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I agree about the difficulty of trying to review more experienced writers. I often find I have little to add, except for an occasional missing comma or confusing description. I've done plenty of reviews where I find fewer than 5 things to comment on, so I don't meet the minimum to receive points. I have a bazillion points already, so that doesn't matter to me. One thing I try to do is give more reviews to experienced writers, so what I lack in quality I make up for in quantity. Granted, I accumulate lots of points, but I tell the recipients of my reviews why I do it.

From catholic.com:
The word Rapture is connected to the Latin word rapiemur, which appears in Paul’s first letter to the Thessalonians in the Latin Vulgate translation of the Bible. It means to be raised up or caught up:

Protestants Dispensationalists use the term rapture to refer to an event in the future when God's chosen ones will be physically removed from Earth so as to be spared the Great Tribulation, which is the persecution by the Antichrist and the False Prophet, of those left behind on Earth prior to Jesus's return. Evangelicals believe Jesus fill physically reign on Earth for a literal thousand years of peace before the Day of the Lord (Judgement Day - cue Terminator theme song).

As it says in the quote, Catholics generally don't use the term to avoid confusion with Evangelical beliefs. Catholics interpret most of Revelation as symbolic, which means no reign of Christ on earth before his return on Judgement Day. The thousand years referred to in Revelation is the Church age, which is arbitrarily long and began with Christ's ascension to Heaven in the 1st century. Christ already rules from Heaven during this period through the Eucharist (Catholic Mass, with its sharing of His body and blood).

I've only begun to engage Catholics about the new story in forums for research purposes. I haven't shared any major details with them, except that I'm writing a Catholic-oriented series of novels about the Second Coming. I haven't received any flak from anyone yet. Serious Catholics probably won't like the ending to the trilogy, since it probably won't include condemnation to the lake of fire of unrepentant sinners.

I don't plan to release Galaxy Tales in its current form. I'm still thinking if there's a way to rewrite it without treating Christianity irreverently (e.g., writing the Heretics Bible with the New Commandments and Jesus's arrival in Joseph's mind, where He tells Joseph that he is the reincarnated second son of twelve children that Christ fathered with Mary Magdalene.) I also don't like the level of violence in Galaxy Tales, but was unable to eliminate most of it as I wrote v3, otherwise the story would have fallen apart. Basically the story needs a complete rewrite.

I usually encourage new members to introduce themselves and their WIP in the Premium group and ask for reviews. I also encourage them to reply to all of their reviews and reciprocate with those authors they want to keep as reviewers.

Connor's arc is well-defined, although it's still just in my head. I'm currently converting one of the Revelation study guides into notes and am about 2/3 of the way through that. After that, I need to create a timeline of end time events, since Revelation is not chronological (nor logical!). A lot of it is symbolic, which means the disasters and battles are usually not to be taken literally. I need to decide which events I'll use and how to represent them. I'm also compiling notes for each book, after which I'll write detailed summaries and chapter outlines. The hardest part will be that my research and book notes will probably run 200 pages. The way my memory works, I have to reread the same stuff every few weeks, otherwise I forget a lot of it even exists. It's amazing the neat things I discovered in rereading v2 of Galaxy Tales to write v3. And I probably already read v2 fifty times in writing/editing it.

When I was a kid I made a ray gun by connecting two D batteries to a flashlight bulb. :-)

What are the rules about what can be submitted to Strongest Start? I'm currently working on the third draft of my WIP. I never submitted it for the contest because earlier drafts were garbage and I knew it. My first three chapters are now essentially in final form.

Believe it or not, I'm still dealing with my move from Jan. 2016. Now it's IRS withholding forms I need to provide to all my US financial institutions (IRAs, NYSE pension, bank checking). Even my Canadian bank wants the forms so they can occasionally invest my money in US investments. These need to be renewed every three years, otherwise the banks have to withhold 30% of all payments to me, instead of the tax treaty-specified 0-15%. Who's supposed to do this sh*t when I'm old and senile? Also, it's almost time for tax returns again. Maybe I'll get lucky and get audited again. Idiots!

I usually get in a few hours most days doing research for the new books. Of course, I have to take copious notes, since I can't remember sh*t. I have a pretty good idea of the overall arc for the first book, but I'm still not sure I should do it the way I want. Catholic Revelation includes two end-time figures, an Antichrist and a false prophet. The mainstream Catholic interpretation of these figures are a worldwide political-military leader (the Antichrist) and an anti-Catholic religious leader (the false prophet) who have yet to appear in history. One alternative interpretation views Emperor Nero as the Antichrist and Caiaphas, the Jewish high priest who orchestrated Jesus's death, as the false prophet. Nero was a nasty piece of work, using many of his enemies as human torches.

I'm considering combining the two figures into a single Antichrist fathered by Satan. According to Revelation, Satan is limited in his powers because he was "bound" by the archangel Michael at the time of Jesus's ministry. Looking back at the murder and mayhem of the 20th century, imagine what Satan could do if he weren't bound. In my story, his son would be just as powerful, but free to act.

Thanks, Amy.

Janet, are you planning to resume posting NS?

My latest chapter, Joseph Enters Heaven, is up. It's a cleaned up version of the same chapter from v2, including feedback from previous reviewers. As mentioned above, I'm not making any more major changes to the remaining chapters for v3. Just cleanup before I shelve it. Feel free to review it if you want the points. A special shout out to Amy whose numerous comments on this chapter in v2 almost broke my printer. :-)

Feel better, Bill.

I spent six years working on a book that I will now probably never publish. Does that count?