Tomorrow (Oct. 10) will mark six months since I started the second draft of Gray Haze, and I am almost exactly halfway done. Isn’t that crazy? My predictions have proven true. Give me another six months, and this thing will be done! *brushes hands together* *sobs*

I’m getting to a point in the story where there is A Lot going on at once, and I look forward to condensing it a little in later sections. It is difficult to write situations where most of the major characters are together, and that has been the case for several chapters now. Can’t wait to break them up again. 😈

I like the way my villains are turning out in this second round. As far as the protagonists are concerned, I realize that they might seem too nice for a good portion of the book, but after the trauma they’ve suffered so far, I think I’ll be able to justify how well they’re getting along. I plan to weave conflict between two particular (potentially romantic) characters in Parts 4 and 5. I need to stir more tension between them before the climax.

I think about character deaths frequently, such as how to build up to them, and whether or not I should kill them at all. I’m inching toward the climax of Part 3, where blood is literally going to rain from the sky. I have a few characters I could kill off in this scenario, but I might save them. Otherwise, the surviving characters may have too much emotion to deal with in the next part, and I’d like to get the action rolling. No more crying in bathtubs, guys.

A big concern of mine right now is whether or not the individual voices of the characters are coming through in their POV chapters. Will readers be able to distinguish between them all? I’ll address this issue thoroughly in the editing phase.

Gray Haze is currently 73 chapters/163,356 words long (48-49% complete). That is 23,202 more words (11 more chapters) since the last update. I have 7 chapters to write before Part 3 is complete. Here we go!