Sequel to The Flyer to be released in April
I suddenly realised today that it’s the end of the month, and I haven’t posted anything for a while now. The reason is that I’ve been writing at a frenetic pace to produce a sequel to The Flyer. Right now I’m sitting on 80 000 words, which for those not familiar with the idea of measuring book length by words, means I’m about two-thirds done. The interesting thing here is that it’s taken me three weeks to get to this point, and I’ll be finished in another two. After that I’ll edit and rewrite before sending the manuscript to the editor I use in the UK, which means the finished book will be available to buy sometime in April.
It’s worth noting that by contrast I spent two years writing The Flyer, including research. The Snow Falcon took about nine months, not including the thirty-odd years of prior experience that was an essential part of the process, especially the two years immediately prior which I’ve been writing about in my ongoing blog posts. (I intend to sit down and finish that very soon, by the way.) My point though, is that the as yet untitled sequel to The Flyer has been written in what is for me record-breaking time and it doesn’t stop there. Not only will I release the sequel in April as an e-book (though it will be available in print from Amazon as well), but there will be a third instalment of the series later in the year. As well that I intend to release four other full length novels this year. They will form part of a different series that I’ll be writing under a different name. More on that another time. So, during 2014 I’ll be writing and releasing six full length novels, which is more than I wrote in five years beginning with Snow Falcon and ending with Aphrodite’s Smile.
To accomplish this I’m going to have to stick to a very disciplined work regime which includes writing a novel at the rate of five thousand words a day. That’s roughly 12-15 pages of a standard printed paperback. it takes a lot of concentrated effort to maintain that kind of output. It means spending at least six hours a day at the keyboard, working to a reasonably fleshed-out story plan. The plan is essential because working like this I don’t have the luxury of writing three four or five drafts as I normally would. I’ve only got time to do two drafts and if I’m going to keep to schedule I can only spend a couple of weeks on the second draft versus five on the first. I doubt that very many people could keep up that level of working while still producing a decent book at the end of it, and that’s the key issue. Will the work be good enough? I mean, if The Flyer took two years to write and the sequel will take that many months, what does that say about the quality of the writing?
Well, it’s not quite as straight-forward as that. The Flyer was a difficult story to write partly because of the research involved, and much of that research is applicable to the sequel so there’s a time-saving there. I’m also using the same principle characters and a big part of writing any novel is figuring out the characters. It’s a lot easier in some forms of genre fiction such as thrillers where the plot is far more important than the characters whose motivations tend to be simpler and the conflicts they face primarily external rather than partially internal, which is the case with The Flyer, for instance. So there was another time-saving there when I came to writing the sequel. Even with those caveats though, two months is a very short time to write a full length novel and still maintain the quality, which for me has always been the goal. It begs the question though, what is quality anyway? Who judges it? Of course the answer is the reader, and it will be readers who judge whether the sequel measures up.
I am my most rigorous critic as can probably be said about most writers. I’m never really happy with my own work, I always think there’s more I could do to improve a book I’m working on. The danger with being too hard on myself is that it can result in a lack of confidence that means I’m reluctant to release books, and so my output dwindles. On other side of the coin I spent two years of my life writing The Flyer, which I know is a good book, a view confirmed by readers, and yet I haven’t been able to find a publisher for it. The reason for that failure has more to do with the state of the publishing industry than anything else and I don’t intend to go into that here. However it’s fair to say that with e-book technology and online stores such as Amazon, publishing has undergone a huge change and that process will continue. Writers can now publish their own work quite easily and readers are buying it. There has been much talk in the industry about perceived quality, mostly negative talk by publishers who are dismayed to find that they no longer decide what the public wants, and neither do agents or critics, but rather it is the readers themselves. This is the Internet, which has given ordinary people a voice they have never had before. Readers want quality, of course, but they decide what represents quality.
Readers also want content. I’m a reader myself, obviously. I read a lot. When I find an author I like, I want more. When I find characters and fictional ‘worlds’ that I like, whether that means a particular era or setting or background or whatever, I want more of that too. hence the popularity of series’ as opposed to stand-alone novels. This is why I’m continuing the series I started with The Flyer, which I always intended to be at least a trilogy. It’s also why I’ll be writing another series too, (thrillers) and explains why I’m planning to release six books this year.
Am I happy with the quality of the sequel to The Flyer? I’m two-thirds of the way through and the answer is that yes, I am. I hope readers will be too. In my next post I’ll tell you a little bit about the story. In the meantime, I’d love to hear from anyone who would be interested in reading an advance draft (as a word document that I’ll email to you) before the manuscript goes to the editor so that I can get some feedback. In return I’ll send you a print version of the finished novel direct from Amazon when it’s released. Let me know via the contact form. Thanks.
