The protagonist of this tale has an awful story. He's is dragged through hell his entire life. At five-years-old, he witnessed his mother's suicide. At eight, he was banished by his father to the front lines to fight an enemy no one knows anything about. There, he faces not only the terrible psychological effects of life on the front of a war, but isolation from his peers, who want nothing to do with the quiet soldier, and he's garnered the special attention of the enemy across the field to boot.
It's hard, and it's depressing, and I have to occupy head spaces that I'd much rather not. Writing this book physically hurts my heart, and it buries my mind. The enemy in this novel is also my enemy.
Sitting in this space with these characters is not a fun time. It pulls at uncomfortable places, blossoming old pains that sprout like weeds through the holes in my coping mechanisms. I know that in the writing of this, I will have an uptick in the number of depressive spirals I will experience. There will be periods when my temper is especially short, when I'm exhausted for no good reason, and when I randomly start to cry; all because of what is going through my head as I live with this story until it's written.
Honestly, this story is so dark and depressing that I'm not sure any publisher will want it. That also weighs on me, to be honest, because I feel like I'm going through all of this for naught.
Still, this book demands to be written. Cai is demanding, as all of my characters seem to, that his tale sees the light of day, somehow. It doesn't matter if no publisher will touch this with a ten foot barge pole. It's enough for the ghosts in my head that it gets onto a page. They will hound me incessantly until it does.
So, I'm writing the damned thing.
And it is affecting me. That, I suppose, is the price to pay when writing a dark fantasy about a boy grappling with an evil that wants nothing more than to consume him.
So I'm going to beg you all for a little more gentleness for the next... however long it takes to get this story finished. I'm nearing the end of Soldier, but there are four or five more books to write before this story is complete. Chances are, I'm going to be in this funk for a while.
Sorry to everyone who knows me. I'm not going to be the best company for a while.
And on that note, I have language lessons to be getting on with before I head back down into the pits.
Ciao!