Jan. 15th 2007

Wow...its been awhile...Time sure flies.

Hi. As I'm sure you've seen, its been quite awhile since AOB has been updated. I would like to someday revise and repost it, but that won't be any day soon. I have moved past ff.net, into a more mature area of the fandom on livejournal and archives like skyehawke and the Hex Files. In its current condition, frankly, AOB is unfit to continue. It has gotten such an overwhelming and lovely response on this site, but it isn't ready for the audience I know cater to, and am a part of. I do plan on redoing the beginning and continuing this story, but I don't know when. I've made some attempts already, but I'm honestly having a hard time. I began AOB at a strange time in my life, when I was much younger and less experienced. Since then, partly because of HBP, and partly because of the fandom, I've come to view the characters in a different way, and am struggling with how to write the story in a way that incorporates this, but still preserves the basic story. At this point, I'm not even sure if I'm going to keep the story AU as of HBP, or make it more accurate towards canon.

Also, my writing style has greatly changed (and improved) in these years, so AOB appears to me as too juvenilly and naively written. I'm setting the conflict up to be easily resolved with plenty of humor thrown in, and I think this is an unrealistic plot, now that I've been reading more sophisticated fanfiction. I also have a different view of the "magical creature" genre, and homosexuality/slash in general.

To make a long story short, I will be continuing this in some way shape or form, but I am unsure of how or when. I'm lacking time at this point. The absolute earliest you can expect something is midsummer. But this story will be very different at that point, very. I will be posting something on this site when I can, and will leave a link to where it can be read (AOB will be upgraded to NC-17 (M+) and be posted on livejournal, and perhaps an archive). My recommendation would be, if you still want to read more of this story, and you're willing to wait: put me on your author or story alert, and forget all about me until you receive a message.

I sincerely apologize for doing this to you; I hate it when an author discontinues a story, and know it is frustrating. I am sorry about this, but I'm unwilling to continue something when my heart isn't in it, so I won't until I can give you a wonderful story that will (hopefully) be worth the wait.

Thank you all so much!

Allika