I’ve just finished proof-reading a final draft of my debut novel and sent it to Rowan Prose Publishing. It’s been an intense few weeks editing and re-reading but I really welcomed the opportunity to go through absolutely every line and tweak it more thoroughly than an A-lister about to walk on the red carpet.
I’ve been living with my three sisters Lucia, Isabella and Sara in their remote Norfolk manor house for over seven years now (I’ve even dreamed I was one of them and walked through their dining room). I think I am finally ready to say goodbye to my unrepentantly Gothic du Maurier and Bronte love-child and release it into the wild, where I hope it will prosper.
If you would like to pre-order it, the link is below, and as always, don’t forget that writers love to get reviews!
Pre-order The House of Dust and Shadows
I am now free to start thinking about my next project. I am happy to say that I am already ten thousand words into this and was long-listed for the Penguin Michael Joseph Undiscovered Writers’ Prize last year. I am still in the honeymoon period with it and I think (hope) it will be a lot easier to write than my first. My first novel is about the horrors of the patriarchy for female artists and is (I think) remarkably restrained considering I finished it at the same time as the Epstein files were released.
My next one is going to be a lot less restrained and will feature some forgotten Celtic goddesses getting fairly mediaeval, or perhaps I should say Iron Age, on various asses. I can’t wait to finish writing it. I’ve been reading strange occult tomes, studying ancient history and learning to translate Anglo-Saxon in preparation. It’s been a fascinating journey. I hope to finish it in the next six months or so – we shall see. I am not a fast writer.
There was a ‘Blood Moon’ solar eclipse on March 3rd. That inspired me to choose the title for this entry, and it seems appropriate as I am going through a difficult time personally at the moment. It’s very strange how just when you think things are coming together, they fall apart. I’m glad that I still have the gift of being able to send my words out into the world.