Infinitas Publishing – Status Report | Stephanie Flint

Today we have the August report! 📋

(Are we really already in September? Really?)

I’ve highlighted the projects that had changes in blue.

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Changing Tides: (Book 4 of the Distant Horizon series). On hold while working on The Dark Forest of Aneth. Next step is to merge the two revised drafts and start writing the missing scenes.

Deceived #3: On hold. Needs revisions. Tentatively titled Exposed.

Future steps: Input Isaac’s notes from Deceived #5 (formerly #4) into the manuscript, revise Deceived #5, and revise #6 (formerly #5) before handing it to Isaac for his feedback.

Dossiers (Deceived Spin-off): On hold. Next step is a revision round which involves incorporating notes into the manuscript.

Multiverse Chronicles (Distant Horizon Universe Spin-off): On hold. Next up is adding the missing scenes, do a read-through for revision smudge, and then a read-aloud with Isaac. Then it’s off to beta-readers!

Little One (Distant Horizon Prequel): Last time we had sent chapter three out to the newsletter, with the fourth scheduled to send, and now we’re up to chapter six! Chapter seven has been through a revision pass and ProWritingAid edits.

TWB 4: (Book Four of The Wishing Blade series). On hold. Next step is to write the outline and reread the first three books.

The Dark Forest of Aneth (A Legends of Cirena short novel): Major progress! I’ve input the notes from the Claude edit, did one more quick revision pass, fully formatted it for ebook (!!!), and sent it out to beta-readers! The feedback has returned, and the next step is the read-aloud! Woot!

I even finished editing the poem/ballad so that could be included. Also got the glossary fully prepped. (Here, having Claude was extra handy because I had it review what I’d already included then check the manuscript for anything I might have missed. My beta-reader did say the glossary was helpful, so it seems to have done its job).

Plus, I revisited the book cover concept using Claude to review what hadn’t been working for me with the previous version, and together we figured out something that was not only more true to the story, but also worked a lot better as a book cover. I had Claude design a reference sheet for me based on that, and then I redesigned the new concept in Daz (yay for having the characters and part of the scene already done), rendered the new scene, polished the render in Photoshop CS6, and the cover is now ready!

I want to do a cover reveal for my newsletter first, but I’ll be able to share it publicly soon. 😁

Plus, I got the blurb done! I wrote my attempt at the blurb first, then had Claude make a separate attempt based on the manuscript and a set of instructions I have for blurb design. While I didn’t use Claude’s result directly, after I had both versions, I shared my attempt with Claude so that we could merge the key concepts, which allowed me to finish the blurb into something I’m relatively happy with. The blurb might still need a bit more polish, but it’s currently workable.

Legends of Cirena Volume 2: Now that The Dark Forest of Aneth is almost done, I’m starting to work on volume two of the Legends of Cirena series collection. I searched through my art files and found two pieces I intend to include. They still need a bit of clean-up, but are otherwise complete. I also brainstormed ideas with Claude about possible core scenes or story locales I might want to illustrate.

The Ruins of Amixthael (The Gryphon and the Mountain Bear Spin-Off): On hold. Next step is to revise the chapters of the secondary character, then merge the two drafts together.

Future goals: Polish cover. Create blurb.

Untitled LoC Short Story (Standalone – Merchant in Reveratch): On hold. Next step is revisions.

Goals: Figure out a title. Create book cover and blurb. Polish the related poem/ballad so it can be included as back matter.

Untitled LoC Novella (Standalone – Twins in Ferta): This is moving along, chapter-by-chapter. Last time I was at chapter chapter twenty-nine sent to the newsletter and roughly 66,500 words. Now we’re at chapter thirty-one and 73,000 words!

I continued developing Nomca’s backstory, which may or may not see its own story sometime, but will help in writing the Ferta story. I also had Claude review the current manuscript and organize a timeline for me so I could see what pieces were still missing and need organized, and I continued using Claude to help me organize my thoughts while brainstorming story’s direction.

Next step is to continue writing the rough draft.

The Wind Mage and the Wolf Spin-Off (Joran’s Story – A Legends of Cirena short story) : On hold. Needs the rest of the fight scene cross-referenced.

Goals: Edit in ProWritingAid, read-aloud, proofread. Book cover and blurb.

Fae (Huntress 3): With the ebook out in the world, my next step is print formatting.

Since I already had the basic formatting structure I’d designed in Word 2007 for the previous books, I decided to test having Claude Sonnet 5 review those files and set up the basic formatting for Fae based on my earlier files. I haven’t had a chance to review those adjustments in detail, but a precursory review suggests this might have sped up that part of the print formatting setup considerably.

Horse Shifter Romantasy 🐎: On hold. Next step is to start drafting from the outline.

Dark Romantasy Idea: Starting to see movement again. I did some brainstorming with Claude about the titles and book cover design. Still not decided on a title yet. Currently I’m reading related books. I also had Claude update the outline based on my notes, and I need to review that to see what other edits I want to make and what’s still missing plot-wise. I also still need to finish writing the synopsis (currently 4,000 words), which should help speed up the drafting side. Tentatively eyeing this as a November project. (I kind of want to start sooner, but Multiverse is up next after Dark Forest.)

Writers of Warrensburg Anthology – I completed edits on my story based on the feedback I’d received and got it submitted! Proofreading notes are in, so my next step is making corrections.

Other Stories: The YA Alien Invasion/Dystopian short story is on hold.

Poetry (?!): Nothing new this month

Game Design:

Phalanx: I need to get a photo showing all of the pieces for the mousepad edition.

Elemental Card Game: On hold. Needs a lot of playtesting because the rules weren’t finalized before I started tinkering with a digital edition.

Legends of Cirena Tabletop Game: On hold. There’s one more expansion to add, and then playtesting. (And I need to see if those expansions have art already or if that still needs to be drawn).

Battle Decks: On hold. Needs playtesting, and then once the base mechanics are working I’ll look into trying to get a mobile version functioning properly.

Anchor: I need to get a landing page for it set up on the Infinitas Publishing website.

Fantasy RPG Productivity App: On hold.

Cozy Fantasy Pet Sim: On hold. Adult creature lineart needs cleaned up and added to game, and juvenile creature art needs adjustments. I still need to add my own flavor text as well.

KROWN Assessment: Personality quiz for the Huntress universe. On hold. Needs testing, but it should be about ready.

AI Usage and Policy: No new updates. Detailed usage is in this report.

Marketing and Admin:

Got the IP Status Report out on time again! Yay! Hoping to keep releasing these monthly. I also continued the process of having Claude review the report for patterns and things to watch for.
I had Claude Sonnet pull reviews from my books to analyze for an overview of what readers like and don’t like across each of the different series.
I’m still keeping up with the accounting. Yay!
With Fae now complete, I had Claude Sonnet 5 review the finished manuscript and update the author/series analysis of my published books.
Had Claude Cowork (Sonnet) research author blog book pages and provide suggestions for how I might restructure the book page on this blog. (It was in dire need of updates). Though not quite finished, you can see the work in progress here! Some books have been organized into the collapsible series headers, some haven’t.
I continued sending out the Distant Horizon and Wishing Blade universe newsletters on time.
I had Claude Code (Sonnet) review all of my finished books for a master list of themes. Afterward, I had Claude Code (Fable) run an analysis across the full sweep of notes. (I had to have Sonnet help create a suitable prompt. My first attempt tripped the guardrails and Fable refused to do the analysis). After the analysis, I had it create a “map” so that I could see which themes commonly repeated across different series, where they were absent, and to give me a better idea of how to position my books. I then used those insights to have Claude suggest niche sub-genres suited to themes I already enjoy writing, as something to consider for future series. Additionally, based on the theme map, I realized my current reader magnet books might not be working the way I’d hoped, so I’ll be reviewing those and possibly testing different magnets in the near future.
I continued having Claude help me review my weekly priorities based on my production schedule goals, and so far it’s been helping me stay on track, at least better than before I started doing this.
I continued testing sending my monthly BookFunnel promo highlights to both newsletters, not just one of them per month. I also had Claude help narrow down potential promos to join, as well as review which ones seem to garner more interest from my readers. October promos have been selected, and now I need to join them and get the blog post and newsletters scheduled.
I continued having Claude help me check which of my permafree books have gone not-free on Amazon. I have it draft a letter based on a template I provided, which I can then send to customer support to ask for the prices to be matched again. Claude also found the UK territory link from Apple that I hadn’t previously been able to find, that I’m hoping will help get those price-matched again.
I ran Huntress at 99 cents as a promotion for Fae. I also did a few more book promos: AuthorXP, GeekTastic, and Best Book Monkey. I’ll wait a couple weeks, then review the retailers to see which sales, if any, can be attributed to a particular promo. (I set each of them at least a week apart).
I reviewed my intended production schedule using Claude, made updates, then had Claude create a calendar of that schedule so I could better visualize my plan. I think having the visualization definitely helped me to see where there were potentially overloaded weeks so I could adjust those ahead of time.
I did lite updates to the individual book pages on the Infinitas Publishing website, mostly updating the structure for an upcoming format change, and adding the review site links to each book.

Next up: Review and update book prices; watch Book Blurb Magic course on books with multiple POVs, review a social media and newsletter email PDF I bought. Continue updating the design of individual Infinitas Publishing book pages and adding metadata. Continue adding books to the Stripe store for direct sales (alternately, review new BookFunnel feature offering Square sales?). Overhaul book categories, keywords, and blurbs. Add alt text to images in earlier ebook files.

Crafting Your Fictional World: Presented online for the UP Poet Laureate: Engage With Words series on August 27th! I restructured it as a presentation instead of a workshop, watched the previous events from that series, and practiced it a few times to make sure the topics were fresh on my mind.

If you’d like to watch the recording, you can find that here!

Repurposing Old Newsletter Content:

I finished scheduling the remaining four blog posts early in August. So far I’ve written three entirely new blog posts that I plan to run in September, which will go out in place of the repurposed content (though I do still plan to continue doing those long term, as well).

Events: See the “Crafting Your Fictional World” section, above. No other events in August.

SBibb’s Photographic Illustration: Still need to upload a minor revision to the formatting project that includes the ASIN, as well as the age categories that KDP is asking for.

Future Goals: Update the SBibbPhoto website to incorporate Daz work and fix the SEO information. Finish designing cute mascot for a local store. Finish editing photos for a local Aikido group.

SIFlint Art: Ended up creating a sketch for a PolyAm themed sword/knife hoarding dragon that might eventually become a sticker. Also created the lineart for the little extras that go with the Plushie Hoarding Dragon and Shark Hoarding Dragon so I can eventually make tote bags for them. Didn’t get a chance to finish those for the upcoming Vograce order, but I did complete the design for a lanyard of the Plant Hoarding Dragon, and I plan to test keychains!

Daz PA: Had another good round of back catalogue sales, I think this time mainly due to the Quick Grab and Outlet Store slots (though I’m pretty sure I re-invested any money from that back into Daz assets for upcoming projects). I plan to continue submitting to those promotions.

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Happy writing and reading (Or 3D rendering if you’re into Daz)! 🙂