Rumours of the death of Armada Wars are greatly exaggerated.

I've written previously about the reason for the delays, so I won't labour that here. The delay for Whom Gods Shall Fear is only really valid as a comparison to the release frequency of the previous volumes anyway — it's one seriously dense book, and it MUST be exactly right.

Quite frankly I'm just pleased that I'm still clearly doing better than George R. R. Martin.

There will at least be one book released this year (2022), which is going to be A Storm to the Savage. This volume has turned into one of the most complex to write so far — you'll see why when you read it — which is quite funny seeing as I originally conceived it as a straightforward bit of extra world-building. I'm confident that it will definitely be a rewarding experience if you read it more than once, hint hint.

ASTTS will be the first Armada Wars book to use the new, mandatory Kindle format. It may also be the first book in the series to receive a hardback release! I'm closing on completion, and the provisional August release date may be brought forwards.

So... what you really want to know... when can you expect Whom Gods Shall Fear. As soon as I am done with A Storm to the Savage, all my writing time will be spent on WGSF. I will be aiming for a 2023 release. I am reluctant to say that's written in stone, because... well if you've been following the series for a while you'll know that I tend to be far too optimistic! Sometimes I am a slow learner.

But things are better now than they have been for a long time, so there is some small sliver of hope that I will get it out when I plan to. More hope than our heroes have, anyway...

Thank you, dear readers, for being so patient.

I am now resuming my original plan of interleaving the novel releases with the novella releases, albeit with the following changes:

• Significant elements from The Granite Whistle have been merged into A Storm to the Savage, so it is unlikely that I will write TGW in the form I originally planned. Watch this space.
• Forge Ruinous will now very likely end up being a full novel, rather than a novella, and it will be released after Whom Gods Shall Fear.

My aim this year is to knuckle down and keep up a steady pace. I Dream of Damastion is already available for Kindle, with the paperback proof on its way to me even as I type. I am planning to have A Storm to the Savage ready for a release soon, then all efforts will be focused into Whom Gods Shall Fear.

You may have noticed the artwork for IDOD changed in the past week, and the same iconography and cover design has been used for ASTTS. It will also be used for Forge Ruinous, although I have not yet chosen an image for the central glyph of FR's cover. Feel free to suggest your thoughts in the comments below.

I've said before that there are aspects of Steal from the Devil which I now find embarrassing and or problematic. As a debut novel, although many readers do enjoy it, one can only really say that it was released way before it was ready.

I've previously floated the idea of making some quite large changes. On those occasions I have received mostly negative responses, with people saying they would rather it was left just the way it is.

I've decided to split the difference. As well as being generally tidied up (see below), SFTD is going to get some enhancements, clarifications, and — of course — a thorough stylistic edit. I want to be very clear that nothing will change substantially as far as the plot goes. What will happen is that characters and situations will get expanded text, so that it is clearer what is happening, and the consequences further down the line are more understandable. I will try to bring the style of the book into line with the sequels, without losing any of its weird atmosphere.

I also aim to trim just a little fat — this means the teasers and references that ultimately went unused as the story found its own way through the sequels.

If you have strong feelings about this, then please do say so in the comments.

Over the years, with me having to update the same stories in various alternate files, discontinuities have crept into the published materials. These include vanishing custom fonts, different typographic conventions, and in some cases even material differences in the actual words of the books.

There is also the MAGA-cap wearing elephant in the room. A poll was conducted across Twitter and Facebook, and the overwhelming majority favoured a retrospective change to the lore where that acronym is concerned. The conventional air and ground assault forces will have to be called something different. Perhaps I just solved it there, and CAGA will be the replacement*. The point is that I've had it up to the eyeballs with people assuming that 'MAGA' is a nod to Trump, despite it obviously having nothing to do with him, so I'm just going to change it.

"AGRO" won the polls (standing for 'Air and GRound Operations'), but I think I will save that label for a team of specialists in a future story :o)

For all of those reasons, every single Kindle edition and paperback is going to be overhauled over the next couple of months. ​With the exception of I Dream of Damastion, which from today has the latest typography, corrections, and defined lore, all the updated versions will be released together. I will do my best to convince Amazon to push the Kindle updates out to existing customers, but only the changes to Steal from the Devil are likely to be considered significant enough to justify doing that.