Xavier Edwards's Blog, page 6

An Easter Break

I hope that all my fans and followers had a wonderful Easter break (or at least were able to take an Easter break). My Easter was spend running around after the kids, so it was very productive and rewarding, even if there was little writing actually achieved. This year we also had ANZAC Day following on the week after Easter, so many people took the opportunity to have an extended break, especially with some states having their school holidays running throughout the period.

My erotica writing remains on hold for now, while I continue to work outside the genre, but I am building plans about the books and stories I want to write when I get back to it all later this year. I haven’t completely forgotten about the genre, and what I have managed to achieve in the last week or so is having my material appear on Scribd, along with my profile. This was an unexpected outlet for my works, and I am glad to have another avenue through which I can connect with my readers.

Rolling With the Flow

So, the mystery virus that I had been taken out by a couple of weeks ago hadn’t quite lifted. Either that, or I just had the worst luck to pick up a head cold straight afterward. No matter what happened, my first week back and doing things felt like I was constantly swimming against molasses, and even the slightest physical activity was an epic struggle against everything. Thankfully, everything seems to have cleared up now, and I actually feel well enough to get back to writing and interacting with my fans.

As to my writing, I am shifting my attention full-time for the next six weeks to another genre, writing under another name, to scratch an itch I didn’t realise I had. It’s going to be an interesting experiment, and will at least clear out some space so that I can get back into writing for my erotica and ER fans. If it turns out okay, it will make for an interesting pay day and some decisions to be made about how to split my time writing across the genres.

Getting Back

Getting “The Deferred Honeymoon” out when I did turned out to be fortuitous, as illness swept through the family, taking everyone out for a day or so.

Except for me.

While I was able to stay healthy while everyone else got sick, when it was my turn I got the full illness and was bed-ridden for almost a week -- something that you don’t expect from what was originally thought to be a head cold. Thankfully the bug has lifted, and I can now focus on trying to work out what happened in the week of time I seem to be missing from my life.

Writing can begin again in earnest, and I’m looking forward to joining my characters in their stories again.

The Deferred Honeymoon Released

So it took a lot longer than I was expecting, but it’s finally here. “The Deferred Honeymoon” is now published, and will be steadily available across the major (and many minor) retail sites in coming days.

Keen-eyed readers will identify that the first part of the book is the same as one of my earlier releases. That is by design. I had always planned to make a companion book to “A Proper Consummation”, but hadn’t originally been planning on a single volume release, as a single story. That changed as I worked my way through the second story, and I soon found myself merging them into a single story, one that ended up being longer than any I have written to date, and one that had a really nice flow in the longer format.

“The Deferred Honeymoon” has been well received from beta and early readers, and there are many who have enjoyed my first foray into the longer book format.

Now to turn my attention to some of the other stories that are demanding to be made into a longer format (many of which haven’t been published yet).

Not My Expected Release

I finally managed to get a big book release sorted out. The only problem is that it was in a form which my wonderful fans will never get to see. It is for a very technical project that I have been working on for the last 18 months, and which has seen its culmination in the form of a 300,000 word tome (among a lot of other major deliverables that were provided last year). When it’s put into terms like that, I can understand why I’ve been feeling so tired and unwilling to write for pleasure.

Even though it hasn’t been fully released to the organisation that it was created for, the limited release has already been extremely positive and, despite people balking at the sheer size of the work, they quickly found it very easy to read and were diving into it and extracting stuff that they need. It was very gratifying as a writer to walk around and just watch as people were using the book in unexpected ways, without them knowing I was there watching how they used it. I like to think that my erotica fans are enjoying my works in the same sort of way.

This other release and work hasn’t really delayed my next public release, and The Deferred Honeymoon should still be released by the weekend, if not on it.

The Deferred Honeymoon Due This Week

After what has felt like a complete age since my last release, “The Deferred Honeymoon” is due for release this week. I’ve received the last of the feedback needed prior to release, and it’s been overwhelmingly positive, so I’m happy to push ahead and release my latest, and longest work.

A short tease was put out a couple of weeks ago, but I’m not going to put much more out before the title is out.

In other writing matters, I’ve been slowly picking away at some of the other things I am currently drafting, but at times it feels like things are slowing down. It could just be because flu season is getting an early start this year, but I’m choosing to interpret as a good sign for longer stories.

Stormy Weather

Another week has rolled past, without a lot of writing to show for it, but I have been considering a thriller storyline that has been kicking around the back of my mind for a little while. It will make for an interesting diversion from my normal style of writing, but I am waiting to see just how things go with my next title, which is due very soon now, and another one or two that are progressing nicely through their drafting stages (and getting longer). If I do write the thriller, I think I’ll be releasing it under another name, just to separate my writing genres.

The weather is just starting to cool down a little, most obviously at night, but things are still wonderfully warm during the day. It’s not the heat, or the night time cool, that is of interest in weather terms at the moment, it is the seemingly-late thunder storm season which is bringing some really interesting effects. The last couple of days haven’t seen a lot of rain, but they have seen some nice afternoon buildups, with lots of sound and light, but not anything to speak of in terms of rain. Due to the effect of the terrain around where we live, the storms seem to hang just overhead, almost like I could reach my arm up and touch the heavy, dark clouds that rumble along.

It could be a wet Autumn and Winter ahead (I love the rain), but I’ve been caught out with that sort of thinking before, so we’ll just have to wait and see what happens.

Hiding as Much as Revealing

Since some people found out that I’ve got another release in the editing / proofing stages of publishing, they’ve been after me to provide some form of tease. I don’t normally do teases, as such, but there’s always a first time.

So, to make some of my readers happy, and hopefully give everyone a small taste of what’s to come in the finished story, I selected a passage at random from the upcoming book as a sample. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did writing it.

“Come on, it will be safer and more comfortable for the both of us in the centre of the boat,” he suggested. They moved in together, wrapped in each other’s arms as the little boat started to toss about.

The rain started with a couple of fat drops, which were rapidly replaced by a wall of solid water that thundered against their little boat, and hammered into the lagoon. Water was coming from all directions and Rachel was beginning to worry about their ability to stay afloat when it stopped as suddenly as it had appeared. A fresh, clean wind pushed away the clouds and the sun was soon baking everything dry. Rachel swore that she could see the steam rising from the jungle, and could clearly hear the cacophony of the birds and other jungle creatures coming out of hiding and drying off.

Rachel shivered and looked down at herself. Her dress was plastered to her body, and it was plainly evident that she wasn’t wearing any underwear by how it clung to her contours. She could see that Robert was soaked to the skin, too, but he didn’t seem as bothered about it as she did.

“Are you okay?” he asked her.

“I think so, just soaking wet,” she replied, breaking the embrace and trying to separate sodden fabric from skin.

“Since we’re out of sight of anyone on the shore, you could always put your wet clothes over the front deck, which already looks dry.” Robert removed his shirt and placed it flat on the front deck, which was lightly steaming and looked dry.

“I think I might have a small problem, there.”

“You mean because you’re not wearing anything under the dress?”

“How did you know?” she asked. “Yes, by the way.”

“Anybody with working eyes can tell you’re not wearing anything underneath. I’ve had a fairly good idea all along, but it’s really been confirmed now.”

“And you didn’t say anything?”

“I didn’t need to. I’ve been enjoying the hint at what lay below. It’s not always about what you can show, it’s also about what’s hidden. And how it’s hidden.”

Rachel peeled her dress from her body and spread it next to his shirt. “Well, now you’re not going to need your imagination.”

“…”

Big Progress

Finally, after a lot of procrastinating (at least that’s what it felt like), I managed to get my next title off for the next stage in the publishing process. This is actually quite a big achievement for me, as it represents an almost doubling of the length of my longest stand alone title, to well over 40,000 words.

Not only has the length increased, but it seems that I’ve found again some of the special elements that attracted readers to my work in the first place. Of course, it’s a little bit harder to make so many words drip with seduction and intimacy, but it was fun finding a way to make it work for this particular story.

It’s currently in the middle of the next stage of publishing, and I expect to have it back and ready again within the next couple of weeks. Then it is looking good for a publishing date around the middle of March.

Aside from working on my writing, I was asking a couple of my new Twitter followers how they managed to find me, as I couldn’t quite sort out the linkage between what I do, and why they might be interested (other than them reading my books, of course). The problem came when I realised that they hadn’t read any of my books, so I was pleasantly surprised to find that they were following me because they found me interesting. That’s a win in my books. The more people who find me interesting, the more likely it is that they will make the transition to reading and enjoying my books, so that’s always a goal.

Glorious Rain

After a very long dry spell, we’ve finally received some nice rain in the South-East of Australia. We really need several days of it to really make a difference to the parched land, but a day and a bit is a good start. It has certainly been of benefit to the large swathes of Victoria and South Australia that were on fire, but to then have minor flooding so soon after the heat, it’s just another Summer in Australia. I’ve heard rumours that we are expecting a dry spell over Winter, and that we’ll be heading back into drought along with it. I don’t really remember whether we ever really left drought conditions, or if the one or two semi-wet years we had were enough to break it.

I’ve continued to work away on my editing, and also done a little bit of work on some new titles, but I do hope to be finished with my editing in the next few days and get on with getting publishing again. I’ve been working with my manuscript set up in Scrivener, and the Winter Olympics running next to it. That way, I can pretend I’m paying attention to both, and actually get some good work done on getting my book ready.