Been a great month for writing so far. 56,000 words, one book finished and last night I started on a new book I've been promising for a long time. I'm also 1/3 through the edits on Crow 3, which should be out within a month. I'm going to keep quiet on what book I'm working on for now in case it doesn't work out, but I'm nearly two chapters in and so far it's going pretty well.

Yesterday I finished the first book in what will a new series. Adapted from an old short story called Saving the Day, Saving the Day: The Curators series #1 will hopefully be released before Christmas. It came about because after writing three successive Crow books I wanted to try something different, and I'd always thought it would make a good novel. The final result, while still using the basic premise of the short story, expanded it into a huge dystopian world. While most of the questions were answered in the novel, I left a couple of things for a possible sequel. It was great fun to write, so I know you'll enjoy reading it.

God I love summer vacation. I've let my social reclusivity gene kick in and so far I've written 41,266 words in 12 days. Bitchin. Just got the epilogue to do on this book and I shalt rest. I have a tentative title for this but I'm going to let it sit for a while. In other news, I just got the edits back on Crow 3, so I'll be working through those next.

I'm on summer vacation at the moment so despite the heat I'm blasting out the new words like never before. The as-yet-untitled new dystopian has raced past 60k and I'm hoping to finish it this month, after which I'll be getting back to other loose ends. More details soon.

Wrote this yesterday. Part of a new story I'm working on, in first person no less! Closing in on 50,000 words, so hopefully I can get it done in August. I still have a 5th Crow book to write, but after doing three in a row I needed a break. This is actually based on an old short story, but it's deviated somewhat into a completely different beast. Not sure of a title yet.



"The damp, algae-coated wooden slats that passed for seats in the bottom of the boat were like a strong hand to a falling man. I hugged them, crying into them, trying to ignore the pain in my torn-open wounds as the brutal reality of the words I had screamed as I leapt from the harbour side into the water rang in my mind like a giant, diseased bell.

None.

At the moment when I had needed them most, I had forgotten my children’s names.

I felt like the world was folding in on me, squashing me flat, and there was nothing I could do to stop it."

I'm not sure how many fans of my writing know that I'm in a band, but I've been a member of Steampunk Unicorn, the best rock band in my city, since its inception three years ago. All our songs are original, and we finally got around to making a music video. Peaceful Levitation was written by Sam, our vocalist/bassist, and the video was his brainchild. Brilliant stuff. I'm the one in the black (and wearing the unicorn mask with the pink nose). We did most of the outdoor filming last November, hence my hat. Take a look! There's a possible album on the horizon at some point. The video was filmed and produced by the awesome Frank, on location in Takayama, Nagano, Japan.

In the last week, thanks to a couple of unexpected days off and a lot of silence, I've written something like 25,000 words. It's awesome but sad at the same time because it shows just how productive I could be without a day job sucking all the energy out of me.

I've mostly been working on a new dystopian, and after a bit of a lull while I figured things out its racing ahead again. Good days.

I've finished my first revision of Tales of Crow 4: The Circus of Machinations. This book took a lot longer to write than the other three so far, but I've always felt I worked better when I stretch things out a little, as I do more revising as I go along and with Circus there were almost no plot holes at all that needed filling, unlike Puppeteer, which had loads. I really liked this book; it was dark and gloomy and much more sci-fi than the rest of the series. I decided some time towards the end of the first book in the series that it would be fun to try to tie it into the Tube Riders back story, but because the tone of the books was very different at some point there needed to be a threshold where things moved over from the Tales of Crow world into the Tube Riders world. That kind of happened at the end of Puppeteer, whereas Circus was a kind of a transition book and I'm hugely proud of it. I do however have this habit of asking more questions than I answer, so there are two or three things that I need to now explore in other books in the wider cannon of my world to clear things up a little, if that makes any sense...

Anyway, I'm currently on a break from both the Tube Riders and the Tales of Crow series. So far that break has lasted two days. It's highly likely that I'll be breaking that break (ho hum) over the weekend and getting on with either Crow 5 or heading back to the Rise prequel series.

Happy reading and speak soon

CW

Most of the way through draft 3 of Puppeteer King. Pretty confident the plot holes are all now filled but I'll probably give it one more skin read (on the Kindle) to check for flow before it goes off to the editor. Hopefully by the end of the month.

Watched the new Godzilla tonight on DVD. Stupid but fun. I wish they'd have the monster fight scenes in daylight so you could see what was going on.

During my day job as an overpaid foreign novelty teacher today, the main teacher I was working with starts laying in to three kids at the start of class for reading books instead of paying attention. I understand that, you know, it's English class, and they should sit up straight and listen to her drone on for 50 minutes without saying anything actually in English at all, but the kid nearest to me was reading this thick tome of King Solomon's Mines translated into Japanese. In this day and age where all most kids do is stare at a Nintendo screen I'd have been inclined to let him carry on reading particularly when he's getting stuck into an action adventure classic.

Still working through plot holes on Puppeteer King. Almost there. It'll need a good polish after this but I'm confident I can get it out to the editor by the end of the month. Another bit of the backlog soon to be cleared...

Friday tomorrow. I love Fridays because I go to my favorite mountain school. Best views in Japan. Here's a pic from a few weeks ago.