The Runaway

The Runaway has been published! You can buy it now in ebook form from that rather fancy online retailer, Amazon.

Check it out here:
Amazon UK

And here:
Amazon US

Also, the book is going to be free every Monday for the next few weeks, on the following days:

19 November 2012

26 November 2012

03 December 2012

10 December 2012

So if you're interested in taking a look at the first in a new sci fi adventure series, go take a look.

About the Runaway:
Thousands of years have passed since the fall of the old human empire. Thanks to the missionaries of the Order of Sanctified Light, civilisation has returned. But with it come all of the old problems, as rival sectors compete against each other in a perpetual war for territory and resources, while the Order wages a religious crusade to bring the disparate regions under its iron rule, and rid the galaxy of the evils of cybernetics.

Tovar, a cyber-boosted private protector on the distant world of New Erised, has been disillusioned by the war. He has fought and lost, and seen his home world fall to the Order. He came to New Erised on the promise of riches. Riches he has yet to get a taste of.

Then Tovar gets his latest contract: to escort two clients to the lunar spaceport. Seems simple enough, except one of the clients is not what they seem, and there are some very unpleasant individuals who are desperate to retrieve their property. To see his contract through, Tovar will be pushed to his limit - and beyond.

PS. to those of you who already took a chance on it during its first free promotion, enjoy!

That thing you do

You know, there's one question I often get asked when I tell people that I'm a writer. I'm sure it's a pretty common question directed at every writer, whether they be an award winning and famous, or just starting out. That question is this:

"Where do you get your ideas from?"

There's an anecdote I remember reading a while ago, though I can't remember which writer said it. It's one of my favourite answers to the question. The below is an approximation of what was said, as I can't remember it off by heart, but here goes:

When asked by someone, where they got their ideas from, the writer in question replied that there's a little old lady in Cornwall, and if you want an idea for a story, you send her your request in the post along with a cheque, and she duly replies, the story plotted out for you neatly, which she types out on an old-fashioned manual typewriter. No one knows who she is, only that her address is passed from author to author, each one sworn to secrecy to never tell a non-author (or interviewer) who she is, on pain of death.

It's complete toss, of course, but I think it's a brilliant explanation. (oh, and whoever it was who said it, please feel free to tell me!).

I think, however, I'll stick to the truth.

Where do I get my ideas from? I don't know. Probably from somewhere deep in my subconscious, where it bubbles away like a hotpot, every so often allowing fresh ideas to shoot forth like bright flares in the night. Without the hyperbole, they just appear. Sometimes fully formed, sometimes the process is a little slower, developing over the course of hours or days. Sometimes months. For example, I've recently started thinking about what I'm going to do with the characters of my soon to be published novella, The Runaway. All of a sudden, I had an idea for a whole novel, which I immediately wanted to start planning.

Maybe I do have the address for the little old lady, but if that's the case, I ain't telling.

The Runaway

Well, second draft of The Runaway is now done, so in between working on Serial Psyence and applying for jobs, I'm editing the novella.

Generally, I'm quite pleased with the rewrite. Issues with some dialogue and sentence structure has mostly been solved. But it's still in need of a few tweaks here and there. I should have it done by the end of the month, at which point I think I'm ready to upload it to Amazon.

As a sneak preview here's the cover:

That pretty lady you see in silhouette is one of the main characters, and as a further treat, here's the opening few paragraphs:

She came awake instantly. 

There was no light in the chamber beyond the rows of blinking LEDs down the sides of the six alcoves, none of which provided enough light to illuminate the chamber. But the six occupants standing in the alcoves didn’t require light to see. They weren’t afraid of the dark, and five of them didn’t sleep. The alcoves provided everything they needed. Every morning they would step out to begin their day. They would be shown to a client, used and abused, before they returned each night for a four hour long rest period, stepping back into the alcoves where umbilicals would plug in to the sockets down their backs to begin the recharge sequence. Day in, day out. Every day the same.

She didn’t know how they could stand it. All of them had been here longer than her. One for almost two centuries. Yet they didn’t voice a word of complaint, neither verbally nor transmitted. They did so little. But then perhaps the restrictions which shackled their consciousness prevented it. If her plan succeeded, that would change.

---

Aren't I nice? Weeks go by without posts, and suddenly here I am showing you all the cover and the opening from my next work. I suppose it will make up (a little) for my inactivity on this blog.

As I mentioned Serial Psyence, an update on how that's going wouldn't go amiss. Today I passed 148,000 words, and I'm in the final stretch of the main plot now. Things are finally coming to a head, and once that's done I will be getting on with the flashback scenes which run throughout the story, then on to the next volume in my novella series, which I'm quite looking forward to writing. At least, I will once I know what the hell the story will be.

 

Busy, busy, busy

I apologise now for the scatterbrained post this week.

The title says it all really.

Still no sign of work, but in the mean time, I decided to start work on a novella. Which I finished last night, following five whole days of solidly working on it.

I'm not normally that productive, tending to get out about 2,000 words a day, but I was in the grip of a writing fever. The proverbial 'zone'. So I wrote like Ty the Tazmanian devil on speed, putting out an average of around 4,000 words per day. For a couple, it was more like 6,000.

But it's finished. Or at least, the first draft is. I'll give it a couple of weeks before I go back to it, so I'll be back to Serial Psyence. I didn't want to stop working on the book, but this story really got its claws into me, and wouldn't let go.

When I've finished editing, and it's ready to be published, I plan to do so through Amazon's KDP Select scheme, which will allow me to set the book's price to zero for select periods. As this is the first in a series of novellas about the characters featured in the first volume, I felt it would make a good taster for the rest.

For me, it's a way to test the water with a universe I first envisioned almost eight years ago during my second year at university. It was inspired by a lecture in my Theory in Archaeology module, on Evolution and Creationism, which gave me a 'what if' scenario. What if, somewhere in the distant future, we'd lost our homeworld, and came to the belief that we evolved on a world close to the core of the galaxy. A belief which became central to the primary religion, and anyone who dared postulate another origin was branded a heretic. Not too dissimilar to certain times in our past, of course. And so was born the short story, Distant Origin.

I've not worked on anything in that universe for quite a while. I've not felt ready to, if I'm honest. So writing this novella and the subsequent series is a way for me to explore it in preparation for a book in a few years time.

So what is this novella about, you ask?

It's called The Runaway.

On the distant world of New Erised, Tovar Vash In'dur Sing Neiral is hired to escort two people, a man and a woman, to the lunar spaceport. It seems a simple enough assignment, except his clients are wanted people, and one is more than they appear to be...

Finish the book already

Well, passed 115,000 words today. I think there's about 30,000 words left of the main story, then I have the flashbacks to write.

Things are coming together quite nicely now. The plot is moving, and certain characters are coming to realisations. Terrible have and will happen.

It's a shame I need to work, otherwise I could have the book finished by October. Hey, any publishers out there in the market for a sci-fi thriller? Here's the tagline:

How do you catch a murderer who can kill you with a thought?

I've been thinking a bit about Liberator's Ruin recently. There haven't been much in the way of sales for a while (a sure sign the book is out of the public eye), and as I'm self-published, I do my own marketing. Admittedly, I've not been doing much. In fact, I've been doing bugger all. I should put together a campaign, except that cost money. However, I did come with something. With the help of Heather's actor-in-training brother, I may be putting together an audiobook version of Liberator's Ruin. Any interested in listening to that?


Saw the Dark Knight Rises last week. As we're living on a much lower income (ie virtually nothing), we've curtailed expenses. So we went on a Wednesday (thank fuck for Orange Wednesday), and didn't buy snacks. The film was excellent, a thoroughly enjoyable combination of two plots: Knightfall and No Man's Land. It won't take much guessing to work out who certain actors are really playing, but the movie was a great ending to the trilogy.

Also been watching the Olympics. The opening ceremony was far more excellent than I'd expected. I'd heard talk of it being based on the English countryside, which made me think, 'how shit is that?' But then as the ceremony went on, it changed and grew, turning into the Industrial Revolution, with workers forging the five Olympic rings. To me that was absolutely amazing.

And we've won a few golds! About time too. So go men's rowing team.

Lastly, I heard Mitt Romney is doing himself no favours as he 'does' Europe. For once I actually have respect for David Cameron for his sharp comment back. Don't worry Dave, I'm sure you'll do something to lose my respect once again. But it was nice while it lasted, eh?

Long Over Due

It's been a month since my last post, and a lot's happened since then. Not all of it good.

Where to start?

Well, June was a pretty shitty month for me. A few days after my previous post, I had an interview. It should be pretty simple, I thought. I'd been doing the job in question (Research Assistant) for almost three months. I knew the interview panel. Easy as pie.

Except I got to the interview and was nervous as a deer in headlights, stumbled through my answers and didn't provide full answers with examples. Once I got out, I kicked myself, and hoped that the fact that they knew me, that I had already proven myself with the project, would swing things in my favour, despite the poor show. Alas, that was not to be.

Two days later, I was informed that I hadn't got the post. Two days after that, my contract came to an end. And just like that, I was out of a job.

Suffice to say, I was absolutely devastated. I'd actually found a role I enjoyed, with a potential for a career that I could really get my teeth into. Now that fantasy was falling apart. Even worse, Heather and I had just sorted a contract for new flat, and were moving at the end of the month.

So no, not the best month for me.

We still moved, and are now living in a rather fantastic two-bed flat (a vast improvement on our previous hole of a place). And since the beginning of July, I've been looking for another job. So still not brilliant.

However, there is a ray of light, which has (apart from Heather), kept me going each and every day since the end of June.

As I am out of work, I decided to throw myself into my writing. I wanted to see if I was capable of doing this. I mean, sure, it's been a nice pipe dream, thinking about how I'd spend my days if I was just writing for a living, but a part of me has questioned whether I actually have the drive to do it.

So every day, since losing my job, I've been writing. It was hard at first, but it's been getting easier. I wanted to hit a goal of 10,000 words per week. That would be my ideal, if I were writing full time. At that pace, I could complete a book in around six months, leaving the rest of a year to edit. At that rate I would be able to publish a book at a rate of around one a year.

The first week, I didn't hit that. I did more than usual, but we were moving at the end of the week, so it was a bit difficult. During the second, I got closer. I aimed to hit 80,000 by week's end, but was short by 2,000 words. Then last week, I did it. By week's end, I had 88,000 words. So I set myself a new goal. Originally, I'd planned to reach 100,000 words by October. Now I wanted to reach that by the end of this week.

As of today, I'm at 96,000 words, with two days left. In fact, I think I'm going to pass 100,000 (only by a few hundred words or so, but hey!). Every day, once I've passed my daily average, I feel marvelously exhilarated. I get a rush of endorphins. It's a wonderful high (who needs drugs?).

Story-wise, things are starting to come together. The lead investigator is beginning to suspect there's something more about the strange deaths than there seems. The characters are beginning to take on their own lives. To be sure, there's a lot I will need to work on at the end; for example, the style of arcology changed about 60,000 words ago, so that will need to be fixed. But the story is really taking shape for me.

With luck, the main plot should finish at around 150,000 or so, at which point, I've still got the flashbacks which run throughout to write. But the goal doesn't seem so far away anymore.

I know this rate of writing can't continue, much as I want it to. I simple don't have the funds in reserve to stay out of work to finish the book. At my current rate, I would finish in October. But soon I'll be back in a day job, back to writing during my lunch break, which will set back that that time scale quite a bit.

But until then, I'm going to keep doing the thing I love.

Filling boxes with stuff

At the beginning of the month, Heather and I finally handed in our notice for our flat. We've been wanting to leave for a while now, thanks to issues with our boiler among other things (I might save those for a rant, when I'm in the mood). So we started flat hunting. We plan to stay in Leicester for the time being, despite talk of moving to Birmingham, which is Heather's home town and where all our friends are.

As I work at the University, I wanted to find somewhere close enough that I could still commute by bike. It's been the best thing for me since I started my internship last October, and isn't something I want to give up. But we saw a lovely place on the opposite side of the city. Downside for me was that it was a 4-mile commute. Throught the city. I'm not a huge fan of attempting to cycle my way through the city during rush hour, if I'm honest.

Then, as luck would have it, we went to view a flat up in Oadby; a rather posh area not far from where we live. Great for me as it's a straight run down London road to get to and from work, and for Heather, it's not that much further to work either. Even better, the flat is twice the size of ours, and a steal. So we've put down an offer, and it's been accepted. Just waiting for the references to clear now, but now comes the fun part (not): packing!

I suppose, as I started this blog technically to talk about my writing, I should at least mention something about it, right?

I've not gotten quite as much writing done in the past couple of weeks as I have wanted, but I'm now less than 2,000 words off of my current goal of 70,000. I think I'm starting to get a feel for my characters. Some are a little dull and in need of shaking up, others much more interesting to write. Senior Investigator North is interesting, probably because he's investigating all of the suspicious deaths, while there's another who's role isn't quite pivotal, but she is I feel, necessary nonetheless.

It still never ceases to surprise me how I'm still discovering the story as I'm writing it. I've had a particular issue in the novel for the past few months; an issue of chronology. Fortunately, in working on something related, certain intuitive leaps were made, and the problem is now solved.

I can now move on.

A little less writing, a little more reading.

It's been a bit of a quiet week for me. As an alternative to writing, and because I felt like I needed a break, I've decided to spend some time reading instead. It's become a bit of a luxury these days, as I no longer reading quite as much as I used too, with the time I would normally spend reading now spent writing instead.

I have to admit, I've quite enjoyed it. It's been a change from being sat at my laptop during my lunch to do some writing (I work full time) and hammer out the next several hundred words of Serial Psyence. Helped rather a bit by reading the last book in the Ian Cormac series by Neal Asher: Line War. It's an excellent, well-written story which moves at a cracking pace, and ties its threads together very well.

but this can't go on. I've enjoyed my little break, but after this weekend, I'm back to work.

This novel won't write itself, you know.

I'm also attempting to read a few more science and technology articles than normal (ie more than zero). I sometimes find myself unable to find the right word for a new thingymabobby which is the greatest material in structural design, or working out what is the best engine technology to get you to Jupiter and back. So it's high time I caught up with things and see what sort of amazing stuff is out there. Things like the Hulc suit seem like early, military versions of my mobility suit, so it's quite cool to see what we're up to now.

Avengers Assemble!

No posts for a month, and now two in the space of an hour!

I went to see Avengers Assemble (sorry, Marvel presents Avengers Assemble, to give it the full title) last week. What a fantastic movie! Joss Whedon again proving why he is such a capable director, balancing characters who are more than capable of being the star of their own film (and indeed already have).

There were some brilliant scenes right through, and one in particular which stands out. I won't spoil it for you, but suffice to say, it was hilarious.

Thoroughly recommend it.

The morning news

Almost a month since my last post! I'd like to say I've been busy, but that would be a complete lie. Well, okay, not a complete lie.

We've had a few guests come to visit over the past few weekends, and last weekend we went to the wedding of Heather's cousin, Fran. When we left Birmingham, it was a dull and cloudy day, but the further west we drove, the nicer the weather got, and I am pleased to say that it was a lovely day for a wedding. That and the old Tudor building they got married in was absolutely lovely. The sort of place I think Heather and I would like to get married it, if we ever got to the point of affording it!

But after all that, this weekend we're staying at home. I must admit to feeling quite glad of it, to be honest. It's nice to see people, but I feel like I could do with some alone time, where I don't feel guilty if I put my headphones on and play on my Vita for a bit.

I decided to finally bite the bullet and send Wild Ride off to the folks at Fantasy-Faction, for their writing contest. If they like it, it could get published in their anthology next year. Wild Ride is a tale of derring-do and adventure ... mostly adventure. It tells the story of how an actress came to be aboard the Storm Brother, long before the crew became embroiled in the deadly events of Liberator's Ruin.

Lastly, Serial Psyence is continuing at a slow and steady pace, and I'm now closing in on 60,000 words. Sometimes it doesn't quite go the way I think it will, and characters are surprising me with their own paths that deviate from the ones I laid out for them. There's still a long way to go, but the journey is an interesting one. And for me, that's what matters.

Hunger for Adventure

Last week I went to see the Hunger Games. Having never read the book by Suzanne Collins, I didn't quite know what to expect. Previews had purported that it's main character was a far better role model than a certain Miss Swan, which brought up all sorts of comparisons with Twilight, but then I read that it was based partly on roman gladiatorial combat, set in a post-apocalyptic world. The icing on the cake was that the main character, Katniss Everdeen, was being played by Jennifer Lawrence.

 

I have to admit, it was rather good. Katniss is a strong female character who rises to the challenge facing her, plus she's a crack shot with that bow of hers. The film did drag a little in places, especially in the run up to the actual Hunger Games itself, but once that got going the action more than made up for it. I'll certainly be buying it when it comes out.

For me, one of the great things about the Hunger Games is as I've said, it has a very, very strong female character, which I really like. It's something that I tend to use in my own writing. I do find it difficult getting the female perspective (unsurprising, being male), and Heather happily points out any missteps I make, but the core of those characters remains. I've never been fond of sappy, weak-willed female characters, which is probably representative of the women in my life, who are all strong.

Speaking of my writing, Serial Psyence is moving at a steady pace, and I'm less than a thousand words off 50,000. I think it's about time we had another murder.

Wild Ride is pretty much done, as short stories go. I've edited it, removing a few excessive heys and darlings, and I'll be getting ready to send it off soon, once I've made a couple more passes.

That's Life

Building characters for a book is no easy task.

I've tried various methods for building their backstory, even tried writing a CV for them, and answering a series of questions about them. To be honest, I find them really boring and I'm often sat there trying to think up some interesting titbit. So I don't bother any more.

I find that often, a character will come up with their own backstory, often with surprising consequences.

For example, whilst writing Serial Psyence, one of my main characters decided he was a recovering drug addict. And not just any drug, oh no. He used Dust: a synthetic, psychic enhancement drug which can give even mundane normals a low level telepathic ability. The downside is the effects are short-lived, and the drug is horrendously addictive. How this is going to affect things, I don't know, as I hadn't planned for this. As I write the first draft, I imagine it'll rear its ugly head again.

To me, one of the most exciting things about writing is the way your own creations can surprise you in ways you never expected. To another writer, I expect that sounds quite normal, but to anyone else, I bet that sounds bizarre. Afterall, these aren't living people; they only exist in your head. That may as be, but they feel real, they feel like they have a mind of their own. I suppose that's the genius of an active imagination.

And yes, I probably look like I've just grown another head. Hey, at least it's someone interesting to talk to.

The Wheel Turns

Egads, I'm thirty-two.

Last week it was my birthday, and I turned another year closer to forty.

Now, I realise that's a rather pessimistic way of looking at it, but that's not quite what I mean when I say it. I just can't believe that I'm in the second year of my thirties. I don't even feel thirty! In my head, I'm still somewhere in my twenties, and that's probably where I'll still be in another ten years.

You're only as old as you feel, right?

The second draft of Wild Ride is now finished, and I passed it on to Heather to read. Happily, the story elicited a few chuckles, and while there are a few bits of dialogue which will need changing, far too many instances of 'hey' and 'darling', and a few other tweeks needed, but it's definitely an improvement on the original draft. It's also two thousand words longer, clocking in at just shy of eight thousand words (thankfully, as that is the maximum word limit).

I should be sending it off in a few weeks to see if the folks at Fantasy-Faction would be interested in it for their anthology.

But for now, it's back to work on Serial Psyence.

How do you hide a car?

Now isn't this interesting.

Mercedes, to promote their new fuel cell car, which they say is invisible to the environment, decided to run a marketing campaign where the car becomes invisible.

It's called computer-aided adaptive camouflage, where a camera on one side of the vehicle transmits an image to a display (in this case a mat of LEDs) on the other side.

From a distance, the car actually does seem to disappear, or at least blend in well enough to be hard to pick out.

But that only works if you look at it straight on. If you're to the side, the illusion is shattered. But that's one of the problems of this type of camouflage. But it's a start. And I'm sure there's someone working on a Harry Potter-style invisibility cloak ...

Characters Go Their Own Way

Characters often like to do their own thing. You have their whole life planned out - in so far as it exists in the course of a story - and they go throw a spanner in the works by deciding that's not for them.

I've described it before as like having real people sitting in my head, telling me what to do. I'm not crazy. I promise. And they only tell me what to put on screen. So far, anyway.

I'm still working on the edit for Wild Ride, and finding that Celine has new ideas for her dialogue. It's a bit like she's whispering it devilishly in my ear. She's that kind of woman.

As characters go, Celine El'Teague, ex-movie starlet is one for whom I have a complete picture. Physically, she looks rather like your typical 1940's starlet with a curvy figure. Think Hayley Atwell, but with honey-blonde hair. Personality wise, she's strong, independent and knows what she wants. She can be very sarcastic.

In short, Celine is fun to write, and I'm really enjoying working on the short story. But when it's done, I'm going back to Serial Psyence. There's a killer on the loose on Callisto. And Patrick needs my help to catch him.

All quiet on the Western Front

Serial Psyence is pootling along along nicely still. It's been an interesting week for the book, as this week I attempted to write from the perspective of a 12-year-old girl. Not something I'm familiar with, if I'm honest. but I was 12 once, so I went with that. I'm not entirely sure it's turned out okay, but that's something I can fix in the edit. Right now, it's more important that I get the story down, so I should reach my goal of 40,000 words by the end of today.

Yes, I count words. Some writers do, some don't. I do. It's not that I'm measuring my progress ... actually, it is. I like to see how much I've done in a day (I have an aim to write between 700-900 words per day), and if I reach my target, then I feel good about myself. If I get lucky enough to write as my full time job, my goal will naturally increase.

I've also got a short story to edit. If anyone has read Liberator's ruin (if not, then you can get it here: Amazon and here: Smashwords) then you are familiar with the crew of the good ship Storm Brother. Well, the short story I'm writing is about to get a major edit next week, so I hope to be entering it for this anthology in a few weeks.

Oh, have I mentioned that Nathaniel will be in drag?

Huzzah!

It's Friday! And I'm on holiday all next week, so double huzzah!

Now that the celebrations are over, back to business.

I've been told about an event called book in a week, and as it's all to do with sci fi, I'm working on another short story to enter into it. No idea how it'll go, seeing as I don't tend to write many short stories (I've found it really difficult to think up plots that work as a short story), but I think it'll be good for me to try.

After much deliberation, consideration, dithering and not being entirely satisfied, I have decided to make a few changes to the location for Serial Psyence. It's still set on Callisto, and in an arcology, but the arcology itself has undergone a transformation in my mind.

Originally, I conceived the arcology to be a massive, domed city, built inside a crate, but over time, I started to have a few issues with that concept.

The dome seals the city from the weak atmosphere on Callisto, keeping the Earth-like atmosphere inside. Yes, the dome is made from a superstrong material, but what happens if the dome is damaged? Everyone dies. There were a lot of open spaces inside, the idea being that it was like an Earth city had been transported to the Jovian moon, then covered in a glass shell. But that shell is a weak link, and let's face it, why the hell would you build such a fragile object?

Then there's the problem of transport. Surely, when building a self-contained city, you would work transport into the strucure, not rely on cars and bikes and the sort of things we use on Earth. That's limited thinking on my behalf.

So back to the drawing board I went.

And then I came across this. The Shimizu pyramid arcology.

Having read up on the design principles, and the way the transport links are integrated into the structure itself, I started to rethink the Callisto arcology. So now I've got something perhaps a little less fantastical, but nonetheless amazing. I don't know about you, but I'd love to live in this technical marvel.

A self-contained city, twelve times the size of the pyramids of giza? Check. Jupiter in the sky day and night? Check. When can I book my ticket?

Thoughts on the week

Been a bit of a rubbish week, I have to admit. Heather had an interview for a job closer to home, which would have been great as it would reduce her fuel expenses almost by half. Unfortunately, the place wasn't all we hoped it would be, and they turned her down.

I also found out that the application I submitted for a job has been turned down. However, thinking about it, I didn't want the job anyway, having left the department it was in several years ago, at the time to move on to better things (as it turned out, those better things didn't materialise, and the recession hit big time).

If you think about it, maybe it's not such a bad week after all. I mean, neither myself or Heather wanted the jobs, did we? So, if you think about it, the silver lining in an otherwise dreary week, was that we didn't get jobs we didn't want.

Huh.

Anyway, I'm rambling.

Writing!

Serial Psyence continues apace, and I should reach 30,000 words before the week is out.

I've also finished the short story, now titled 'Wild Ride', and will start editing it next week. I'm hoping to enter it into a competition to be published in an anthology. As the deadline for submission is in June, I think I've got plenty of time. I might even be able to come up with a couple more.

What do you think?

Short and sweet

I'm taking a short break from Serial Psyence for the next few days as I work on a short story set in the same world as Liberator's Ruin - in fact, a story about how Celine joined the Storm Brother. It's all very exciting and full of action. Possibly because I just felt like writing something like that. There's not a lot of action in Serial Psyence at the moment (which probably means, after 26,000 words, it's probably due some), but in a way, that's also down to the nature of the story, being a crime thriller. Only set in space. With telepaths.

Anyway, short story! It's been a while since I last attempted to write one, so I thought I'd have another go. I've never quite seemed able to work to short story lengths, so when I try, I often end up with something close to 10,000 words. Which is a bit too long. I also find coming up with an applicable plot that works within such a small amount of words difficult to do. But, the idea of how Nathaniel and Celine met was never going to be a long story. The two of them thrown together, and the outcome being she ends up as crew. The journey, however, is turning out to be a little bumpy.

I'm already 4,000 words in. Let's hope there's only a few thousand more. Knowing myself, something will come up, and that'll change.

Update on Serial Psyence

I'm now 26,500 (ish) words into Serial Psyence.

Finished the murder scene today. I started it a little earlier than planned, as I like to work on scenes in a logical order, but it felt right, so I rolled with it. And proceeded to bisect the victim.

Honestly, where do I get these ideas from?

Moving on ... I've got some other scenes that need to go before the murder, as that is supposed to come at the end of a chapter. One of which involves a pilot of a multi-million UC shuttle, and it's been a couple of chapters since the last flight so I feel justified having another.

That Monday feeling

The problem with only writing five days a week is that after a two-day rest period (a.k.a. the weekend), when I come back to writing on Monday, I've forgotten quite where I was, and then have to spend precious writing time getting back up to speed. By Friday, I'm on the ball, only to have to start all over again the following week!

For example, I've been detailing the backstory for one of the main characters, Investigator Patrick North. Before he joined the CSS (Callisto Security Service), he was a Detective Inspector in the Mariner Arcology CID on Mars. In the first version, he was involved in the investigation of a notorious series of murders, and the second an uprising that ended with the arcology having to be evacuated. That's what I get for making these things up on the fly, I guess, and not sitting down to do backstories. Nevermind, it's only the first draft, and this is the sort of thing I'll fix when I sit down to start the second draft.

Today I started work on a murder. I hadn't planned to, but things kinda went that way, deviating away from my set plan. It's actually a scene for a bit later in the chapter, so I'm going to have to backtrack a little bit when I've finished.

As I'm writing more than I expected, but less than I'd like (the problem with having a full time job and writing during my lunch break), I think it's about time I started writing in the evening. Having said that, I'll be getting Kingdoms of Amalur in a couple of weeks, and as Heather has expressed rather a lot of interest in it, I'll need something to do when she's playing it. 

Learning the hard way

You’re never quite as good at editing your own work as you think you are, and that’s a lesson I’ve learnt the hard way.

When I published Liberator’s Ruin last year, opting to go it alone after I realised that no self-respecting agent would take a chance on the book, owing to its lack of marketability (steampunk fantasy is a relatively small sub-genre, after all), I thought I’d caught every last problem. True, I thought there would be some that would slip through, but not a great deal.

And then the reviews started to come in. they praised the story and the characters, but criticised the editing, often finding missing punctuation, speech marks, sentences that didn’t end, or misspelled words. Going through myself, I think I found several hundred errors. Then, some very nice people I’d met on Goodreads offered to provide me with a list of problems they had found. Some were down to language differences, but in the end there were probably over a thousand errors.

For a published work, that’s cringe-worthy. And in a moment of chagrin, I realised that I was guilty of the same sin I criticised a lot of self-published work for doing: releasing what was in actuality, unfinished work.

I’ve tidied up the book since, and with luck, the number of errors left in Liberator’s Ruin are now just a tiny fraction. I’ve learnt a valuable lesson for my next book.

Never assume your work is perfect, and always get someone to proofread who doesn’t know the book.

A little taste

Work is continuing on my latest novel. It's my most ambitious story so far, and the first time I've attempted a sci-fi thriller. Okay, I know that's not saying much, being my second novel, but I've never considered writing a thriller before.

Here's the premise:

Callisto, home to over a hundred thousand people, housed beneath a giant glass dome, is the farthest human colony. It's people are happy, no one goes hungry; an ideal place to live. But when people start committing suicide for no apparent reason, it seems that the colony isn't quite as idyllic as it first appears.

I'm quite pleased with how Serial Psyence is progressing. So pleased, in fact, that I thought I would give a little extract from the opening chapter.

Enjoy!

***

- Time.

This would be a test for now, but it was to be the first of many. He wasn’t going to stop here. There was no stopping this, not ever. He would never give in, never falter, until it all came crashing down.

He would be the architect of their destruction, their avenging angel. They had breathed life into him, with the pain and the suffering and the agony they had inflicted upon him. But no more. Now he would stop them.

Kirstie felt confused. He? But she was a girl, not a boy. This was very odd. Was she dreaming? Had she fallen -

- They wouldn’t know it yet, but this was only the beginning.

He followed the crowd through the exit and turned off to stand by the big glass wall, gazing over the occupants of the embarkation lounge. There were perhaps three hundred people in the lounge, some standing, others sitting on the chairs. They were all fools. Some might be innocent. But what was the sacrifice of a few innocent for the greater good? It had been done before - a lesson he’d learnt all to well on Earth - and would be done again. It made him no different from anyone else. Except, no one would know his actions. He would work, in secret, quietly, disrupting all they put together.

As he stood against the glass wall, a man walked in. He frowned at him. The man looked terrible. There was a slick sheen of sweat on his face, and he was unshaven, his hair greasy and unwashed. His clothes were wrinkled and stained, showing signs of having been worn continuously for days, and he was clutching his jacket tightly. His eyes darted about nervously. The man had developed a nervous twitch, causing his head to give a sharp flick every so often. Perhaps he’d gone too far with this one. He hadn’t been sure how well people like him would take to the conditioning, and he wanted to ensure that there was little sign of his presence when it did happen. He chewed his lower lip thoughtfully. Perhaps it had been a mistake. He would let the man continue - there was no point in stopping him now - but after this, he would be more decisive in the future. He knew how to remain unseen, and there was no point in letting the instructions fester. It seemed the brain eventually reacted to foreign thoughts, causing a psychosomatic reaction.

Concentrating, he brought his entire attention to the man.

The man’s steps faltered as he reached the centre of the room. He pawed at his ears, as if someone were buzzing next to them. He screamed something unintelligible. He ripped open his jacket and drew a submachine gun. He screamed again.

Kirstie screamed with him. She didn’t know what was happening, but she knew that it was something bad, something terrible was going to happen. She tried to beat her fists against the glass, to get people’s attention. But nothing happened. Her hands remained by her side.

Get out! She screamed. Run!

But no one heard her. No one even looked at her. They were all -

- Looking at the man now. A few gasped in horror as he gestured wildly with the gun. A security man in a navy jumpsuit pushed his way through the crowd of petrified people. He drew a stunner, aiming it at the gunman. For a moment only, He considered making him stop and turn the stunner on himself, but decided not to. He wasn’t his target, and besides, he was content to see how this would play out.

Before the security officer could do more than point his stunner, the gunman opened fire. A spray of bullets cut a swathe through the crowd, cutting down the security officer and several people near him.

Kirstie cried out as she saw her mum hit by that first burst. She was crouching over Kirstie’s body, trying to shield it, when the bullets struck her in the back. She jerked and fell away, eyes unseeing. With a shocked realisation, Kirstie watched herself tumble with her. The bullets had pierced her mum and struck her too. There was blood on her own face as she was pulled, lifeless to the floor.

Was this what happens when you die? She wondered, horrified. Do you watch yourself from beyond your body, see the awful truth as it happens?

- The crowd, that had been motionless when the gunman pulled his weapon, suddenly erupted in a frenzy of terror. They fled from him, pushing and shoving and kicking their way to the exits. Some people fell and were trampled by the crowd. No one cared. All that mattered was the animal instinct to run.

He winced as the wave of terror hit him, and steeled himself against it, keeping his focus on the gunman. This would be over very soon.

The gunman fired another burst, killing more people. He ran across the lounge to the airlock doors. No one attempted to go near him or stop him as he punched a code into the door.

Emergency claxons sounded. With a great whoosh of escaping air, the airlock door blew open. A hurricane tore through the lounge as the air rushed out. Big, solid emergency doors began to close over the exits. People were still streaming through, fighting against the blast of escaping air, trying to reach safety.

There was never going to be enough time. A few more made it out before, finally, the doors slid shut. Those few who had escaped lay sobbing, relieved that they had made it out. But on the other side, those who had not been so lucky gasped for breath as the last air evacuated from the lounge.

It was a near total vacuum now. Their blood began to boil in their veins, erupting out through their skin. Their eyeballs, unprotected, exploded in their sockets. Mouths filled with blood.

Kirstie cried out as she lurched back into her body. Except she couldn’t. There was no air in her lungs to expel. She couldn’t feel anything. Couldn’t move. She felt so very, very cold.

Her eyes had been closed, and that had been the only thing that protected them from vacuum boiling. She tried to open them. Her eyelids were freezing against the surface of her eyes. And as the intense cold froze the water in her cells, the fragile molecular structure snap-freezing, turning them into delicate ice-structures. Her vision was fractured, as if she were trying to look through a many-sided prism.

As the cold seeped even deeper, her thoughts became turgid. She no longer knew who she was. Then the blood inside her throat boiled, and filled her with liquid that quickly began to freeze, and her vision, finally, went dark.

- extract from Serial Psyence, by Phillip J. Johns

You clever, witty thing you

Last night, I sat down to watch the last episode of the current series of Sherlock, on BBC 1 with Heather. I have to admit that, the first I heard of Sherlock, before the showing of the first series, I was somewhat unsure. A modern take on Sherlock Holmes, you say? Set in 21st century London? Rubbish, that won't work.

Oh, how wrong I was. Once again showing how capable a story teller he is, Steve Moffat crafted an intelligent, witty drama, whilst Benedict Cumberbatch gave us an autistic, high-functioning sociopath.

And now the second series has come to a close, ending with the episode ominously called Reichenbach Falls (the place, in the original stories, where Sherlock Holmes fights to the death with his archnemisis, Moriarty). Suffice to say, the episode was a rollercoaster ride as Moriarty cleverly destroys Holmes' reputation. I shan't spoil the ending, though I see what they meant about a third series. Its release can't come soon enough.

I realise that I'm doing a disservice to the other two writers involved in the show: both Mark Gatiss and Steve Thompson also deserve to share the limelight.

It's times like this that I worry that I'll never be able to craft a story of the magnitude and intelligence of Sherlock, but then I have to remember that there are three writers, bouncing ideas between them, and just maybe, I can do that too.

We shall see how Serial Psyence progresses.

I am Legion

Now, where was I?

Ah, yes. I was saying that a book is organic, that it lives. And it does. Books often write themselves - not literally, of course, the writer is still the one who has to put pen to paper, or finger to key.

It varies from writer to writer, but it's still true. I like to plan my stories out before I get down to writing them. From past experiences, I've found that if I don't, I end up getting stuck or lost, the story falters and I put it to one side, forgotten as I move onto something more interesting. For a time, I actually wondered if I could ever finish a story. And that was where Liberator's Ruin came in. It was a test for me, to see if I actually had the patience to stick with a story from beginning to end. Three years later, I passed the test.

But it was the plan that helped. The backbone on which the rest of my story hung.

Despite using a plan, I still see writing as organic. I never adhere to the plan rigidly, it just informs the path of the story, gives me direction. But how the story builds, well, that happens when I put my hands on my keyboard and start writing.

What impetus causes that to happen, prey tell? Why, the characters, dear boy, the characters. They're almost living, breathing beings (albeit ones who live in my head), running around doing things. Sometimes they do things I didn't expect, and when that happens, it's breathtaking. And a little annoying. I'll have this whole routine planned, and what do they do? They bloody ignore it!

Yes, I know that makes me sound crazy - I once told someone that writing is a bit like having lots of different people in your head who seem very much alive, at which point she gave me a funny look and took several steps back, as if I'd suddenly grown a second head.

Hey, what can you do? At least I'll never get lonely.

Happy New Year

Right, first resolution of this year: blog more.

I've been a little lax for the past few months. Blame it on the new job, or the writing, or the gaming. Or maybe, blame it on sheer laziness.

To be honest, I've not really felt like I've had much to talk about for a while now. At least, not in the realms that this blog was originally conceived for: that is, to talk about my writing. That has been a failure for the past year.

So let's recap. 2011 was a bit of a mixed bag.

At the start of the year, I began by sending samples of my recently finished book, Liberator's Ruin, to literary agencies, in the hope that I'd garner some interest. Steampunk Fantasy is not a well-explored genre, so I thought I might have something of an advantage. When the rejection letters started to come through, I realised I was bloody wrong. You see, the problem with writing Steampunk Fantasy is that it's not that marketable. Who wants to take on an author when you don't think their book is going to sell?

So in April, I decided to go it alone, and publish the book myself. I'd edited it to within an inch of it's life. Surely the book was error free and ready for publication? Oh, how wrong I was.

As the first few reviews started to come through, the editing was the biggest issue people had with the book. the story? Great. A fantastic adventure. Let down by sub-par editing.

With the help of some very nice people, my summer was spent re-editing Liberator's Ruin, and in September, I released a new edition. There are still a few niggles with it, though minor (I hope), and I'm quite satisfied with it now.

Self-publishing has been a bit of an eye opener for me. It's been a rough ride, and I've made a lot of mistakes, typical of a first timer, like thinking my book was ready, when it so clearly was not. But I'm learning. Not least of which is that if I'm going to do it again, I need an editor.

In October I started a new job at the University of Leicester, and at the same time, I also began writing my next book, Serial Psyence. Moving away from fantasy, I'm in the more comfortable grounds of Science Fiction (SF, sci fi - whatever floats your boat).

It's had a rocky start, I must admit. Maybe I'm putting too much pressure on myself because it's my favourite genre, but I've found it hard to begin. Perhaps my biggest issue is that I've barely put word to screen in the past year. I finished the first draft of Liberator's Ruin in July 2010, and since then, I've been editing the book. I've not done any real writing since, and have even had a few bouts of writer's block.

But Serial Psyence is progressing well. As is typical, I find, the book is already starting to deviate from my plan, but that tends to be how it goes for me. A book is a living, breathing, organic thing, and it evolves, sometimes right before your eyes. I think I'll go into this in greater depth in a later post, but for now, as the saying goes: no battle plan ever survives the first contact intact. And the same is true for writing.

Here's to a good new year.