I did really well this month, mostly due to Nuts About You (I keep writing Nuts to You–is that a Freudian slip?) and to A Knight in Shining Kevlar. That’s not to say that other stories didn’t get a little love–If/Then got a little longer and got a plot snarl sorted out; Je Veux…had some editing done and a few thousand more words added; Bite Me, Furface! gained about 1500 words. The biggest change, though, happened in a story that I hadn’t even planned on writing for a long time. But I happened to look it over about a week ago and it liked the attention. But then, what would you expect of a courtesan? They live by the amount of attention they can attract.

The Courtesy of Knives seems to be elbowing its way to the front of the pack, with backstory and new characters filling in blank spaces as fast as I can make notes. It’ll be interesting, getting back to my fantasy roots, but there’s a fair bit of research to do yet, not the least of which involves some indepth reading about the courtesans of 16th century Venice and the birth of the Geisha class in Japan. And I need to draw a flippin’ map. I hate drawing maps. Time to start looking at cloud formations again, so I at least have a starting point for the land masses. Dang it!

So, you’re probably wanting to slap me right about now, because I haven’t explained a thing about the story. Darn thing is—panzter! I don’t know all the story. I can tell you a bit about it, though. Iyani is a courtesan in a country where only men are allowed to ply that trade at the highest levels. Ganelon is a prince (the spare, not the heir) on a diplomatic foray to said country with the courtesans. Due to some political shenanigans that actually take place before the story, Iyani ends up seeking shelter with Ganelon and travelling back to his country with him. The story themes around trust and that sense of dislocation that you feel when you move to a new community, where you don’t understand the customs and, in poor Iyani’s case, don’t even speak the language. There’s some typical epic fantasy action, as well, and a suitably tragic something that happens near the end. And a happy something, and a going-to-be-happy something as well.

Ah, this is going to be fun.

For those who are curious, here’s the screenshot of my actual daily wordcounts. There’s a few days in there for editing and a few I ended up taking off because some days the hamster is more dead than alive up there.