The Edge of Obedience.
One of the few long (100k+ words) stories that I have seen from start to finish. I had so much fun writing this and was excited every day to continue working on it. I’m just posting some extra stuff in case anyone is curious about how it came about.
When the story was originally written, there was a massive time jump between where chapter 6 ends and chapter 16 where the poolside meeting begins. The plan was to gloss over everything and have Lila just be used to the mansion, the new life, and all the changes. The maids Amara, Hana, and Clara, Marcus the personal trainer, and James the chauffeur didn’t exist. The original chapter 16 was a meeting between Andrew Barrington and some guy named Johnathan, and the meeting ended well.
Obviously, I ended up not liking the time jump, missing out on everything that could and did happen to Lila was too much to just gloss over. The chapter was shelved and I began writing about Lila’s first weekend and it continued to flow from there.
What that shelved chapter did was give me a goal. I knew that at some point I wanted that poolside meeting to happen, and I knew that it would be near the end of the story. It resulted in quite the rewrite of that chapter, incorporating Robert and switching the meeting to ending unsuccessfully.
It worked out to be a much better end to the story than I had expected. As a result of that, I am very proud of this story as a whole. I’m also very appreciative of all those who read my story and messaged me with editing tips and corrections. It costs nothing but time to be friendly, and I thank you for taking the time to reach out.
What’s next?
I have been writing a follow-up book for The Edge of Obedience, but the process hasn’t flowed as nicely as the original. I finished the 5th chapter. Then I realized I hated the entire 1st chapter, which resulted in deleting it entirely and rewriting it from scratch. Now I’m at the point where I don’t like where the 4th chapter left off, which means the entire 5th chapter would need to be rewritten or deleted as well because the results of the 4th bleed heavily into the 5th.
This has me in a slump. Typically I try to write a little every day or go over the content I’ve written, but I haven’t been opening the document lately. I know myself. If I stay away from the story for too long I’ll drop it completely and move onto something else.
I like what I have for chapters 1-3 and half of 4, but I also don’t want to release just a part of this story. Too many times I’ve let a long story die, and that isn’t fair to the people who take the time to read them.
So will there be a follow-up? I hope so, but I don’t know.
Thank you for reading and your support! :)