Stephen Leather's Blog, page 6
May 17, 2014
White Lies - The Cover Is Ready
The cover for the new Spider Shepherd novel - White Lies, which will be published in August by Hodder and Stoughton - is pretty much done, and I love it!
The book is already up on Amazon for pre-sale and is available by clicking HERE
I'm really pleased with White Lies, it's more action-packed than previous books, with Shepherd heading off to the badlands of Pakistan to rescue a former protege who has been kidnapped by al-Qaeda.
The tagline at the bottom - The Truth Can Get You Killed - is mine.
I also had a hand in the writing of the blurb - the copy that goes on the cover and which is a vital marketing tool. Most people do indeed judge a book by its cover, and once they've looked at the picture they go on to read the blurb (hopefully). Blurbing is an art - that and the cover are often the two main selling points of a book. A good blurb can sell a book, and a bad one can condemn it to oblivion.
I learned about blurbs many years ago watching my then editor Bill Massey. Bill handled my breakthrough book The Chinaman and his blurb was as close to perfection as you can get.
These days I often have a lot of input into my blurbs. Blurb writing is a totally different skill to writing a book. The trick is to sell the book to the potential buyer without giving away too much of the plot. Punchy, active sentences work best and you need to keep punctuation to a minimum.
Somewhere around 120 words works best.
Here's a suggested blurb I was given for my new Hodder and Stoughton book, White Lies, which will be published in August.
When Osama Bin Laden was killed in Operation Neptune Spear in May 2011 there was a British observer on the US-led mission. Dan ‘Spider’ Shepherd along with Raz Chaudry was at the heart of a high-risk MI5 intelligence probe which uncovered Bin Laden’s hiding place. Shepherd’s place on the raid was his reward for favours rendered.
Now Raz has been sent back to Pakistan on a near-suicidal mission to infiltrate an al-Qaeda terrorist cell. He’s soon falls under suspicion and tortured for information. Spider will do anything to save Raz’s life even at the risk of his own. But unknown to Spider and the Pakistani Forces tasked with recovering Raz from a remote desert fort, their mission has been betrayed. A bloody fire fight follows and now it’s Spiders turn to fall in the hands of the vicious extremists. It’s only a matter of time before he or Raz crack and admit their part in Bin Laden’s death.
There’s one chance left to extract them – working behind the scenes, Spider’s MI5 controller, Charlotte Button, pulls strings to bring in America’s finest -- the elite SEALs who carried out Operation Neptune Spear – in a do-or-die operation to rescue the captives.
White Lies is vintage Stephen Leather: fast paced, beautifully characterised, a seat-of-your-pants thriller which will have you hooked from first page until last.
And here's the blurb I wrote, using the above words as a starting point:
Dan ‘Spider’ Shepherd is used to putting his life on the line – for his friends and for his job with MI5. So when one of his former apprentices is kidnapped in the badlands of Pakistan, Shepherd doesn’t hesitate to join a rescue mission.
But when the rescue plan goes horribly wrong, Shepherd ends up in the hands of al-Qaeda terrorists. His SAS training is of little help as his captors beat and torture him.
Shepherd’s MI5 controller Charlotte Button is determined to get her man out of harm’s way, but to do that she’s going to have to break all the rules. Her only hope is so bring in America’s finest - the elite SEALs who carried out Operation Neptune Spear - in a do-or-die operation to rescue the captives.
White Lies is a fast paced, seat-of-your-pants thriller which will have you hooked from the first page until the last.
My blurb is shorter, and I do believe that shorter blurbs work best.
My blurb concentrates on the hero - Spider Shepherd - because it's the hero that you're trying to sell. And it spells out the danger the hero's facing.
It's less cluttered and I think it's easier to read. Will it sell the book? We'll have to wait and see!
The book is already up on Amazon for pre-sale and is available by clicking HERE
I'm really pleased with White Lies, it's more action-packed than previous books, with Shepherd heading off to the badlands of Pakistan to rescue a former protege who has been kidnapped by al-Qaeda.
The tagline at the bottom - The Truth Can Get You Killed - is mine.
I also had a hand in the writing of the blurb - the copy that goes on the cover and which is a vital marketing tool. Most people do indeed judge a book by its cover, and once they've looked at the picture they go on to read the blurb (hopefully). Blurbing is an art - that and the cover are often the two main selling points of a book. A good blurb can sell a book, and a bad one can condemn it to oblivion.
I learned about blurbs many years ago watching my then editor Bill Massey. Bill handled my breakthrough book The Chinaman and his blurb was as close to perfection as you can get.
These days I often have a lot of input into my blurbs. Blurb writing is a totally different skill to writing a book. The trick is to sell the book to the potential buyer without giving away too much of the plot. Punchy, active sentences work best and you need to keep punctuation to a minimum.
Somewhere around 120 words works best.
Here's a suggested blurb I was given for my new Hodder and Stoughton book, White Lies, which will be published in August.
When Osama Bin Laden was killed in Operation Neptune Spear in May 2011 there was a British observer on the US-led mission. Dan ‘Spider’ Shepherd along with Raz Chaudry was at the heart of a high-risk MI5 intelligence probe which uncovered Bin Laden’s hiding place. Shepherd’s place on the raid was his reward for favours rendered.
Now Raz has been sent back to Pakistan on a near-suicidal mission to infiltrate an al-Qaeda terrorist cell. He’s soon falls under suspicion and tortured for information. Spider will do anything to save Raz’s life even at the risk of his own. But unknown to Spider and the Pakistani Forces tasked with recovering Raz from a remote desert fort, their mission has been betrayed. A bloody fire fight follows and now it’s Spiders turn to fall in the hands of the vicious extremists. It’s only a matter of time before he or Raz crack and admit their part in Bin Laden’s death.
There’s one chance left to extract them – working behind the scenes, Spider’s MI5 controller, Charlotte Button, pulls strings to bring in America’s finest -- the elite SEALs who carried out Operation Neptune Spear – in a do-or-die operation to rescue the captives.
White Lies is vintage Stephen Leather: fast paced, beautifully characterised, a seat-of-your-pants thriller which will have you hooked from first page until last.
And here's the blurb I wrote, using the above words as a starting point:
Dan ‘Spider’ Shepherd is used to putting his life on the line – for his friends and for his job with MI5. So when one of his former apprentices is kidnapped in the badlands of Pakistan, Shepherd doesn’t hesitate to join a rescue mission.
But when the rescue plan goes horribly wrong, Shepherd ends up in the hands of al-Qaeda terrorists. His SAS training is of little help as his captors beat and torture him.
Shepherd’s MI5 controller Charlotte Button is determined to get her man out of harm’s way, but to do that she’s going to have to break all the rules. Her only hope is so bring in America’s finest - the elite SEALs who carried out Operation Neptune Spear - in a do-or-die operation to rescue the captives.
White Lies is a fast paced, seat-of-your-pants thriller which will have you hooked from the first page until the last.
My blurb is shorter, and I do believe that shorter blurbs work best.
My blurb concentrates on the hero - Spider Shepherd - because it's the hero that you're trying to sell. And it spells out the danger the hero's facing.
It's less cluttered and I think it's easier to read. Will it sell the book? We'll have to wait and see!
May 15, 2014
No Expense Has Been Spared To Promote Blood Bath - Now Free Everywhere!
Blood Bath - a collection of seven free Jack Nightingale stories written by me and six other writers - is now in the UK Kindle Top 40.
No expense has been spared promoting it, as you can see!
You can download Blood Bath for free HERE
No expense has been spared promoting it, as you can see!
You can download Blood Bath for free HERE
May 12, 2014
Blood Bath In The UK Kindle Top 40
Blood Bath - a collection of seven Jack Nightingale short stories, has just entered the UK Kindle Top 40 which is pretty good going as it was only published ten days ago.
What makes Blood Bath different from most books is that I bought the cover - and the title - long before I wrote the story. I saw the cover on the website of Brandi Doane McCann who has done several covers for me, including the US editions of Lastnight and Nightshade and several of the Spider Shepherd short stories. She's a cracking designer and her covers are very reasonably priced.
You can see more of Brandi's work by clicking HERE
I thought the cover was so brilliant that I bought it without even having an idea for a plot!
I finally got around to writing a short story to go with the title and cover earlier this year, but I thought it might be a good idea to see what other writers would do with it.
I asked if anyone else wanted to have a go and to my delight six other writers came forward with stories, including bestselling thriller writer Matt Hilton, author of the Joe Hunter series. He joined writers Alex Shaw, Conrad Jones and Andrew Peters, and Nightingale fans Robert Waterman and Lynnette Waterman. All put their own spin on the character, and it was fascinating to see how different writers built such different stories based on a cover and a title.
Blood Bath is free - you can get it at Smashwords for all eReaders or for the Kindle by clicking HERE
It was a fascinating experiment, and readers seemed to enjoy it too, as it has been downloaded more than five thousand times already. It might well be an experiment that I'll repeat!
What makes Blood Bath different from most books is that I bought the cover - and the title - long before I wrote the story. I saw the cover on the website of Brandi Doane McCann who has done several covers for me, including the US editions of Lastnight and Nightshade and several of the Spider Shepherd short stories. She's a cracking designer and her covers are very reasonably priced.
You can see more of Brandi's work by clicking HERE
I thought the cover was so brilliant that I bought it without even having an idea for a plot!
I finally got around to writing a short story to go with the title and cover earlier this year, but I thought it might be a good idea to see what other writers would do with it.
I asked if anyone else wanted to have a go and to my delight six other writers came forward with stories, including bestselling thriller writer Matt Hilton, author of the Joe Hunter series. He joined writers Alex Shaw, Conrad Jones and Andrew Peters, and Nightingale fans Robert Waterman and Lynnette Waterman. All put their own spin on the character, and it was fascinating to see how different writers built such different stories based on a cover and a title.
Blood Bath is free - you can get it at Smashwords for all eReaders or for the Kindle by clicking HERE
It was a fascinating experiment, and readers seemed to enjoy it too, as it has been downloaded more than five thousand times already. It might well be an experiment that I'll repeat!
May 7, 2014
No Expense Has Been Spared To Promote Blood Bath - Now Free On The Kindle!
Blood Bath is now free on the Kindle and on most eReaders. It's a collection of seven Jack Nightingale short stories, written by me and six other writers and fans.
You can get Blood Bath for Free at - myBook.to/bloodbath
May 5, 2014
Twitter - A Barrister's Tale
I’ve never really seen the point of Twitter. Most of the time it seems to be a lot of people shouting and no one listening.
My first twitter account - @stephenleather – was opened by a fan a few years ago who said that he thought it would be an important marketing tool. He sent me the log-in details and gave the account to me.
While I do use it – and another account @firstparagraph – I have to say that I’m not a big fan and don’t use it much. I prefer to keep in touch with fans through my Facebook page or email. But I do check in every day or so because some fans like to use Twitter to tell me their thoughts or ask about my work.
I tend not to read other Tweets as there is a lot of bullying and sheer stupidity on Twitter that in my humble opinion is a waste of time and best avoided. I have had my fair share of insults thrown at me on Twitter and I have learned from experience that they are best ignored. It’s a bit like having someone shout abuse at you in the street –there is almost certainly an element of mental instability involved and nothing good ever comes from confronting the abuser. Walking away is always the best thing to do!
But recently when I was on seeing if there were questions from fans, I noticed that someone I had never heard of had mentioned me. It was a chap called Howard Jones, and he posted a very strange Tweet. Someone had posted about a character called Mo Ansar being evasive and Howard Jones then Tweeted ‘Makes Stephen Leather look easy to pin down.’
That was a strange thing to say as I had never heard of Howard Jones. So who is Howard Jones? It seemed the obvious question to ask.
According to his Twitter profile he is a barrister, politician, historian and cricket lover.
Now I was worried, because when a barrister says that you are hard to pin down, it suggests that he has met you and gathered that impression from something you had done. And I was very sure that I had never met Howard Jones, in his professional capacity or indeed in any capacity.
To be honest, I did worry that people might think that he had questioned me in court!
He obviously wasn’t an anonymous troll, he’s clearly a real person, and an educated one at that. It could of course have been a case of mistaken identity, so I decided to make contact with Howard Jones just to check what on earth was going on.
I Googled him and the only ‘HOWARD JONES, BARRISTER’ appeared to be at the Carmelite Chambers in London, a venerable and much-respected firm. – CARMELITE CHAMBERS
This actually worried me even more – it wasn’t a random stranger casting aspersions on my character but a barrister from a leading City firm.
I sent an email to the firm asking if Mr Jones would please contact me but they didn’t reply, so I picked up the phone and called them. It seems that he doesn’t work there any longer and the charming lady on reception said she didn’t know where he worked now.
According to Google, Howards Jones’ last case through Carmelite appears to be back in September 2010 – there is a newspaper article about it here - http://www.croydonadvertiser.co.uk/Ex-sailor-jailed-downloading-disturbing-child-pornography/story-11362567-detail/story.html
I wasn’t sure what to do as I didn’t want to send him a public Tweet but then I noticed that he was following my @firstparagraph account. I was following him and he was following me, and when two people follow each other they can send each other a direct message, a Tweet that only they can see. A private Tweet. So I sent Howard Jones a private Tweet, just for his eyes, saying that I wanted to get in touch with him.
Unfortunately, instead of getting in touch as I’d asked, he then fired off four public tweets, for everyone to read.
In the public Tweets he said that I had been putting some time and research into trying to get in touch with him. That’s a bit of an exaggeration as I spent just one minute on Google and one minute on the phone. Ten seconds to send him a private Tweet.
And he made it seem as if I had been doing something wrong in following him – completely ignoring the fact that he was following me. If he hadn’t been following me, I wouldn’t have been able to send him a Direct Message.
But what really worried me was his public comment – “Should I expect grief or do you have to be a fellow writer to get grief?’
I was stunned that a barrister would think it appropriate to ask such a leading question in public. It’s on a par with the legendary ‘how long have you been beating your wife’ question. I doubt any judge would allow such a question in court and I don’t understand why he felt it necessary to say that in public. All I wanted to do was to talk to him, to ask him why he felt that I was hard to pin down when he had never even spoken to me. Why would I want to cause him grief? It looks like I’ll never know because I certainly don’t want to start a conversation with him in public and he’s clearly not interested in talking to me man-to-man.
As I said, I’m not sure where Howard Jones works now. His last chambers said they didn’t know where he had gone.
I did notice that not long after he sent the Tweets, he changed his profile to say that he was a non-practising barrister.
I don’t know why Howard Jones isn’t practising any more, but according to Google he does have political aspirations.
For some time he was a thorn in the side of Surrey Police. – There is a NEWSPAPER ARTICLE ABOUT IT HERE
He was so frustrated with Surrey Police that he tried to get elected as Surrey Police Commissioner. He managed to get on the Conservative short list. – THE BBC TALKED ABOUT IT HERE
He wasn’t chosen as the Conservative candidate and the people of Surrey eventually elected someone else – AS REPORTED BY THE BBC
It could well be that Howard Jones will be seeking public office elsewhere, in which case I wish him well, but I trust he realises that as a politician he will need to engage with people directly and not just through Twitter.
Anyway, as I said at the beginning, I don’t really understand Twitter or the people who use it to attack others.
Some of the best advice on dealing with trolls comes from self-publishing guru Joe Konrath. His mantra is - ignore them. – ALWAYS GREAT ADVICE FROM JOE KONRATH
Joe’s right, of course. He usually is. So I’ll just do what I usually do with strangers who have a go at me and ignore Howard Jones if he Tweets about me in future. I have better things to do with my time.
White Lies Cover
Hodder are moving forward on the cover for White Lies, the eleventh Spider Shepherd thriller, which is due to be published in August. I think it looks great. They were asking for suggestions for the shout line across the bottom and I suggested 'THE TRUTH CAN GET YOU KILLED'. We'll see if they go for that. I'll be starting the next book fairly soon - I'm planning to call it BLACK OPS and there will be some surprises in store!
March 26, 2014
The Art Of Blurbing
Blurbing is an art - that and the cover are often the two main selling points of a book. A good blurb can sell a book, and a bad one can condemn it to oblivion.
I learned about blurbs many years ago watching my then editor Bill Massey. Bill handled my breakthrough book The Chinaman and his blurb was as close to perfection as you can get.
These days I often do my own blurbs. Blurb writing is a totally different skill to writing a book. The trick is to sell the book to the potential buyer without giving away too much of the plot. Punchy, active sentences work best and you need to keep punctuation to a minimum.
Somewhere around 120 words works best.
Here's a suggested blurb I was given for my new Hodder and Stoughton book, White Lies, which will be published in August.
When Osama Bin Laden was killed in Operation Neptune Spear in May 2011 there was a British observer on the US-led mission. Dan ‘Spider’ Shepherd along with Raz Chaudry was at the heart of a high-risk MI5 intelligence probe which uncovered Bin Laden’s hiding place. Shepherd’s place on the raid was his reward for favours rendered.
Now Raz has been sent back to Pakistan on a near-suicidal mission to infiltrate an al-Qaeda terrorist cell. He’s soon falls under suspicion and tortured for information. Spider will do anything to save Raz’s life even at the risk of his own. But unknown to Spider and the Pakistani Forces tasked with recovering Raz from a remote desert fort, their mission has been betrayed. A bloody fire fight follows and now it’s Spiders turn to fall in the hands of the vicious extremists. It’s only a matter of time before he or Raz crack and admit their part in Bin Laden’s death.
There’s one chance left to extract them – working behind the scenes, Spider’s MI5 controller, Charlotte Button, pulls strings to bring in America’s finest -- the elite SEALs who carried out Operation Neptune Spear – in a do-or-die operation to rescue the captives.
White Lies is vintage Stephen Leather: fast paced, beautifully characterised, a seat-of-your-pants thriller which will have you hooked from first page until last.
And here's the blurb I wrote, using the above words as a starting point:
Dan ‘Spider’ Shepherd is used to putting his life on the line – for his friends and for his job with MI5. So when one of his former apprentices is kidnapped in the badlands of Pakistan, Shepherd doesn’t hesitate to join a rescue mission.
But when the rescue plan goes horribly wrong, Shepherd ends up in the hands of al-Qaeda terrorists. His SAS training is of little help as his captors beat and torture him.
Shepherd’s MI5 controller Charlotte Button is determined to get her man out of harm’s way, but to do that she’s going to have to break all the rules. Her only hope is so bring in America’s finest - the elite SEALs who carried out Operation Neptune Spear - in a do-or-die operation to rescue the captives.
White Lies is a fast paced, seat-of-your-pants thriller which will have you hooked from the first page until the last.
My blurb is shorter, and I do believe that shorter blurbs work best.
My blurb concentrates on the hero - Spider Shepherd - because it's the hero that you're trying to sell. And it spells out the danger the hero's facing.
It's less cluttered and I think it's easier to read. Will it sell the book? We'll have to wait and see!
I learned about blurbs many years ago watching my then editor Bill Massey. Bill handled my breakthrough book The Chinaman and his blurb was as close to perfection as you can get.
These days I often do my own blurbs. Blurb writing is a totally different skill to writing a book. The trick is to sell the book to the potential buyer without giving away too much of the plot. Punchy, active sentences work best and you need to keep punctuation to a minimum.
Somewhere around 120 words works best.
Here's a suggested blurb I was given for my new Hodder and Stoughton book, White Lies, which will be published in August.
When Osama Bin Laden was killed in Operation Neptune Spear in May 2011 there was a British observer on the US-led mission. Dan ‘Spider’ Shepherd along with Raz Chaudry was at the heart of a high-risk MI5 intelligence probe which uncovered Bin Laden’s hiding place. Shepherd’s place on the raid was his reward for favours rendered.
Now Raz has been sent back to Pakistan on a near-suicidal mission to infiltrate an al-Qaeda terrorist cell. He’s soon falls under suspicion and tortured for information. Spider will do anything to save Raz’s life even at the risk of his own. But unknown to Spider and the Pakistani Forces tasked with recovering Raz from a remote desert fort, their mission has been betrayed. A bloody fire fight follows and now it’s Spiders turn to fall in the hands of the vicious extremists. It’s only a matter of time before he or Raz crack and admit their part in Bin Laden’s death.
There’s one chance left to extract them – working behind the scenes, Spider’s MI5 controller, Charlotte Button, pulls strings to bring in America’s finest -- the elite SEALs who carried out Operation Neptune Spear – in a do-or-die operation to rescue the captives.
White Lies is vintage Stephen Leather: fast paced, beautifully characterised, a seat-of-your-pants thriller which will have you hooked from first page until last.
And here's the blurb I wrote, using the above words as a starting point:
Dan ‘Spider’ Shepherd is used to putting his life on the line – for his friends and for his job with MI5. So when one of his former apprentices is kidnapped in the badlands of Pakistan, Shepherd doesn’t hesitate to join a rescue mission.
But when the rescue plan goes horribly wrong, Shepherd ends up in the hands of al-Qaeda terrorists. His SAS training is of little help as his captors beat and torture him.
Shepherd’s MI5 controller Charlotte Button is determined to get her man out of harm’s way, but to do that she’s going to have to break all the rules. Her only hope is so bring in America’s finest - the elite SEALs who carried out Operation Neptune Spear - in a do-or-die operation to rescue the captives.
White Lies is a fast paced, seat-of-your-pants thriller which will have you hooked from the first page until the last.
My blurb is shorter, and I do believe that shorter blurbs work best.
My blurb concentrates on the hero - Spider Shepherd - because it's the hero that you're trying to sell. And it spells out the danger the hero's facing.
It's less cluttered and I think it's easier to read. Will it sell the book? We'll have to wait and see!
March 13, 2014
The 9th Spider Shepherd Short Story
I've just self-published the 9th Spider Shepherd short story - Personal Protection - in which Spider, still in the SAS, is tasked with protecting a Middle Eastern ruler whose life is under threat.
You can buy Personal Protection on the Kindle BY CLICKING HERE
There are now nine Spider Shepherd short stories, more than 120,000 words in total, so I'm going to look into the possibility of having them published as a paperback.
Watch this space!
You can buy Personal Protection on the Kindle BY CLICKING HERE
There are now nine Spider Shepherd short stories, more than 120,000 words in total, so I'm going to look into the possibility of having them published as a paperback.
Watch this space!
March 11, 2014
White Lies - Off To The Editor
Well, White Lies, the 11th Spider Shepherd novel, is off to the line editor. My editor at Hodder and Stoughton, Oliver Johnson, who also edits John Grisham in the UK, gave me his input and there wasn't much to do - about three hours' worth of rewriting. Three hours? Yup, that's how long it took to get from the first draft to the final draft.
I always smile when I hear writers talk about the weeks they spend polishing and rewriting their books. I've never worked like that. I rewrite as I go along, so if I write a paragraph that I'm not 100 per cent happy with, I delete it. If I'm not happy with a description I change it, and I rewrite all my dialogue as I go along, after reading it out loud. Generally my first drafts are pretty much complete. Rarely do I have to make any changes to the structure of the plot, for instance.
My journalistic background is a big help. When you work on newspapers like The Times and The Daly Mail, the news desk expects you to deliver your copy on time and ready to go. There isn't time to edit and polish, a reporter who doesn't get it right the first time won't last long. When you deliver a story to a national newspaper the facts need to be right and the writing has to flow. Yes there are sub-editors, but if your copy isn't good enough they will soon let you know. I always prided myself on being fast and accurate when I was a reporter, and that has carried over to my fiction writing.
Writing shouldn't be like pulling teeth, and getting your work ready for publication needn't be a struggle. Some writers say that once the first draft is done, the hard work really begins. And I get what they mean, I just think it's a very wasteful way of writing. I know some writers who throw away half of what they've written between the first draft and the second draft, and another big chunk between the second and third draft. That seems to me to be very inefficient. Far better to maintain quality control as you work and if you see something you're not completely happy with, don't be afraid to use the delete button. I always think it's far better to produce 200 words that are close to perfect than 2,000 words that are going to require hours of rewriting. Having said that, as a writer you have to choose what works best for you.
So what's next for me? I have another Spider Shepherd short story I want to write, and a couple of Jack Nightingale short stories. I already have a rough plot for the 12th Spider Shepherd book. But I also have a really neat idea for a totally different sort of thriller, one that I'm pretty sure hasn't been done before. I'm keeping that one close to my chest, but I've already started on the research and I'm pretty sure it's going to be amazing!
I always smile when I hear writers talk about the weeks they spend polishing and rewriting their books. I've never worked like that. I rewrite as I go along, so if I write a paragraph that I'm not 100 per cent happy with, I delete it. If I'm not happy with a description I change it, and I rewrite all my dialogue as I go along, after reading it out loud. Generally my first drafts are pretty much complete. Rarely do I have to make any changes to the structure of the plot, for instance.
My journalistic background is a big help. When you work on newspapers like The Times and The Daly Mail, the news desk expects you to deliver your copy on time and ready to go. There isn't time to edit and polish, a reporter who doesn't get it right the first time won't last long. When you deliver a story to a national newspaper the facts need to be right and the writing has to flow. Yes there are sub-editors, but if your copy isn't good enough they will soon let you know. I always prided myself on being fast and accurate when I was a reporter, and that has carried over to my fiction writing.
Writing shouldn't be like pulling teeth, and getting your work ready for publication needn't be a struggle. Some writers say that once the first draft is done, the hard work really begins. And I get what they mean, I just think it's a very wasteful way of writing. I know some writers who throw away half of what they've written between the first draft and the second draft, and another big chunk between the second and third draft. That seems to me to be very inefficient. Far better to maintain quality control as you work and if you see something you're not completely happy with, don't be afraid to use the delete button. I always think it's far better to produce 200 words that are close to perfect than 2,000 words that are going to require hours of rewriting. Having said that, as a writer you have to choose what works best for you.
So what's next for me? I have another Spider Shepherd short story I want to write, and a couple of Jack Nightingale short stories. I already have a rough plot for the 12th Spider Shepherd book. But I also have a really neat idea for a totally different sort of thriller, one that I'm pretty sure hasn't been done before. I'm keeping that one close to my chest, but I've already started on the research and I'm pretty sure it's going to be amazing!
March 5, 2014
The New Spider Shepherd Short Story
I've just self-published the new Spider Shepherd short story. It's called Narrow Escape and is set at the time Spider was on SAS Selection - in particular on the Escape and Evasion part of the course. It's generally regarded as the toughest part of the SAS Selection process, but as Spider progresses through it he realises that all is not as it should be, and that his life is truly on the line.
You can buy Narrow Escape BY CLICKING HERE
I have another Spider Shepherd short story planned - I shall keep you posted! It will be the ninth at which point I hope to publish them in a paperback. The series of short stories take Spider from his time on SAS selection, through missions in Sierra Leone and Afghanistan, and end with the episode where he got shot. I had great fun writing them and will probably do more in the future! Spider was in Sarajevo before he joined the SAS and I think there is a good story to be told about his time in the former Yugoslavia. We'll see!
You can buy Narrow Escape BY CLICKING HERE
I have another Spider Shepherd short story planned - I shall keep you posted! It will be the ninth at which point I hope to publish them in a paperback. The series of short stories take Spider from his time on SAS selection, through missions in Sierra Leone and Afghanistan, and end with the episode where he got shot. I had great fun writing them and will probably do more in the future! Spider was in Sarajevo before he joined the SAS and I think there is a good story to be told about his time in the former Yugoslavia. We'll see!
