Writing Update June 2024
After a number of stops and starts with various projects including a follow-up novella to EVA, a second book featuring my yet to be published detective series set in a dystopian Edinburgh and then a new novel dealing with Artificial Intelligence, I found myself with the publisher of my cybercrime novel The Kill Chain, calling it a day. This means that the rights to the novel and its characters will revert back to me.
This is great news. I have since had an editor go back through The Kill Chain to ensure all is well and has worked through the sequel which is now called The Kill Ward. (It had a working title of The Kill Switch and has been previously referenced on this blog). It is important to make sure the style choices are consistent across the series and I have had an opportunity to have this looked at. It made good sense to do so since the novel will be relaunched. This sequel had remained unpublished due to not having the rights to do so. This year I also outlined a third novel in the series and was intending to write it, but with a week to go before starting I came up with another idea and moved on to that for book three. This novel has a working title of The Kill Flag and takes place in a two week break my main character Jacob Anderson takes between leaving the hospital he was working at as a contractor, before starting a new role in a new industry. This means I also have the outline for book four in the series.
I’ve been writing for the last two weeks, putting down two thousand words a day. I will maintain my routine for the next two weeks and then I will have completed the draft. I’m confident the title of The Kill Flag will in fact last the distance. Right now I don’t see it changing. I then have to work through the edits for book one and two, plus working up the final part of book two as I’ve been advised it needs more work to really make it shine. That’s exactly why writers need a great editor who can tell them how it is and get on with it.
The plan is to have all three books ready to go by the end of the year. I’m going to relaunch The Kill Chain with a new cover that needs to be featured in some respects across all three books. I don’t have one yet, but I have an idea of what I’m looking for. I do struggle with covers!
I will have to write the opening of book four so I can include that at the end of book three. The end of book one will feature the opening of book two, and of course book two will include the opening of book three. At the time of writing I have several possible working titles for book four and have yet to decide which one I will use.
I’ve started the query process with agencies again. I’ve experienced the indie publisher environment and it’s been a great learning experience, but the long lead times is now causing me to question what I want to do as a writer. Obviously, a big publisher is an attractive proposition, and I get that that comes with its own set of challenges, though ones I wouldn’t mind having a go at meeting. But the Kill series is something I’m passionate about and want to put out there as quickly as I’m writing them. That means taking charge and ensuring I put them out. But to underline the point, clearly if an agency expressed an interest, I would be willing to follow that route. However, I can’t wait on the basis it may happen. I need to continue to progress on and do what I can. The Kill Ward is a year old now. I don’t want to wait another year to make it available.
I had no idea this would become a series set in the present day. When I originally drafted The Kill Chain, I did have the idea of jumping ahead twenty years and doing a second book set slightly in the future with Jacob’s daughter Emily as a young cyber security specialist. The third book would see Jacob fast approaching a hundred and I would be writing science fiction by that point. However, my view of the book and the series changed, as new ideas, set in contemporary Edinburgh, began to take shape.
I’m excited for this. I have a plan and an end goal. I also have a large body of work in progress that is waiting for me to pick up once I clear more time. I feel on form and I can’t really ask for anything more than that.
The Fiction Factory 