I put in a lot of work tonight fixing the end. Technically completing the read through with a critical eye. It's not nearly as broken as I'd thought, which is pretty exciting. This was definitely the right decision. I need to make the ending work before I can be confident enough to move forward with book 2.
I'm quite in shock that I like the ending now. There are still some holes and problem scenes but not nearly so bad as it was.
Novel currently sits at 110K and soon to grow.
I am starting to get hopeful again that this will one day be a book worth reading. And maybe the second one is possible too.
