Hello, welcome.
Please excuse me for being cryptic – there are some very interesting things that should happen in September. I am being patient and can’t say too much, but – fingers crossed – I will be able to let you know about them soon.
Anyway, September has arrived, and I have moved up a gear. I was having difficulty leaving The Dark Crown alone. It had been out for a while and continues to sell well. However, I was not happy with it.
So I decided to go through it again, tidy up some of the language and rectify some grammar issues. I also added to the last chapter to give it more emotional punch. I’ve also tweaked the front cover following some advice I received. The end product is a book I am much happier with and will now leave alone.
Book two – Coven of Shadows – is moving along ok. There is one particular chapter that I was having real difficulty finishing. Being stuck in the same one for so long really sucked. It drained my momentum and gave me the feeling that I was making no progress.
To help change things, I split it in two. It makes sense to do so and will save readers from having to go through such a huge chapter. This gave me the feeling – perhaps falsely – that I was making progress.
The second half of the chapter is still causing me problems, but the end is in sight. The other things that have made a difference are that I’ve also introduced another major character – a bad one – and it has added some fresh impetus to the chapter. It also signals the start of a new set of challenges for one of the main protagonists.
In my last update I spoke about Imposter Syndrome, something that all writers suffer from. It is the negative voice that you hear, telling you that your writing is not good, that no-one will read or like your work and generally tries to convince you to give up.
It is something that has been pertinent this last month because I received my first 1 out of 5 star review on Amazon. So I have decided to write a whole post about it and how it has affected both me and my writing. It’ll be out in a week or so.
Things I am looking forward to this month are the new Joe Abercrombie novel ‘The Trouble With Peace’ and getting into a new fantasy author Philip C Quaintrell. He’s been around for a few years and although I know I’m late in finding him, he sounds brilliant and his books have some of the best front covers I’ve seen.
Also, go see Tenet, it’s in cinemas and is brilliant.
Take care of yourself and each other.
Steve
scgowland.com 