I'm done.

And by that I mean I'm done with RoyalRoad.

This really shouldn't be a shock because I've mention/hinted at some loss in motivation posting her for month. Pretty much at the start of this year.

The truth is, RR was fun when I jumped in. It was very much unlike where I was posting my work on DeviantArt where every thing novel sized original fiction was drowned out by fan-fics. In fact, if I wanted readers, I had to write short-stories which I'm not good at.

I tried to post on Wattpad and that was a bigger hurtle because of fan-fics and romance. I don't write romance heavy stories and neither do I feel incline to write it the brand of romance that is prevalent there.

As a niche writer, finding a community to insert oneself in is difficult. And I thought that RoyalRoad worked. It was fantasy heavy and I was playing at writing something so different that I would stand out. As it turns out, this place is probably just as bad everything else I've been on. Just different.

At least with every other community I've been on, there was at least some semblance of variety of stories. With RoyalRoad being so power fantasy heavy, it makes it difficult for anything to get a decent shot.

I write too character drivem stories. I'm not afraid of tackling heavy topics. Fantasy writing to me is not full about just wishfulfilment and escapism. It's a way for me to explore people and character. And this place kind of de-motivates you from wanting to do that.

It really kind disheartening seeing so many writers who start out writing something different, end up writing something to taste on RoyalRoad and then abandon their first project they promised they wouldn't. They do it anyway. Any time I find someone interesting to read, they are gone.

And such a thing benefits me more than any progression isekia fantasy. I'm trying to refine a style of storytelling that is low-stakes and very personal to the characters involved. I've no interest in progress, isekia, or lit-rpgs.

And then there is the bias against female characters on here. And this is something I didn't want to mention and that's the fact that Kiao, of all my POV characters, does the worst. I mean, you could see the drop in views when she was the POV character in Edict the first time I posted the story. Then the views would magically pick up again when Mien was the POV character.

During my second round of updates, it was clear this hasn't changed when the second part of The Priest and Priestess was written. Views just dropped the heck off.

So what si a writer supposed to take from that. Write male protagonists only?

Oh and your male protagonist, he better not be anything other than describe and his interest in females as a heterosexual. Don't write about you character being asexual and how he what he is doesn't jive well with the culture he's in. Basically, don't write a character with a different experience or you lose readers.

Of course, if you write something different, the standard you are held at is completely different. In fact, you feel judged and that you need to write above everyone.

And for me, that means I have to take my time. However, RoyalRoad seems to reward quantity more than quality more. It's all about how fast you writer and as a dyslexic and with the goals that I want to achieve with my writing. The more time goes by, it just feels like I'm between a rock and a hard place.

And then there is just the sense of loneliness I've been having.

It's already difficult for me to connect to people. It feel like none of my interest in writing aligns with anyone else's. In the past, I felt scoffed out in the fantasy communities for even daring to write anything different. I went from, everyone needs to write epic fantasies like Lord of the Rings to everything needs to be like Worm, to now everything needs to like these four top stories or you are doing it wrong.

I'm really honestly tired of everything always being an uphill battle. Writing with dyslexia is already an uphill battle because I've traits that sabotage me. Not only that but the kind of stories I want to writer and the character I want to explore do as well. I can't even write at the pace I need to go to write a good story. And RR seems to becoming more and more like a rat race the bigger it gets and I'm not going to win.

And this realization has left me frustrated for nearly an entire year.

And I'm not really frustrated anymore. I've moved beyond that to solutions. And my solution is to just leave and just focus on writing and using a platform that allows me to be free from distractions and comparing myself to others.

I admitted to myself several weeks ago that RoyalRoad makes me miserable. And I've been hanging on, but I can't anymore. I don't want to. It's affecting my writing. I've been dragging my feet with updating Edict. And it's not as bad of a process as I am making it out to be. And since I want to feel excited about sharing a story again, this is the solution.

I'm done.

I'm closing up shop.

I'm abandoning ship. I've called in the helicopter and going back to shore, to write in the way I can enjoy it again.

I am also pretty much done with writing platforms as a whole. There isn't any place for my writing to go. It's Wattpad or sites that have the exact same things RR does. None of the smaller ones get enough traffic, as I looked at analytics for all the writing platforms. RoyalRoad, ScribbleHub, Wattpad, and WebNovel are the only ones that don't waste your time. They have enough traffic with people reading. So I'm not posting anywhere else but on my website unless something changes.

https://www.brotherhoodarchive.com/

I do plan on finishing the Archive. All stories will be posted on there in some form.

I'm considering, at a certain point, placing Hy'Ruh-Ha and Crossroad in PDF or EPUB form only. So Edict will join that sort of thing eventually. The site would only host what I'm currently working on. I'm not going the KU route. I really little desire to deal with Amazon. My plan is to likely put it up on Smashwords. I can put it there for free. I don't know. I have to actually see support for that sort of thing.

When it's Dark will be finished. I'm actually drafting out that last three chapters as we speak. I likely post all the chapters up in a week then leave it up for a month or two, but that's going to be removed with Changes as well. I've already deleted the chapter.

For anyone who has read my work and stuck around

Thank you.

God Bless

-L.J. McEachern