March 2026
As I’ve mentioned in the past, I like to post an update here at least once a month. More if there’s tasty news to share. Also as I’ve mentioned, there isn’t always any news to share (tasty or otherwise) and I’m not convinced non-writers care too much about the process of writing a book. The finished result, yes. The weeks and months (sometimes years) of getting there. . .not so much. But that’s most of what this is about. Bum in chair, fingers on keyboard and looking for the story. For the characters. For the next word. And the next. And the next. Until things take off and go their own way from the idea or plot or notes the writer had in mind for their tale. For what it’s worth, I tend to work with a loose set of notes and something so vague that I’m not sure it can really be called an outline. Plenty of writers I admire a great deal start with an idea and a character and that’s literally it. They’re winging it page to page. Even after doing this for thirty years, I’m crap at that almost all of the time. It’s worked out once or twice but for the most part, I need a thin idea of what the hell is next and where I’m going. Otherwise I get lost and can rarely find my way out.
That’s the case with the first draft of what I’m working on now. I started this book right at the beginning of January with my loose outline. Generally speaking, it went well until maybe six weeks ago when all the shit with my now ex publisher hit the fan. Turns out massive professional and personal stress isn’t good for creativity. So my output has slowed to a crawl since then. I think it’s taken me maybe five weeks to write 20k which w0uld usually be around two weeks of work. The bigger issue with this is it then becomes work rather than anything enjoyable. A slog. A grind. A bunch of scenes and events that don’t flow and up feeling like a bunch of ideas the writer chucks at the page in the hope something sticks. Of course, the first draft of everything is shit and this is where further drafts and extensive edits come into play. But it’s still deflating to have it going well only for factors competely outside of the writer’s control to utterly fuck it all up.
On the other hand, that’s part of the job.
With that in mind, my focus since PublisherGate has been to stick to the new book and ignore everything else for now outside of sending my two homeless books to publishers. One has replied to say no thanks but sub again. The whole thing is always a long waiting game so I don’t expect any more replies for now. When they come, they come. Another issue out of the writer’s control. So, current draft should be done in the next month and come in somewhere around the 80-90k mark. Plenty of work for a second draft and I should really work out what the title is sooner or later. Once this draft is done, I’ll leave it for a few weeks and hit the submissions on my other books - publishers rather than agents for these two - and then get this new one into shape which includes the submission package (my least favourite part of this by a long way) for agents. And if there are any newbies reading this who are in the early days of the agent hunt, I can assure it never gets any easier. Sorry, but this isn’t a game for bullshitting anyone. It never gets easier.
Outside of writing, the plans my wife and I had to move house are on hold thanks to the UK mortgage industry shitting itself over the orange fuck’s disastrous war in Iran. If things calm down and approach normal (hahahaha) in the next few months, we can rethink it. For now, though, we’ll stay where we are and hope for the best.
Because what else is there?
Take care. Talk soon.
Luke