State of the Sector: 2025

My Sector Colleagues,

If you read my last post in 2024, you’ll know that my creative wins last year were quite rare, especially in the literary field. Overall, it’s a pretty mixed bag, although there are a few bright spots along the way. Let’s go ahead and discuss it all, the good, the bad, and the ugly.

Bad news

I thought I’d change it up and deliver the bad news first. So, let’s go ahead and solve this problem.

A Swing and a Flop: Early in 2024, an interesting opportunity arises. One of the Big Four publishers was interested in one of my fantasy manuscripts. It was sent upon submission and we waited…and waited. Months passed without news, but publishing was not a game for the impatient. Eventually, the editor stopped communicating with us. It’s frustrating, because it took years to get to this position only for editors to basically scare us away. However, there is actually a difference for a writer in making his project ‘dead on delivery’. That means you almost get there, because the next step is a book deal. Next time, if I can reach one step higher, I will be in a better position. As with publishing, it’s nothing until it becomes something. Back to square one.

Changing Situation: In addition to a lot of personal strife this year, I also changed jobs about midway through the year, and it was one of the most difficult professional transitions of my career and very different from anything I’ve ever done. Between that and some other potential work issues with my family, stress and lack of mental capacity took me out of my regular writing schedule. I couldn’t find my way back there until mid-November (more on that below). So, as a result, I have little to show on the fictional side. Nearly every goal I made last year fell short, and I’m not sure when I’ll be able to do it again. I made small progress on the sci-fi novel I mentioned in my last State of the Union address, but even that eventually hit a wall. If there’s any good news, it’s that this holiday has made my veins fire again when it comes to my fiction. We’ll see how it goes now that my vacation is over.

Sector M Shop Closed: I will close the Sector M store in February. I won’t delete it entirely if it’s needed again. Unfortunately, it requires a huge amount of maintenance and costs to keep running, and Sector M merchandise sales are basically next to nothing. So, I will be updating all the designs that are currently available, but I plan to close them on Saturday, February 1st. So, if there’s a design that appeals to you, now is a great time to take advantage of it. You can find the Sector M store here.

The Future of the M Games Sector is Uncertain: This year, we published two titles on DMs Guild, Artificer’s Guide to Magic Items And Solamnia Knights Revisited. Both have been well received by the community, and both were featured in the DMs Guild’s weekly newsletter. I do have a script for the third part for DMs Guild, but it looks like it will need to be saved for the future. With so much uncertainty in my family situation, my disposable income (which I use to finance my gaming projects) may not be available for some time to come. My philosophy with this supplement is to make it as good as possible, and I want to stick to that. So, I would rather delay a project until it can be approached to a high standard than try to rush it. If anything changes on this front, I’ll make a special update post here on the blog to let everyone know.

Wobbly Blog Deadlines: As a writer, I like to meet my deadlines consistently. My track record with 2024 blog posts is…troubled, especially as time goes by. I still shipped all twelve books as expected, but I found myself having to adjust the publication dates, sometimes by a few weeks in order to fully ship them. I will try to be more consistent in 2025, although many of the factors that caused the delay are still at play. For this next year, here are my target dates for a new blog each month. Of course, there may be some wiggle room, but here’s the schedule I’m currently following:

I’m well

OK, I knew that earlier Lots in the way of bad news. Believe me, if it’s hard for you to get through, it’s just as hard for me to write. It’s not every year that the wheels just come off of almost everything. Considering all the things that went wrong or didn’t materialize this year, it makes the bright spots shine even more.

Blog’s Best Months: Traffic on this blog has definitely increased in the last few years. I now get traffic a week that might have taken a month or two before. I think part of it is regular updates, in my case at least once a month. I’ve had this blog since May 2013, and as far as I know, October, November, and December of this year were the top three months I’ve ever had. I know that many blogs tend to specialize and focus on one thing. This blog is sort of a potpourri of museums and history, nerdy/geeky stuff, writing topics, and just any weird thing that crosses my mind. Thanks for coming back and checking it out. If you’re a regular here, I highly encourage you to follow this blog so you don’t miss a single post. (There should be a pop-up when you visit that you can click to do this.)

DM Guild Release: As I stated above, we are releasing two titles on DMs Guild in 2024, one in January and the other in November. Artificer’s Guide to Magic Items is the more extensive version of the two, and is available as a downloadable PDF or as a hardcopy format (if you get the hardcopy, you also get the PDF version for free). Other titles, The Knights of Solamnia Revisitedaimed at Dragonlance fans, and only available as a PDF. I intend to follow up both with some FAQs and sample PDFs that will be available for free download. Those are in the works, although I’m not sure at the time of this writing when they will be ready for release. Anyway, if you haven’t picked up a copy of either/both of these titles, check them out. I’m proud of the results.

An Unexpected Witch’s Tale: As often happens, when I’m busy writing another story, I always have disturbing ideas for another story. As I struggled (and ultimately failed) to maintain the storyline of that science fiction novel, I had an idea for a fantasy novel that would follow up one of my fantasy manuscripts. I finally decided to start putting it together around mid-November, and the story just flowed across the keyboard. My average number of words per hour has more than doubled for each writing session, which tells me that I’m really getting into it. Even with holidays, which can be a real killer on a writing schedule, I’m happy to say that I finished the initial draft by 11:30pm on December 31st. So, if I don’t accomplish anything on the fiction side by 2024, I can start and end this novella, which is just under 27,000 words. Of course, it’s a mess right now, but one of my projects for January will be making it readable for my beta readers.

The Way Forward

Normally, this is the section where I would outline my goals and projects for the new year, but I’m at a loss right now. I’ve finished the wizard novel, and now I’m confused, at least at the time of this writing. Until I know more about how this year will play out, and the possible impact it will have on my family, it’s hard to make long-term plans at this point.

I have a sci-fi novel that’s partially finished that I could try to finish, or I could revisit a cyberpunk novel that I’m about two-thirds of the way through (both have a special place in my heart, even if I have to put it down). Or, I could try something completely new. I haven’t decided yet, although short to medium fiction has its appeal in that it takes less time for each project, usually between a few weeks and a few months. I wish I had a definitive answer, but the road ahead is currently too foggy for me to see.

Rest assured I will land something. I almost don’t want to have another year as creatively as 2024 if I can help it. If 2024 taught me one thing, it’s that we’re here in less time than we think. I feel like I’ve only scratched the surface of the story I want to tell. If I want to do it honestly before my time runs out, I have to stay focused.

Therefore, I really hope that if my situation can be turned around, I can open the 2026 State of the Sector Address with the words: What a difference a year makes.

Until then, I hope your new year is filled with the realization of your dreams and solid metaphorical (as well as literal) ground beneath your feet.

See you in Sector!

If you are worthy, I am worthy.

-MC