Benjamin Medrano's Blog, page 42

November 25th 2018 Update

I survived Thanksgiving, and The Obsidian Palace is up to 92,500-ish words. I’m not sure exactly how much is left of the story, but I can confidently say that it’ll be over 100,000 words. That means it’s going to be ready well in advance of my deadline, which is a relief.

This past week the audiobook of The Avatar’s Flames came out, and links to three of the major sites it’s on can be found on It’s Page. Thus far the ratings have been pretty decent, so it seems that people are liking Ruth as...

Patreon Launched!

I’ve launched a Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/BMedrano! Some of you may remember that a while back I was considering doing a Patreon, but I really didn’t know what I could give, and also that I was quite uncertain about it. Recently that’s changed, and so have my circumstances.

An author’s income is unpredictable, and it makes it an insecure career on the whole. I freely admit the ability to relax a little about income is part of why I’m doing a Patreon, but only part of the reason. Anot...

November 18th 2018 Update

First off, for all of you who read and left reviews on Queen of Ice, thank you very much! Reviews help me immensely, so every one of them helps. I hope those of you who’re working on the book enjoy it, much as I hope anyone who reads my books enjoy them.

As for The Obsidian Palace, it’s up to just over 75,000 words. I’ll be honest, it’s been tough hitting my goal this month, but I’m hopeful that I can keep it up. That said, if I manage to hit my goal even just today and tomorrow, that’s as mu...

November 11th 2018 Update

Queen of Ice is released tomorrow, at least from my perspective. I know that there are plenty of time travelers who live in the future, so I can’t be sure when it’s finally been released. I’m excited to see it go out, as I’ve been quite deliberately suppressing my urges to talk about it for a while.

The Obsidian Palace is at about 57,500 words, which means I’m about a day ahead of my writing goal for the month so far. That’s good, because I fully expect I’m going to lose a day of productivity...

TAF Audio, TOP Pre-Order, & Art

So, things have been happening, and stuff has been coming in! I’ve uploaded the final version of Queen of Ice for Monday’s release, and I’ve also been getting the paperback ready for publication. As an aside, which I’ll reiterate on Monday, Amazon has changed their print-on-demand software, so the spine font is likely going to be different on my books now. I also intend to change the book size slightly for future series, but am keeping them the same for the moment. Anyway, on to the news!

Fir...

November 4th 2018 Update

Queen of Ice releases a week from tomorrow, which I’m excited for, and The Obsidian Palace is coming along well. How well? Currently it’s at over 38,000 words, and I’m doing more writing today. Partially this is because I’ve decided to sort of participate in Nanowrimo this year (National Novel Writing Month, or something close to that, for those of you who don’t know). Normally the goal is to write a 50,000 word novel from scratch during the month, but the main idea is just to help writers le...

Happy Halloween & Lilith’s Shadow

Happy Halloween to all of you who celebrate such! I hope your day goes well and that you have an enjoyable holiday!

In addition to that, I have a somewhat belated announcement to make. I intended to have this up several days ago, but I put up a short story set after the end of Down with the Queen, which involves Blooming Orchid and a few other details. The Lilith’s Shadow Interlude 1 isn’t full of action, and most of the details aren’t incredibly exciting, but I feel that it’s something that...

October 28th 2018 Update

So! The Obsidian Palace is up to about 21,000 words, and if all goes well, I should have the edited version of Queen of Ice back about this time next week. I’m not certain about a release date on The Obsidian Palace yet, but I’ll likely set it up next week while getting Queen of Ice‘s formatting done. Thing is, self-publishers like myself can only do pre-orders 90 days out via Amazon, which makes it a bit more difficult to time them right.

I’ve also received word from Tantor Media that the au...

October 21st 2018 Update

I started writing The Obsidian Palace this past week, and it’s got ~6,000 words. Not a ton, but I was trying to start slow and build up to things. I’m looking forward to getting moving on it, and am also nervous about things that’re going to happen in it. One thing I’m also concerned about is that some of the characters may not have seemed like they were in significant peril at points, and that’s something I’ll have to fix.

Anyway! Queen of Ice is scheduled for November 12th, and I’m tentativ...

October 14th 2018 Update

So, the second pass on Queen of Ice is complete! I’ve sent it off to the editor, but they won’t be able to get to it for some time. I expect to get it back easily in time for the November 12th release date.

With that in mind, either this week or the next I’ll be starting on The Obsidian Palace. I’d take a break, but I know myself, I’ll likely be chomping at the bit to get started this coming week. I’m looking forward to seeing how things work out! I also started setting up ARCs for Queen of I...