Wayrift Fantasy RPG Manga Webcomic

Can you believe it’s almost the end of January? Yeah, me neither.

Here’s a lot of great fan work that we’ve received throughout the month, including one new artist and fan poetry!

Brand new Oekaki board! 

Keep in mind, if you’re not crazy about drawing on the screen, there is also an upload feature you can use to display art instead.  You will need to sign up for an account, but there’s a lot of user profile settings, too.

New Overworld Map of the Blue Planet

We’ve needed one on the Wayrift site for a long time! Thanks to Thari for the artwork and Illinia for the colors. I’ve added the name of cities and important locations. You can find it in the “About” menu or at the link below:

Map of the Blue Planet

Fan Poetry

Rift by Yllamse – Touching poem about Kip and Ben.

Fan Art

Welcome to new artist, Lighthouse Beacon!

TsuYaTai by Lighthouse Beacon

Brand new art from our resident Kudako/Sarafina shipper, Maracate!

Kudako & Sarafina by Maracate

Kudako & Sarafina by Maracate

Last but not least, lots of wonderful art by Yllamse!

Zemi, Tiarc'rie, Jayce & Aeraganon by Yllamse

LuReSe by Yllamse

Rift - Kip & Ben by Yllamse

Footsteps of Life - Tai by Yllamse

Figured I’d post this here because this is where most folks will read it. Be ready for a loooong post. 

As some of you may know, almost two years ago I decided to take a big leap of faith in my life that changed everything. Back in March of 2010, I resigned from my position at my day job and became a full-time freelance technical web writer. If you had told me prior to that time that I could possibly make enough money to live off of from my writing, I would have laughed and asked that you pour me a cup of whatever you were drinking.

But it happened, and here I am, going on almost two years of freelancing. While I can’t complain about my job at all, I can say there have been worries, difficulties and big learning experiences. Overall, I feel that I’m coming away from this understanding how to maintain myself as an independent writer in a world that’s not always so creator-friendly.

All this leads into my thoughts and this announcement. As much as I enjoy my time freelancing, my heart and soul is always that of a fiction writer. This is something I sadly haven’t been able to do while freelancing, and struggling through the past NaNoWriMo brought it home to me.

However, times are getting tougher for web freelancers. Work (in my area, at least) is slowly drying up, and I foresee myself needing to find another path fairly soon. That means taking another leap of faith into something unknown, but possibly something that will lead me closer to becoming who and what I really want to be in this lifetime.

Getting To the Point

With all that said, I would like to announce my plans on actively pursuing an avenue of online self-publication with the goal of becoming a self-sustained fantasy fiction writer. What does this mean? I want to take my stories and figments, tweak them where necessary to make them my own, and transform Sygnus.org into a hub for my published writing and projects.

I can hear some folks asking: “But haven’t you already done that with Dreigiau?”

Yes and no. I’ve experimented with Dreigiau and I’ve learned the basics of self-publication. I’ve been studying my options, learning from other successful writers and determining what I need to do to make this happen.

This is not something that is going to happen overnight. It’s going to take a lot of planning, experimentation, marketing and hard work. I believe it’s possible – I’ve seen others who can prove it’s possible. I also believe that with some editing, my figments and stories are worthy of making this attempt.

What Will This Mean?

First and foremost, I will be transforming the Sygnus.org domain into the central site for this project. I’ve wanted to do something more with the domain than the simple splash page that it’s been for so long. I’ve kicked around the idea of making it a writer’s blog… and then, with this new idea firmly in mind, that’s pretty much sealed the deal. I’d love for this site to become a journal of my experiences, a platform to announce upcoming releases and a place where hopeful writers and Sygnus Friends can continue to meet, chat and interact (as always). I’m considering archiving the articles from the Finding Figments blog, and possibly reactivating the Figment Q&A section, but I haven’t made a decision on that yet.

Don’t worry, though. Links to existing projects on the network will be maintained on Sygnus.org.

I’m putting Shimmer and Runne on hold to focus on getting the project off the ground. Wayrift will continue, business as usual. If I feel things are working out well as I work through Dreigiau, it’s very possible that Runne will follow in Dreigiau’s footsteps (with some tweaks, of course). If things REALLY start to work out for this project, it’s even possible that Shimmer may be reworked into original fiction – but all of that is waaaaaay distant (if ever), and will take a lot of planning.

Dreigiau Changes

Here comes the part that may bring some winces – I apologize beforehand, and hope you will allow me to explain and see it to the end.

Dreigiau still needs a lot of work before I’m happy enough to publish it professionally. The more that Syn and I discussed our Secret Project, the more I realized how much is actually missing from the core story of Dreigiau. Part of that is just the fact that the original book was written almost a decade ago (doesn’t that make some of you feel old?). As with anything, when you look back at something written 10 years ago, you’re going to see the faults and the things you want to change. Such as it is with Dreigiau.

But I also see the strengths of the story, the concepts, the figments and the world. I feel that I can work with it and expand on it to make it into something I’m really proud of. Much of that comes with thanks to everyone who has read and commented and helped to edit. I’ll get into some of the major changes I’m thinking about in a different post.

Here’s the catch for all of this. If I hope to rework and self-publish Dreigiau as a successful e-book (possibly even a printed version), this means I am going to need to pull the existing writing off the website. If the goal is to eventually sustain myself on ebook sales, I can’t leave the story posted up, even in an unfinished rough draft form.

This bugs me a lot. I’ve never created my worlds exclusively for money – Sygnus folks hopefully know that by now. In fact, it costs me money to keep the sites running, pay for the domains, gift prizes for contests, etc. – and we have never asked for monetary support during these ventures. My stories are works of love and will always continue to be. I’m just hoping to find a way to turn my love into a way to pay my bills! *laughs*

However, I don’t think it’s fair to long-time friends and readers. So I’m going to see what I can do to ensure that those who have stuck it out with me this long have access to a digital copy at no expense (unless, of course, you don’t mind plunking down the $2.99, or whatever it is).

So, heads up! I don’t know exactly when it’ll happen, but I’m going to be pulling down the writing on the Dreigiau site (it won’t be deleted, just deactivated – I still have a lot of comments and editing to look through). This means that if things don’t work out with this project, I can reactivate the chapters and life will go on from there. I will also be discontinuing the printing of existing books – if you have a copy, consider it a limited prototype edition! There won’t be any more of that kind made!

So. This turned out a lot longer than I meant it to be. If anyone’s read through this, I congratulate you and would like to hear your thoughts on the matter.