BlakeAstor

I just finished reading The Maze Runner book today. This means I can continue writing The Ballad of Group B, now that I have a full understanding of the first book in the TMR series. But I have to finish writing that 10,000+ word story I mentioned in an earlier announcement before I can continue writing Ballad.
          
          Of course, I'll have to read The Scorch Trials and The Death Cure at some point too, considering Ballad will take place over those two books as well. Not just The Maze Runner. And I still have to write my now Archive of Our Own exclusive story Two Mazes, which used to be published on Wattpad.
          
          Not going to lie, I didn't like reading The Maze Runner book. It didn't help that I had already read a ton of negative criticism about it before I started this proper beginning-to-end read. And I had already read a bunch of random scenes throughout the whole thing prior to this read. I already knew pretty much everything that was going to happen. All of that made me bored throughout my reading of this book. All I could focus on was finally getting to the end. I think the well-written TMR fanfics I've read and TMR movie are way better than the actual book.
          
          Anyway, I can't wait to publish chapter 3 of Ballad of Group B at some point.
          
          Thanks for reading.
          
          Your friend, Blake Astor.

I can't wait to continue writing The Ballad of Group B at some point. I've been reading The Maze Runner as a proper beginning-to-end read. I'm more than halfway finished now. After I finish reading this book, I'll have to continue writing a 10,000+ word story I started recently, one that I won't publish under my BlakeAstor alias, though. After that, I'll continue working on chapter 3 of Ballad. As usual, I still have to finish writing Two Mazes, a story of mine that used to be published on Wattpad but can now only be found on Archive of Our Own. Two Mazes was heavily inspired by The Maze Runner series. I worked on Two Mazes a little bit recently, but I haven't been writing it much these days. I'm not writing much in general lately. I've been spending a lot of time reading The Maze Runner, especially because I can't continue writing Ballad until I've read all of TMR.
          
          Thanks for reading.
          
          Your friend, Blake Astor.

I made a minor edit to chapter 2 of The Ballad of Group B. I changed the narrator, Anne, moving closer to get a better view during the closing of the walls to her moving back to get a better view. I had just read the part in The Maze Runner book where Thomas actually moved back to get a better view while the Doors were closing. That's what made me make that edit in chapter 2 of Ballad.

I started reading The Maze Runner recently. A proper beginning-to-end read. I've read a bunch of random scenes of the original trilogy but never actually read all three books, so I'm trying to read the first one. Plus, I have to read the whole book before I continue working on my TMR fanfic The Ballad of Group B. Writing those first two chapters was difficult because I had to have a good enough understanding of TMR book without actually having read the whole thing. It'll be easier writing Ballad once I've finished reading TMR.
          
          And Ballad is going to be around 300,000 words long. I won't split it into multiple stories. Splitting it means less readers and less popularity/fame for this story. More words means more votes and readers. Hence Ballad will be a really long story and it'll take place over the course of The Maze Runner, The Scorch Trials, and The Death Cure. Currently, what I've written for Ballad so far takes place before TMR. Right now, the focus is on the early days of Group B's time in their version of the Glade. I predict Ballad will be a kinda popular fanfic. I hope it will be, anyway.
          
          And I'm still writing Two Mazes. It was a Wattpad story that was cross-posted on other sites, but now it can only be found on Archive of Our Own. The first 19 chapters are published. I'll publish more chapters after I've finished writing the next 21 chapters, which will take a while to do. And when Two Mazes is finished, and when I'm done being TMR, I'll be able to focus on getting Ballad finished. I'm looking forward to it. I love the concept of Group B, and I hate that there's not enough fanfics about them. So, I'm glad I am writing my own fanfic about Group B. I hope a lot of people will love my story someday.
          
          Thanks for reading.
          
          Your friend, Blake Astor.

I just published chapter 2 of The Ballad of Group B.
          
          I don't know when chapter 3 will come out. After all, I'm still working on my now Archive of Our Own exclusive, Two Mazes. But I took a brief break from that story to write and finish chapter 2 of Ballad, just to have some more Ballad content out there. I hated seeing the first chapter just sitting there by itself like that. Anyway, enjoy reading chapter 2.

I'm still working on Two Mazes. I can't wait to finish this thing so I can focus on my TMR fanfic The Ballad of Group B. I'll have to read The Maze Runner too.
          
          Also, seeing the new Wattpad guidelines is what scared me into taking my stories Two Mazes and Grim off of Wattpad. And because of those guidelines, I made a minor edit to the first chapter of The Ballad of Group B to make it more PG. Initially, I made my character Beth say something pretty inappropriate, and I figured it would've been wise to change that line of dialogue to something more "friendly", so I did. I'm not going to state what she said.
          
          I worked on the second chapter of Ballad some more, but it's really hard trying to write it when I haven't even read the entirety of The Maze Runner. Hence I really need to read it. Until then, I can't write too much of Ballad. Also, Two Mazes still isn't finished, so that takes away a lot of my focus as well.
          
          BTW Two Mazes isn't doing well. The first 19 chapters of it are published on Archive of Our Own, and it has very few hits. Very few. On Royal Road, Two Mazes had around 500+ views by the time I took it off that site. I can't remember how much it had on Wattpad. Maybe a few hundred views but less than 500. And on Inkitt, I don't think I ever saw how many people viewed Two Mazes, but I remember a bunch of people would add it to their reading lists. Unfortunately, they probably don't even know where they can read Two Mazes right now. I didn't inform anyone on Inkitt or Royal Road that I would make Two Mazes an Archive of Our Own exclusive. Bummer.
          
          Anyway, I'm not expecting Two Mazes to get popular or anything. It might remain an obscure work forever. There's hope for my fanfic The Ballad of Group B, though. When I finish Two Mazes, I'll get to work on Ballad. After I read The Maze Runner, that is.
          
          Thanks for reading.
          
          Your friend, Blake Astor.
          
          Didn't proofread this announcement. I apologize for any errors.

I just finished publishing the 19th chapter of Two Mazes on Archive of Our Own. You can read all 19 out of 40 chapters of Two Mazes on Archive of Our Own right now. Now Two Mazes is on hiatus until I finish writing the rest of the book.

So far, I published eleven chapters of Two Mazes on Archive of Our Own so far. I wish I were still publishing this story on Wattpad, but it is what it is, I guess. I started publishing The Ballad of Group B on AO3 too.
          
          Two Mazes will go on temporary hiatus when the 19th chapter is published, so I can finish writing the rest of the story.

I published the first chapter of Two Mazes on Archive of Our Own/AO3. Search for BlakeAstor there, find my profile, and you should be able to see Two Mazes. Assuming Archive of Our Own is available in your country. I still wish Two Mazes didn't have to be an AO3 exclusive, but this is how it has to be. At least I decided to go through with republishing it instead of keeping it unpublished.
          
          I'll publish chapters 2 through 19 too. I don't know how long that will take, though. Publishing on AO3 is time consuming. When I copy and paste a chapter into the draft there, it adds an extra line between each paragraph, and it takes a really slow amount of time to delete those extra lines. It's really frustrating.

I've got some bad news.
          
          I'm going to delete Two Mazes and Grim from Wattpad and the other platforms I have them on, and then publish them on Archive of Our Own. They will be AO3 exclusives. Wattpad is too strict, and I don't want to break any of their rules, along with the rules of the other platforms I have Two Mazes published on. And I'm not willing to delete anything in my stories that might break one of Wattpad's rules, so I'm just going to make these things be AO3 exclusives.