Hi everyone.
I hope you’re all well and that, if you’re in the UK, you’ve managed to stay cool in the extreme heat. Welcome to a rollercoaster mini-blog of first reviews, Sponsored Writes, and the cold hard realities of writing a book. Onwards!
Mountainfell’s first review
First up it was fantastic to see the brilliant Stephanie Burgis (author of The Raven Heir, The Dragon with a Chocolate Heart and many more) post such lovely things about Mountainfell on Twitter and give it its very first review. Hooray! It can be scary sending a new book out into the world, so early recommendations like this are to be treasured.
Green Ink Sponsored Write 2022 kicks off soon
Every year I take part in the Green Ink Sponsored Write, where published authors come together with Green Ink’s amazing writing students to raise money for MacMillan Cancer Support. How? By each of us spending one chosen day in October writing a short story, which will become part of an anthology sent exclusively to our Just Giving supporters 48 hours later. If you’d like to be one of those supporters, you can donate your chosen amount here. Thank you!
The reality of writing a book
Finally, ever wondered what really goes in to writing a book? Well, I’m here to tell you the WHOLE truth. In list form. (As it’s a mini- and not a maxi- blog). Get ready, here goes:
You have an idea and it’s EPIC
Idea grows. You plan and plan until planning gets too boring and YOU’RE IN
Wow. This is the best thing you’ve ever written!
Time to reflect. Oh, God. This is the worst thing you’ve ever written
This is the worst thing written, ever
Time to rewrite
Actually, this isn’t too shabby… you can relax
Editor has questions. Time to rewrite
The rewriting continues
Get a pressing deadline. Everyone gets covid
The book is, finally, finished. You press send and instantly fall asleep
Nope, it isn’t finished. Wake up. Editor has questions. Time to rewrite
Eye starts to twitch every time book is mentioned
The rewriting does not end
Existential crisis
You are stuck in a time loop where all you do is edit
You are done with this book. DONE
You are never going to put yourself through this, ever again
Where am I? What is time? Who is “book”?
Finally book is written, rewritten, edited, polished. You read it with dread… and are pleasantly surprised to find that you don’t hate it
Actually, you quite like it
You might even be a little proud…
Are you?
Yes, you think so. All that work might have been worth it after all.
Press send and cross fingers. Time to sleep and play Hollow Knight
You promise yourself it’ll be a long time before you attempt to write anything else. A long, long time.
A seriously long time. You need a break from writing. A proper one.
Except, wait! You’ve just had an idea, and it’s EPIC…
Well, there you have it - and although every book is different, there always seems to be a decent dose of all or most of the above, at least for me. Do you relate to this if you’re a writer? Or does anything surprise you if you aren’t one?
Mountainfell available to pre order
If you’d like to read the product of all that work and polishing, you can pre order my new book, Mountainfell, now :-)