to where we were last year… that is to say, I have no idea what I’ll be posting this month! Ha!

Maybe a Reikk. We’ll see what comes up.

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Copyright (c) 2025 by Alex S. Garcia.

[LIKE] - [COMMENT] - [SHARE] NOTE: these links point to Substack!