I have scheduled this post for every other week since Febraury and each time I go write it I panic and then push it back.
I don’t know why I am panicking because I have technically already put the wheels in motion and Instagram know about it. They’ve known about it for weeks. If you go on my profile it’s pinned right there.
My intentions are clear.
And yet…
I entered 2024 in query limbo. I had been in limbo since October/November time. While I was in the limbo period I focused on a new idea.
As I have mentioned a couple of times, it was festive themed. It was in a lot of ways the perfect place to burrow into while my sun soaked first completed manuscript was sitting in limbo.
On December 28th I attended the London Writers Salon ‘Dreaming Big for 2024’ workshop. My main takeaway from it, my realistic goal was to ‘know that I was going to be a published author’.
It wasn’t to be a published author, it was just to know that it was on the horizon. The small flicker of hope that someone on my agent query list would give me a yes was at the forefront of my mind.
Then 2024 started and I got a couple of rejections but the majority of the query letters sat in a limbo state. So, while I was neither here not there I started shifting my intentions. (As it stands I still haven’t heard from most of the agents I queried, and clearly I never will.)
I held two dates in my head; September 3rd and December 3rd.
I let those dates percolate in my head. They seemed a far enough distance from each other.
They felt like they could be my publication dates.
Then I thought about how much work that would be. The turnaround would be insanely tight. I would have to stop almost immediately after one book was released to start promoting the other and that didn’t really seem fair to my firstborn.
The first book that I ever managed to write from start to finish should be the first one to enter the world right?
Right?
Well, maybe. But if Thing 2 goes out into the world first then it would mean that The Festive Thing would have to wait another year before it could be released because if my nickname and the numerous times I have mentioned it didn’t give it away, this book is set at Christmas. There is only a finite amount of time during the year where it would work as a release (and I wouldn’t hate ramming Christmas based stories down people’s throats)
Thing 2 has been a labour of love since 2021. It was the book that told me that I could write a book. It was the first time I had to confront killing your darlings. It was the first time that I perservered with the boggy middle. It was the first time I had leaned into this new version of who I was a writer. It was the first story that had ever come to me with such startingly clarity that it basically demanded to be written. It reminded me that I love editing. It taught me that I am not as bad at dialouge as I thought. I learned that someonetimes characters will act completely opposite to the way that you intend them to and you just have to let them. It was the springboard for so many other story ideas.
I am thankful to it for so much. And it was going to be my firstborn into the world as well.
But September and December are very close together and the turnaround was too tight and I also want to write another book at some point this year and if I am exhausted by permenantly having to promote my own book then how am I going to be able to write a book?
So Thing 2 has to wait until winter turns into spring again.
The Festive Thing however…
That, as things stand, will be published this year. December 3rd to be precise.
It means I get to take an eaiser run up to marketing and can start it when mince pies hit shelf anyway. I’m on a really long runway before take-off and so I have more time to get all my ducks in a row. Because I have Thing 2 in my back pocket I can cross things off for both of them at the same time (I will have covers for both by autumn). In theory it means that I will have both of them edited and ‘completed’ in good time and will have space to play around in some other playgrounds, it gives me more of a buffer when I start thinking about the next release (which in my head would be in October 25, which is…well months away).
The sheer number of things I have to do is mildly terrifying. If I think about it too often then I start to feel panicked and also because it is so far out I have a lot of time to attempt to talk myself out of it.
I won’t, I’ve sowed a lot of seeds already and uprooting them now would be counterproductive.
So let me formally rename The Festive Thing:
Looks Real Good Now
Out December 3rd. I will be a published author by the end of 2024.
Pre order Looks Real Good Now here (it will also be available on Kindle Unlimited once published and paperback pre-orders will go live closer to the time)
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Jumpin’ Jumpin’
What I’m reading - I was at a stage where I was technically reading 9 different books and well, I needed to get that under control. So I am holding my ARC of Learn Your Lesson hostage until I clear this shelf. It is proving to be surprisingly motivating because I have a soft deadline for it all and I also really wanna read this damn book so I need to get others gone.
ARCs read - Next to You - Hannah Bonam-Young (out now). The Four - Ellie Keel (out now)
Other books - Hit Me With Your Best Shot - Multiple Authors (on KU). Butcher & Blackbird - Brynne Weaver. Second Chance - Jay Northcote (on KU)
(Bookshop links are affiliate links)
What I’m watching - The Gentleman, which is great. Grey’s Anatomy and Station 19 are back (still low key fuming that they’ve cancelled the latter).
What I’m listening to - Look, I have listened to other things since Cowboy Carter came out. I am enjoying a lot of the playliss in the ‘romance category’ on Apple Music. I had a bit of a Kings of Leon kick. I spent a day spent listening to country songs that weren’t Cowboy Carter, but I am at random points of my day just saying ‘American Requiem’ out of nowhere and thinking about looking at horses.
I haven’t been the same person since I heard YAYA. And I really just want to talk to someone about the Jolene into Daughter of it all.
Title Inspiration - Just in case you have forgotten that I am a musical theatre girlie at my core, this title comes The Ten Duel Commandments - Hamilton
HECK YES!!!!!!!! Congratulations! How wonderfully exciting!
congratulations on your publication date. xxx