the second one's coming!

The second book is scarier than the first. After months writing and weeks editing, the third (and hopefully final) draft was delivered to my publishers yesterday. But while I wait to hear back from them about it, I know it'll be nothing compared with waiting to hear from you lot when it's published next summer! It's funny when you spend so long with a book and a cast of characters: letting them go is how I imagine it is watching your kids go for their first day at school. Will they be all right? Will they make friends? Will anyone be mean to them? And, I guess, extending the analogy, for a second book the question is: will they hide in the shadow of their older sibling, or might they outshine?

As an author you want to prove to yourself as much as anyone else that you've got lots of stories in you, not just one. It's like any debut follow-up - second album, second series . . . can you make it better than the first? Take films, for instance. Terminator 2: Judgement Day - YES. Aliens - YES. Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey - YES. Teen Wolf Too - NO. Speed 2: Cruise Control - NO. Weekend at Bernies 2 - NO (actually, I rewatched the first one recently and over the years it's lost its sheen, driving a corpse around in a golf buggy and flirting as it does with necrophilia). Anyway, I can guarantee that the follow-up to HOLLYWOOD SINNERS is bigger and more ambitious than its predecessor, and for me that's what it's about. Every part deux worth its salt should be a fresh challenge, one that draws on the lessons of the previous and stretches beyond, and one you embark on feeling slightly, just slightly, unsure you can pull off. 

But, anxieties aside, the months ahead of publication have to be the most exciting. Now's the time when titles are settled on, shoutlines come up with, covers finalised . . . and suddenly the world you've carried around for ages becomes a thing you can see and touch and hold. It seems like last week that HOLLYWOOD SINNERS was published. I can't wait to do it all again. I'll definitely keep you posted on all this as it happens - I cannot wait to know what you think!

In the meantime, for a glitzy festive fix, look out for my FREE Kindle Christmas short story. It'll be available through Amazon towards the end of the year. You'll never see Santa in the same way again.

Lots of love, Victoria x