In my last Corrosive Knights update of 7/10/14, I stated the following:

Having finished draft 11c (of the fifth book in the Corrosive Knights series) just a few minutes ago, I am very, very optimistic about the novel now being just about done.  So much so that I intend to print the whole thing out later today and give it one more complete read through.  If all looks good, draft 12 will be the novel’s last draft.

Estimated time to get it done?  Another week to a week and a half.

Keep your fingers crossed.  You know I will!

Ok, first the bad news: Draft #12 is not the final draft, though as I predicted it took me a little less than a week and a half to finish it up (a blazing speed, considering that when the novel was in its early and very rough stages it would take me a couple of months to do a draft).

The good news?  Draft #13 (lucky number!) will be the final draft.  No ifs, ands, or buts about it.  When I went over Draft 12, I found exactly three things that needed to be fixed post-draft, and they all involved roughly one-two pages each of fixing.  The first involved explaining a certain technology.  The second involved cutting down on one of the characters explaining something that had previously been shown (repetition is my mortal enemy!).  The third involved changing some dialogue as it “fit” another character saying it much better than the one I had saying the lines.

So Saturday the 19th I finished the draft and went back and fixed those three items.  Out of an abundance of caution, I made the decision that I should print the whole thing out and give it one more read-through, just to be absolutely sure everything was good.

Last night, Sunday, while sleeping, the realization of how close I was to finishing this book finally hit me.  I woke up some time between 2-4 in the morning (I didn’t check my clock) and felt…giddy.

Happy.

Ecstatic!

Trust me, it was very hard to get back to sleep and I’m feeling a bit of a lag as I type this out.  Still, those good feelings remain.  For me writing is an at times very difficult process which requires a great deal of effort to get the work completed in a way that satisfies/pleases me.  This book, the fifth in the Corrosive Knights series, has probably taken the most effort out of me of all my previous books.  And it rightfully should have.  This book is, after all, the culmination of the first Corrosive Knights story and ties everything, and I do mean everything, together.

If you were wondering how Mechanic, The Last Flight of the Argus, and Chameleon, three novels that can be read as “stand alone” actually fit together, after reading this new book, you will wonder no more (I already had two of the books come together with Nox, the fourth book of the Corrosive Knights series).

So, if all goes well, I will be finish this new novel by later next week.  Then I’ll prepare it for release and it could well be available for everyone else to read by this time two weeks from now.

Meanwhile, here’s the cover of the book.  I’ve blurred the book’s actual title because I still want to keep it my little secret.  Nonetheless, if you look hard enough, you may just “get” it: