Book Update & Thoughts - 2026

So, it's been a busy time, and over a year without any update on Blood Vortex. There is a reason for this. The bad news is that there is still no proper release date. The book's newest draft has been finished for months on end, but after a lot of rewrites, I sent my manuscript to agents. Unfortunately, I received no offers. This is normal. Many writers can send their work out to hundreds of agents and not get a single acceptance email. At a point, I stopped trying and started working on something new. This does NOT mean that Blood Vortex or Husk as a book series is dead. The good news is that Blood Vortex is alive and well, just on hold until I can put time into sending it to agents. I will send my work out for as many days, weeks, months, or years as it takes until I get my novel published. Then after that, I will publish another. I could go down the route of Amazon publishing again, which is never a bad thing, but I believe the process is a lot more arduous and time-consuming. At the end of the day, all I want to do is write and read. The roadblocks consisting of editing, advertising, and pitching are all unbearably dull. I cannot stand the aspects of writing that do not include writing, or include writing in a way that has no creative input. I do not enjoy writing about why my book is the best thing ever. I understand the need to do it, which is why I will continue to approach agents with enthusiasm. I just find it tedious. The reason that Blood Vortex is on hold is a good one. I will save it for the end of this post.

As for my short stories, I enjoy writing them immensely; I just find it difficult to put time into them when I could be spending it on my larger projects. However, I will continue to write them, as they are a great way to "stretch my legs," so to speak. I can drift from an intense project onto something quicker, without having to think about updating my glossary and character list with information.

Something else that has been slowly creeping into all aspects of daily life is AI. The acronym has almost become a slur at this point, and rightfully so. When looking at anything nowadays, all I see is AI-created content. The rise of AI-created books has become an epidemic. This is, without exaggeration, a literary apocalypse. The fact that anyone can pretend to write a book, pretend to create a cover, and pretend to care about art is terrifying. A quote that best sums it up is, "I want AI to do my laundry and dishes so that I can do art and writing, not for AI to do my art and writing so that I can do my laundry and dishes."

The fact that people are so willing to turn a blind eye to it is disheartening. But the pure and simple truth is that it is unavoidable. If you have a career in any creative sector, you are purposefully at a disadvantage if you do not use AI. Almost like when medieval soldiers created crossbows, making them wildly accessible to people unskilled at archery. The last bastion of archers then held out, continuing to use the bow and arrow. But then semi-automatic rifles were invented and threw everything out the window.

My writing has never had, and never will have, any room for artificial intelligence. It is counterproductive to art and expression, and I will never use it to create any text.

It's not all doom and gloom. Blood Vortex is on hold because I have been working on a new book, one not in the Husk series. Hopefully I don't adopt George R.R. Martin's work ethic with this.

My newest novel is called How I Saved the Universe. It is another science fiction book, but nothing at all like my unreleased one. This is going to be a darkly comic story about an unlikely hero who saved the universe and became a loser. The catch is, it's a biography, written from the main character's perspective. I am very excited to see it released, but once it is finished, I can then begin to pitch both of my novels simultaneously. Hopefully I can generate some interest in either, making this future publishing process a lot easier with an agent on my side.

As for the timescale for this book, I am currently 40,000 words deep, so there's quite a bit more to go. I'm thinking around 60,000 to 80,000 words total, but who knows; this could all change.

I had been working on it since the start of this year, but with a lot of setbacks and becoming a homeowner, I had to take numerous breaks that slowed me down. I won't be slowing down now.

I'm optimistic about the rest of 2026, and I hope to make huge progress as an author.

It doesn't matter how much progress you make, as long as you do it every day.