What next?

Haldred Chronicles: Anna is out.  2 years of work and book 4 has at last been released.  I am happy with the result and it seems so are my readers!  So, after more than a month of resting, what now?

I’ve already completed one big task, and that was to submit a short story to sci-fi and fantasy publishers Black Library as part of their call for submissions.  With the able help of my wife Deborah, who proofread the submission, I sent off the 500-word extract and summary a couple of days ago.

The second big task now sitting on my to-do list is, of course, book 5.  I have taken some time to look through my various story ideas and have decided to go with ‘Haldred Chronicles: Twig’.  This story will concentrate on the Courier-fey, message passing creatures that have been a staple of Haldred Chronicles since the first book.  Now, with book 5, readers will learn a little more about these creatures.

I have a few other plans as well that I’ll work on when I have time.

 I hope to go over my first 3 books and reformat the look of them.  Each of them featured slightly different font and paragraph design so I now want to re-edit them so that they are all the same.  In addition, I hope to use the re-formatted work to create better-printed copies of the books via Kindle Direct Publishing.

I’ve also been working on a synopsis of book 3, ‘Shade’.  Together with a recently completed introduction letter and the first 3 chapters, I hope to use this package as my way to advertise the series to potential publishers and agents.

There is plenty planned for the next few months.  I feel like the Easter holidays have allowed me to get back into writing and make my plans for the future of the series.

Till next time.

I've not been idle

Well it's true, it's just I've not had much time to write a blog, but I'm taking a bit of time now to redress the balance.

It's been four months since my last blog update, and exactly seven months since my son Logan was born. We've been a busy little family since then, and our 'wee man' has been growing up fast.

On the writing front, I've been busy with the following.

I finished the first draft of the Wrathborn wargames background and submitted my writing so far to its creator. We'll be meeting up again soon to expand on the background further.

I submitted a short story entry to Black Library publishing house, who produce Warhammer and Warhammer 40k novels. Sadly, my entry was not accepted for publication, but I did get past the first triage so I'm pleased they took a good look at my entry. I'll definitely be trying again next year.

Very recently I've been working again on my fourth Haldred Chronicles book 'Anna'. For a long time I've been going back to it but not feeling inspired enough. Now, with an infusion of new ideas, the story is back on track! I'm up to 22,000 words and counting.

I'm also writing a synopsis for Haldred Chronicles : Shade. The plan is I will being using Shade as my pitching book to publishers, so I need to write the synopsis very carefully.

Finally, I'm taking part in Nanowrimo, the November writing competition, but in a different kind of way. Mantic Games, a local wargaming company, are running a writing competition in celebration of Nanowrimo. They want a couple of short stories written for their Warpath and Kings of War gaming systems. So, I'm going to have a go! Closing date is 1st December so like all those taking part in Nanowrimo proper, I've a deadline to work toward.

 Plenty to keep me busy these next few months. Until next time, take care.