What happened in the second half of 2023?!

Happy New Year! I hope you all managed to have a break over the festive season. As usual, an apology for the infrequent updates – life managed to get in the way of writing and editing in quite a significant way in the latter half of 2023, but I’m determined to make more progress in 2024, in a managed and kind way, of course.

Firstly – I’ve been doing a bit of technical tinkering over the break. Somehow, I’d managed to only buy the insecure version of my website address (http:// rather than https://) which meant that browsers occasionally redirected to a British property company! I’ve now got my SSL sorted, so there’s no redirect issue. Happy browsing!

I’ve been making steady progress on The Slow and Gentle Wyrd, which was meant to be a seasonal release at the end of last year. That definitely didn’t happen, but I’ll come back to it throughout 2024 and hopefully schedule its release for Christmas 2024. It’s a feel-good, comfy, cosy, low-stress read, and should be a little shorter than Small Places, so again, not a long or stressful read.

We’re also moving along nicely with Navigator / Parasites 3. It’s all planned out, although the actual writing and execution sometimes moves a bit differently to the plan. I often find that when I’m writing split-perspective novels, I want to continue writing from one perspective when I’m really in flow, which means a bit of hopping back and forth, cutting and pasting chapters and so on. Ultimately, it gives better continuity and flow, so I’m usually happy to go with whatever my brain commands! Mind you, there’s a lot to be done – it’s currently at 25k words, so we’re about a quarter of the way there, without any kind of editing etc. It should be finished this year, but I can’t be more specific than that.

In terms of other bits and pieces, I’ve been enjoying a number of rereads in the last few months. I’m about three quarters of the way through William Gibson’s Pattern Recognition, which is an all-time favourite of mine. I’ve also been doing a re-read of Laurell K Hamilton’s Merry Gentry series, which I never finished; the story / narrative side of things seems to evaporate around book three, but it’s all on my local library’s app, so I’m willing to give it another try! I’ve always been fascinated with modern takes on the fey / faerie, and book one is superb.

Otherwise everything has been fairly quiet – I definitely needed a bit of a rest and a break, and hopefully it’ll supercharge the months to come!

What happened in June? Dusk, Wild Court and Small Places progress, life issues and gorgeous books

June has been a fairly crap month writing-wise, and there’s not a lot to report on the writing front. I’ve written a measly eleven thousand more words on Dusk, the sequel to Parasites, taking it to 37k, and unfortunately progress on Wild Court has stalled again. Thankfully, despite not really being able to travel far, I’ve had a few ideas for the sequel to Small Places, and even tentatively titled it, but my structuring ran out of steam after what is probably the first third of the book!

After a fairly long dry spell, I’ve been writing more again in the last few days, but I think lockdown has definitely taken its toll. I suspect that, like others, needing to feel in control of my own life is something of a pre-requisite for functioning like a proper human being. I’ve really been trying to look after myself – running does actually help me, and I managed to see (socially distanced) friends the other day, which was a lovely slice of normality.

However, there’s still trouble brewing in my ‘real’ job. I’m working fewer hours, which is something of a double-edged sword. I have more time to write, but am slightly dreading my next paycheque! And despite working fewer hours for the last few weeks, I’ve just not been motivated to write.

Still, I’m hopeful. I’ve written more in the past two days than I have in the preceding two weeks, so with any luck it was just a small dry spell. As you might have seen from my Instagram, I’ve also been very lucky to get the Illumicrate version of The Last Wish and the Folio Society version of Howl’s Moving Castle. They’re both absolutely gorgeous and I’m looking forward to diving back into them – although I’ve also been reading the much-lauded Six of Crows and am just reading Crooked Kingdom, alongside Nora McKinney’s A Natural, which has been quite a change of genre for me!

Small Places is still being beta read, although one of my betas seems to have disappeared – so I can’t yet share a release date. I’m so keen for it to be read, but (especially since I’ve started to plan the sequel) I only want it out once it’s ready.

As ever, please take care, look after yourselves and read bloody amazing books.