As most or all of you know, the road to getting the second installment of the Darkside Trilogy published and on sale is over, and frankly I'm relieved.

I had finished the manuscript last July or August and getting it edited and dealing with the fulfillment house, Xlibris, took far longer than it did for me to write it. Discovery took 9 months, Conception took a little over 5 months and ended up about 100 pages longer than Discovery.

With Conception, I had one reader who looked at each chapter as I finished it. Two other readers were able to read the manuscript in toto. The problem in moving along faster was that one of the editors, who did the work as a labor of love, wasn't able to finish going through the entire manuscript until earlier this year.

On this site I have read about people who have experienced problems with the particular print-on-demand contractor that I chose for Discovery and Conception, however I have had nothing but positive experiences with them. My only complaint is that the folks in the Philippines who do the work and deal with the authors are just too damned polite, and I'm more of a bottom line person!

The positives though are a responsive consulting staff and a willingness to make authors happy. I was also surprised that Conception appeared on Amazon.com's Web site weeks before scheduled; that's definitely a plus for me.

So now I'm posting this, taking a break from the writing of the final installment of the trilogy, Confrontation; I just started chapter 10. My plan is to have it ready for sale by late summer or early fall...that is if all goes well.

Each time it gets easier and easier, mostly because I understand the process better and better.

Before I conclude, I would like to thank those of you who read Discovery, your support is what drives me to continue, not the vast riches that have... well, maybe some time.

For those of you who enjoyed Discovery, I have been assured by those who read and edited Conception that it turned out to be an even better read than Discovery. I would love to hear from you, one way or the other...

WmH