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.