For those who may be interested: Chapter Seven of "The Big Meow" is now posted for subscribers

[dianeduane]

Friends,

It's up at last.

There are a lot of places where this notification needs to be posted, and a lot of explanations and profound apologies to be made... but for the moment it just seems best to get the news out.

Chapter Seven is now available online for subscribers: it's linked to from the normal TBM subscriber gateway page. The same old username and password that worked for previous chapters will get you in. (If you can't find your login info, email me and I'll send it out to you pronto.) HTML and PDF versions are there right now --  the mobile .prc versions will go up in due course, as soon as we receive the conversions.

If you're not a subscriber, the chapter will go public on the 28th of the month. Look for the link to its gateway page in the left-hand menu at the project page at http://www.the-big-meow.com. (And for those of you who might feel inclined to subscribe, the subscription button is at the top of the left-hand column, along with info about what you get.)

Once again, I'm deeply sorry for the immense delay. I'm going back on the old one-chapter-per-three-weeks schedule: Chapter Eight will be going up in mid-August. Additionally, the book has become a couple of chapters longer in the course of being restructured -- check the project schedule for the anticipated posting dates.

Thanks again, everybody, so very much, for your patience during this past crazed and difficult year. More info shortly.

Comments

[keristor.livejournal.com]

Yay! Just glad you're back to a condition where you can get on with things.

[metahacker.livejournal.com]

Hurrah!

Selfishly wishing you a more sane, happy, and productive year.

[dsgood.livejournal.com]

Welcome back to reality -- err, to LiveJournal!

[were-gopher.livejournal.com]

Glad to see you're back up and running again. I'm looking forward to the finished book (I don't like reading stuff in installments, I even save my Analogs until I get a complete serial).

Best to Peter and the cats.

[kit-ping.livejournal.com]

I hope you don't mind a stranger (but long time reader and TBM subscriber) popping on your journal to say: I'm just glad you're back!

[lunza.livejournal.com]

Just glad to see you back in the blogosphere. :)

[lifein2x3.livejournal.com]

While I don't read the Big Meow, glad to see you're back.

[nebroadwe.livejournal.com]

Excellent news! Hope all is better for you in future.

[hrrunka]

Yay! (...both for the new chapter, and to see you posting here.)

[posicat.livejournal.com]

Welcome back! I'm glad that things are normal enough in your life now that you again have the time to write this story. Peace and tasty tea to you!

[dameruth.livejournal.com]

Good to see you posting again! People were getting worried. :)

[particle-person.livejournal.com]

Well yeah, but see, I had this theory she was kidnapped by the Maharajah -- never mind who he works for -- and taken to his South Seas island paradise where her only companions were Pippi Longstocking and an annoying mosquito side-kick named Mosquito (animation by Universal, voice by Mike Myers) while she wrote her new non-fiction book, "Guests of the Maharajah" with sea shells by the sea shore. She had to take to selling shells to finance her escape. Pippi, while full of ideas for hijacking boats and suchlike, got to be a bit of a pest, what with schemes for trapping coconuts to make hot cocoa and the constant boasts about her daddy. (She was very disappointed about the cocoa, by the way.) In the end, the shell game got her off the island, and now here she is.

[(Anonymous)]

(sidelong look) Ah jeez, another project to write. You people have no pity on me. ;)

[brightling.livejournal.com]

Very glad to hear from you again! There have been several times over the past months where I've distinctly missed seeing your bloggings. :)

I'm sorry that your last year has been such a rough one too.

[peachpastiche.livejournal.com]

I'm glad things are letting up, I hope? It's good to have you writing again, but I think many of us are just happy to know you're all right. :)

[krisw.livejournal.com]

I'm so glad to hear from you! Some of us were getting worried. You and your family have been in my thoughts!

Oh, and I'm glad to get more book, too ;)

[dark_fishie]

I've been a fan of yours for many years now, and I'm just glad to hear from you again! Hope everything's (finally) okay again =]

[jaxomsride.livejournal.com]

Glad you are back, I was a little worried at the loong silence.

[tarpo.livejournal.com]

Like everyone else.. Its terrific to see you posting again.

[readingredhead.livejournal.com]

And here I was beginning to worry that you had been kidnapped into another dimension somewhere! I'm really glad to see you're back--I'm sure I speak for a lot of people in saying my thoughts were and are with you.

[gerimaple.livejournal.com]

YAY! and YAY! also to seeing posts again. Like everyone else, I'm delighted to see you back on some semblance of a 'normal' track :)

[dduane.livejournal.com]

Believe me, I am too. :) I do not want another year like the last one.

[sarekofvulcan.livejournal.com]

*happy dance* Glad to hear that things seem to be improving. :-) Looking forward to seeing more of you around...

[badger.livejournal.com]

Pleased you are doing better.

[wetdryvac.livejournal.com]

Hoping this means that the crazy of life has now gone somewhat saner out there, and glad to see the writing in progress!

[d-84.livejournal.com]

Yay! Now I can't wait to go back to work, where I have my passwords written down...

We've been worried... Whatever was wrong, we hope that things are going better.

[kayshapero]

Hallelujah! Welcome back.

[alitalf.livejournal.com]

I hope life is more benign from now on, but if you don't mind me asking, what was the major life problem that put you off track for a while?

[dduane.livejournal.com]

(sigh) Multiple losses in the family, with all the local upset that that provokes, and about four different kinds of physical ailment (the gall bladder trouble was the most annoying, and continues). I'm going to resist getting into detail, as I have a great distaste for what my mother used to call "the organ recital". ;) ... I guess we could call it Just One Damn Thing After Another Syndrome. It proved incredibly disheartening, and made work of any kind nearly impossible.

But things are improving now....thank Heaven. (Though they could improve further, so if you want to bug other feline-wizardry types to subscribe to the project, this would be a great time.) :)

[alitalf.livejournal.com]

Multiple. Oh dear, that can't be at all easy to come to terms with. Maybe in some more years it will feel yet less bad - but a project to work on is good therapy.

Different people can have different levels of problem with gall bladder - some of the people I know who have had the operation can now almost ignore that they ever had a problem, but one has to be careful about what and when he eats. I hope you turnj out to be the one whose body adjusts and it doesn't bother you.

I was not even aware of the online book project until this post appeared on my friends page. I'm going to drop off the net soon, because the electricity failed about 20 minutes ago, but when it all works again I will have a closer look. I'd pay for an ebook, but don't need a physical copy. At least, not unless we suddenly become wealthy and can afford a larger house to store all the books.

Then I will add a link on my LJ...

[dduane.livejournal.com]

I'd be a ton grateful for the link, as some more subscriptions would be useful just about now. :)

There are six chapters freely online on the TBM website at the moment for those interested, so they can judge if this is something they're interested in subscribing to: Seven will go "free range" in about a week.

[sarekofvulcan.livejournal.com]

And at that point, this userpic will make sense to a lot more people. :-)

[dduane.livejournal.com]

Aww. :)

[dduane.livejournal.com]

But also:

 

 

[sarekofvulcan.livejournal.com]

DIEZ DED.

I can't _believe_ that second one never occurred to me before...

[particle-person.livejournal.com]

Aww. I prefer to imagine you and the Maharajah (who arrives on the island each morning in a hot pink dirigible) exchanging quips over your afternoon chess games. But I'm glad you're feeling better, anyway.

[dduane.livejournal.com]

(wry look) I think I prefer your version, too.

[robotech-master.livejournal.com]

That was a marvelous chapter, well worth the wait—especially the tale of Aifheh and Sehau, which was truly touching and uplifting. I feel one of your greatest strengths as a writer is your ability to create mythologies for your societies that are evocative of the feel of those societies while at the same time being wonderful stories in and of themselves. That's one of the things that makes your Wizardry series so great, and probably a big reason that a lot of people are hoping and praying you'll finish the Door series so we can learn how it all comes out. :)

It's going to be hard waiting for the next chapter to come out.

[dduane.livejournal.com]

Hey, thanks.

However, I think everybody who eventually reads it should congratulate me for not having certain deities stick their head down into the action through a hole in the ceiling. :)

[robotech-master.livejournal.com]

You know, you really should write something tongue-in-cheek explaining the whole LOLcat phenomenon as the result of an Intervention by Arhu and Sif that didn't quite work out the way they intended. :)

[weofodthignen]

You're back! Thank goodness; I was worried.