Afterword
Wow! I'm finally done. It feels weird to say that after such a long time spent writing. I started this in late February, and it is now July. That is insane! To put it lightly, I never imagined that I would actually finish this. The only things that I've ever finished writing are two screenplays, and those of you who have written a screenplay before know that they are a lot less time-consuming than a novel, so this feels really bizarre for me, to say the least.
Originally, when I began writing, I planned to make this story sixteen chapters and eighty-thousand wards long, which is the typical length of a novel. Of course, then I actually did some research—the first four chapters were only done with my pre-existing knowledge with a little help from Wikipedia—and realized that it was going to have to be a little longer than that. One less battle was planned, and both "The End of a War" and "The Training Montage" didn't originally exist until I read about the Seven Year's War and Steuben and realized just how important they were to the story.
I have a full spread of paper hanging on my bedroom wall with what I had originally planned as the basic structure of the novel, which I'd done with both of my screenplays, and was shocked to discover the other day just how different it turned out to be. Part of this was me trying to fit the personal events of the characters with the right historical events, but part of this also had to do with several plot elements being entirely altered before they even hit the page. Many of the characters didn't even exist until I got to writing them down. Samuel Gray and Matthew Kilroy—who were actually real people! Look it up, it was the coolest find ever—and their subplot in The Massacre, McNally the Irishman, and even Ethan the Swabbie, who wasn't even given a name in my head until I decided that I needed to reintroduce him as the walking plot device, are just some of the few.
I'm also super glad that I was able to learn about the real events of the Revolutionary War. I've slowly discovered that what really happened was VERY different from what they teach you in school. In America, at least, we're taught that the Americans were this incredible fighting force that just tore through the eeeevvviiilll British at every opportunity because they wanted their liberty and freedom, dammit! I suppose for us in the good old US of A, it's easier to see historical events in black and white, we were good and the British were evil, the north was good and the south was bad, we were good and Soviet Russia was also (even more) evil (apparently). But this is really not the truth. This is why I love history. There are two sides to every story, and nothing is clear-cut, the world is painted in various shades of gray.
So what's next for me? Don't worry your butts, I'm not going anywhere. I may take a break for a few months, to catch up on my reading and try to get my research done before I start my next project, which I'm not going to tell you all about just yet. I think I know what I'm going to do, but I'm going to hold off for just a while to take a break. I'll probably release another oneshot by the end of summer, something humorous—I need a break from all of the intense angst, because the next project's going to be even worse!—and something involving Francis, because I just can't write him seriously no matter how hard I try. He's too crazy! But we'll see if I actually get around to that.
Immediately, however, I've decided to take up a slightly different project. What I'd really like to do is start a podcast to read all of my stories out loud to you all, probably in an audiobook format. I'd also absolutely looovvveee to do a Q and A just so that I can talk to people about my work who also write. And just to get some things off of my chest about it. So totally PM me some questions that you'd like answered, and I'll make a recording and share it with you all!
As of this writing, the podcast is available at Soundcloud and iTunes, whichever you prefer. I will most likely be unable to leave a link to it, as we've seen how that's gone so far (Fix your links Fanfiction god damn it!), but if you go to iTunes, to your handy little search bar, and type in "AngryHedgehog's Fanfiction", you should find it. I'll check before I post this to make sure that this is all true and easy to locate, so if you're reading this right now, than all should be according to plan.
Hopefully I'll see you all there!
It's most certainly been a trial, but I've had the best time writing this story! I'm kind of sad to see it done, actually, but this WILL NOT BE THE END! I'll see you all on my podcast, and at the end of the summer with a new story (which will probably be announced on the podcast at some point, if you still need a reason to go check it out).
Cheerio!
~Hedgehog