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Vern, there is a version of Office 2019 (successor to 2016) that is a one-time purchase (about $170) as opposed to Office 365, which is the subscription. I'd gladly shell out $170 for a one-time purchase since I rarely upgrade (12 years on Office 2007 and counting), but as far as I've read, you can only reinstall it on the same machine, which doesn't work for me. I upgrade (dead) hardware more often than software.

If you want to use emoticons, wait until you see one in the forums and hit Quote on that post. It will show you how the icons are created. Or try Googling it. I'm old-fashioned and still use :-) ;-) etc. I figure if modern developers expect me to step into a driverless car someday, then they first have to detect the smiley faces everyone used for decades and automatically convert them into modern icons.

EDIT: I see the forum automatically converts ":P" into an icon, but not the much more common simple smiley.

If you click Portfolio->Action->Edit from your home page, then Content->Action->Edit from there, you can change chapter number, version number, or both. That way you can change the sort order of the chapters. If you want to change the order of your first two chapters, change chapter 1 to 3, 2 to 1, and then 3 to 2.

Hmm. One of the publishers of a Bible I'm thinking of using for all quotes says I can use up to five hundred verses but must quote the verses exactly as they appear in their Bible. More quotes may require a royalty. Also, quoting them exactly limits my ability borrow material for use in new prayers such as the one Connor spoke during Alessandro's seizure. I need to check with the folks who publish the most common U.S. Bible, the NABRE. Maybe they'll have better terms.

Your short story is only posted to your new group, which greatly limits who can read it. If that's intentional, then you're fine. However, many potential readers are maxed out at 10 groups and won't be able to join. Unless there's a reason why you want to restrict your readership, I suggest you use points and cross-post the story to Premium for maximum readership. By using points to post, your readers will receive points for reviewing it, so you'll probably get the most readers that way.

Thanks, Amy. I'm still trying (and failing) to include a third prayer at the end of scene one. :-)

thanks

Thank you, both. Retrofitting that stuff into the existing scenes on the fly may not have been the best approach, since I forgot so much stuff. After the initial burglary, there should be a comment in scene 2.1 about the police sitting outside in a patrol car (the cardinal can comment about that, so I don't have to show it). Also, Romano and Cardinal Gallo should discuss the initial event. And once it occurs a second time, they shouldn't just sit in the chapel for a friendly chat. I'm already working on intensifying the "battle" between the fog and Connor in the chapel to up the ante. All of the above will keep me busy for at least a week given how little time I have right now for writing.

I am thinking about the next scene, though. I have some idea of what I want next in the hunt for the Antichrist, but I need to be sure I'm not moving too fast through that part of the story since it needs to go in lockstep with Connor, where I have at least four scenes left before the end of act 1. I may have to kill another clergyman in act 1 to get enough material for Campagna and De Rosa to chase down. I have the outline for Connor well-defined, but not the detective's hunt, which is slowing me down. There's only so many clergyman I can kill before the book becomes unfit for its target audience. I've already decided there have been more deaths than the three I wrote about, but they happened before the start of the book, so it's less gruesome. They took place around the world and the Church is trying to suppress the evidence to avoid scaring the world about what may be the Apocalypse, so I may send the detectives on a trip of their own in acts 2 and 3 that parallels Connor's tour of the Holy Land. TBD.

Following are the changes to the two scenes so far related to increasing the threat to the MCs, as suggested by Kdot.

Scene 1.1:

Scene 2.1:

Will just read 2.1 today and felt there wasn't enough setup for the threat. I don't think he saw the added material above in scene 1.1 since I didn't republish. I just inserted the new material into the already published chapters.

I should add that I forgot to include the initial threat of scene 1.1 in the discussion between Romano and Cardinal Gallo, the Secretary of State in scene 2.1. I'll fix that.

Anyone have any thoughts about whether the above material works in the chapters you've read?

Thanks
Dirk

I have a question about how to handle characters in my book crossing themselves. Until now (three scenes), if a character was going to pray, I was always explicit that they crossed themselves. However, I think that's going to get tedious over the course of the books. I'm considering slowly shifting away from saying it and just leaving it implicit that it's part of praying. I think the best way to handle it is to base it on whether I'm writing a detailed prayer scene vs. a simple summary that someone prayed. In the former case, I would be explicit that they crossed themselves, then have them voice (or think) the actual words of the prayer. In the latter, I treat it as a given that it's part of praying, without bothering with the details.

I plan something similar with kneeling. If a character kneels to pray, I'll always state it, since kneeling is a more profound form of reverence. If they don't kneel, I won't mention it, unless it were relevant to the scene.

Thoughts?
Dirk