State of the Scribe: November 2025

Serious health issues attacked me last month, tanking my wordcount into the nethersphere. Fortunately I write in advance, so nothing was prevented from going up. I’ll spare the gory details and just say I’m finding out Wednesday when my surgery will be. It’s been far too hard for me to concentrate on writing, right at the threshold to the most sacred time of the year: NANOWRIMO.

Crossing my fingers for a turnaround. to come. In the meantime, I should be able to keep things afloat. But I’m coasting on steam that will run out if my health doesn’t eventually improve. Fingers crossed. Yes, it turns out there is a combination of physical symptoms intense enough to stop me from getting writing done. The torment is real.

But on the bright side, I’ve got a super fun project to show you all! No cover yet, so it’s pretty informal at this stage. Everwood is what happens when I really didn’t want Bloomburrow to end. It’s wanting to see a modern take on what something like Redwall could look like. Small anthro creatures in a pseudo-fantasy world with its own Sandersonian type magic system. Originally I was going to make it focus on mice, but Redwall already did that, so squirrels and foxes won the day instead. Never did vibe with all the racial determinism and endless descriptions of how food looked (though I bet Jaques intended blind audience quite liked the last one, so I don’t fault him for it).

This will also be a much more heavily-edited story than my usual, because I fully intend for it to make it straight to publication, like the Forerunner’s Child books did. Different genre, hoping it was something a little more commercial. We’ll see. In any case, read it free on my patreon. My writing group looked at it, in addition to the usual editing team, so I’m hoping that raises it a cut above. Wish I could do that with every story, but that’s too time consuming… would be stuck to one story at a time if I did.

In any case, that’s the big news. Sorry if I miss getting things posted as I’m trying to survive these next two weeks or so. My prognosis is not serious, but it is agonizing for the morbidly curious, it’s an obstructing kidney stone. The sooner I can be past this grim period, the better.

Love to you all for your patience as I post less and less core pony and more just like… pony vibes. I feel very strongly about the values of the show, but no longer creatively invested in the characters the way I used to. I think that’s natural–how many stories can I write about the same people? My pony wordcount exceeds the length of the wheel of time or stormlight archive. I must expand or I will go mad.

What I will not do, however, is abandon stories before they are complete. After that happens… I’m not really sure what shape my future takes. It’s a strange and painful time to be alive.

Love,

Starscribe

· Quarantine, our vote-driven story about magical pony diseases and unfortunate transformations, is still rolling strong. If you’re not voting yet, now’s your chance to influence how Elliot’s story unfolds. https://www.fimfiction.net/story/568477/quarantine
· Another Day at Unity continues to explore aspects of the Spirits of Change world that were out of scope for the main narrative. Visit strange new locations, meet all kinds of weird Pokémon. available right here: https://www.patreon.com/posts/new-story-day-at-115556555

• Surya’s Sunrise: Sequel to Ravana’s Shadow. Can the immortal children of Mara unite with the survivors of a destroyed human colony? https://www.patreon.com/posts/132919487
• Legio IX Hispania, our historical journey into the question of what if the lost Roman legion ended up in Equestria, unravels here: https://www.patreon.com/posts/new-story-legio-78027950
• Accidental Sunshine: Changeling discovers ponies, but can she learn to master friendship before her deception is discovered? https://www.patreon.com/posts/new-story-105351764
• New Way Home is the story of when accidental human arrivals to Equestria are discovered by some very unfriendly creatures, and they’re forced to fight for survival: https://www.patreon.com/posts/new-story-rescue-94115163

Grab copies of my books: https://starscribe.net/
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