Tag: Codename Foxglove

Crusader … is available

On By TomIn Achievement, author honesty, author ideas, beta readers, collections, editing, General, Insight, killing your darlings, Novel, paperback, paperbacks, Promotion, reading, relaxation, Review, self-publishing, series, thriller, work in progress, writing

Crusader is available as an eBook, and the paperback edition will follow soon.

Once again, I immersed myself in the story, aiming to create not only believable, but memorable characters and situations. There are only so many plots irrespective of the genre, so it’s the duty of the author to create twists and turns to develop the tale from the first word to the last.

Writers often create a formula which works for their readers, and while this is acceptable, it is the differences that will spell success or failure for an individual story.

Another area that can affect how a new tale is received is the length. My first draft of this story ended at 120k words. It took a lot of work to reduce it to 112k words which is how it went out to my beta readers. In response to their feedback, and because I wanted to tighten up the narrative, I reduced the content to 106k words.

As explained in a previous post, my secondary character was taking centre stage too often, so I removed whole chapters, and Constance deserved her own story. You’ll see from my Work in Progress that her tale will be the sequel to Crusader.

For those of you interested in such things, a handful of characters from the Beyond The Law and Codename titles play cameo roles in Crusader, and they earn the right to be there. I may get Constance: Crusader – Part 2, underway, but I’m in no rush. It has to feel like a different hero taking the lead, and to create that, I must leave the Jason and Constance team alone for a short while.

If you’ve never read my crime thrillers, this would be a good one to try. If you have read my work, I’m confident that you’ll enjoy Crusader.

Thank you, once again for valuable input from fellow author, Carmen Lopez, and from IASD authors: Lesley Hayes, Barbara Speake, Penny Luker, and Ruth Coulson.

My thanks also to those who take the time to read my work, and this writing blog.

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My Writing Year – 2021

On By TomIn Achievement, author ideas, collections, editing, erotica, fantasy, General, Insight, Novel, paperbacks, paranormal, post-apocalyptic, Promotion, pseudonym, Review, sci-fi, self-publishing, series, Short Stories, thriller, work in progress6 Comments

Most of my time over the past couple of years has been spent in fictional worlds, which might sound peculiar but has for me, been a blessing. As an author I’ve found it easier than many people to accept national and international travel restrictions. Late in the year I fitted in trips up to Scotland and across to Amsterdam. In both cases I witnessed a different real world from before Covid 19.

I started my writing year as usual, with targets. Four new titles was always going to be ambitious, but without ambition, there’s little point in setting goals. Next Steps: and other stories, Sylvia: Beyond the Apocalypse, Codename: Foxglove, and Crusader were all in the line-up. Of those, only Crusader remains a Work in Progress.

What else filled my time?

A challenge I’d set myself was to produce my mainstream titles in paperback, which created a lot of work. The task was accomplished. A secondary job was to publish my short stories in paperback but not include tales from my anthologies which had been submitted by guest authors.

To cut a long story short, if you’ll pardon the pun, I had eighty tales which I mixed to produce four volumes of twenty short stories. My aim here was multi-faceted:

– produce books which were value for money for readers.

– an approximately equal word count.

– a mix of genre but without erotica.

– all my own work.

Did I maintain any other author interests?

As always, I filled in many hours reading, reviewing, beta-reading for fellow members of the IASD, and mentoring a couple of aspiring authors.

Apart from those things, I offered my services to my pseudonym. For her part, she produced five new titles. Her books are slightly shorter than mine but have plenty of action, albeit for a different taste. Five may sound like a lot, but they are written over a longer time period because most are based on notes and short story ideas from over the years.

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Do I believe I’ve had a productive writing year?

Yes, I do, and as we all look forward to 2022, I’m content with the titles I have planned. One of next year’s stories is Selena: Sea Nymph, my first attempt at sci-fi paranormal fantasy. The first five chapters are available for reading and comments in my Work in Progress menu.

I already know how most of my author’s year will be spent in 2022, and 2023, so I’ll drop a hint with my New Writing Year blog in January 2022.

Comments and suggestions are welcome as always, and thank you for taking the time to read my blog.

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