The Outsider: Blog

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Revisiting the Past

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My work schedule, and the work itself, has drained me of any creativity I possessed. Progress on the new Knox story is dead in the water.

While moaning about my lack of progress, an opportunity to revisit A Charmed Life rolled up on me unexpected. I've been wanting to do a heavy edit on my first story for some time. Re-reading what had been here for five years would give me chest pain when comparing it to A Glass, and Darkly. Thankfully, I have enough in the tank to edit an existing story.

I've submitted a revised version of the first part of ACL - the Introduction to Chapter 10 - for the mods to post when they are able. I don't think there is much of a change, if any, to the underlying story. Any changes made have been to sentence structure and grammar.

I hope to finish the ACL edit and be to be back to the third story soon. If work ever slows down, that would be helpful, too. I've got an idea for a fourth Knox story rolling around in my brain housing group, and need to finish number three first...

Work In Progress

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A keen-eyed reader noticed an offhand comment I made over on the SOL Forums about my latest project. That reader asked if my comment was true since they didn't see it here on this blog.

As I mentioned in my reply, yes, I am working on another story in the Knox series. Unfortunately, between home and work I cannot give you a definitive posting date; as with A Glass, and Darkly, I am going to finish writing before I post. Given how slow my writing is these days, it wouldn't be fair (IMHO) to do otherwise.

Once more unto the breach…

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Again. Yet again.

My hometown has had entirely too many Line of Duty Deaths since I started in EMS, that being more than zero. For a city the size of Worcester there has been entirely too much heartache.

December 3, 1999:
Lt Tom Spencer, FF Paul Brotherton, LT Timothy Jackson, FF Jeremiah Lucey, Lt Jay Lyons, FF Joseph McGuirk

December 8, 2011:
FF Jon Davies

December 5, 2016:
Paramedic John Lynch

December 9, 2018:
FF Christopher Roy

November 18, 2019:
Lt Jason Menard

June 4, 2021:
Officer Enmanuel "Manny" Familia

All of these men died while they tried to help their community. Manny died today while trying to rescue a drowning teen from a city pond; that teenager also perished.

It is often said that Worcester is a big small town. The city will once again prove that as it rallies around its police department.

Oops...

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I uploaded a corrected copy of Skyscrapers, and introduced a new error where half of the story is in italics. Annoying.

Another update is in the queue.

A Brief Detour...

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So there I was, working on my next story, when my Muse has the bright idea to have me change course for a bit. Fourteen thousand words in a month, which is not my usual pace; this one just came pouring out...

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