A.k.a. Best review ever

What do you get if you cross an Anne McCaffery with an Oscar Wilde? According to Locus magazine’s review of The Adamantine Palace, what you get is me:

‘The wittiest of a bunch where wit is rarely in short supply is Stephen Deas, in his remarkable début The Adamantine Palace. A Prologue sets the scene, as the mid-air liaison of two humans (a scheming prince and an adulterous “dragon-queen”) shifts from lusty grappling to murder with one push: “Her arms flailed and then she was gone, off into the sky.” Every entity here, whatever their species or aristocratic rank, proves to be thoroughly physical, and most are morally flawed, but Deas isn’t interested in giving us another epic clash of Good vs. Evil.

Even the vivid portrayal of dragons, in a culture which has constrained them and made them into an uncanny version of our flying machines, doesn’t lead to a wallow in high magics or picturesque delights. As Queen Shezira (a hedonist more cynical than the late Queen Aliphera) tells one of her daughters when they enter a new city, “You’ll see many strange and different sights here, Lystra. Keep your sense of wonder, but keep it to yourself, too, or people will take you for a fool.”

At first, the combination of the fantastic with keen observation and sheer impudence reads something like Anne McCaffery as filtered through the mind of Oscar Wilde. Amid the partial chaos of shifting viewpoints and a growing cast of characters there’s a strong thread of sardonic humour, enough to keep the prospect of a brokered marriage – handing over another of Shezira’s daughters to the murderous Prince Jehal – from seeming entirely horrific.

Meanwhile, details about the dragons – and their relationship to the humans they think of as “Little Ones” – continue to trickle in via another plot thread, laying the ground for a tale that will come to be both substantially darker and more imaginative than cynical social comedy. As Deas moves beyond the wiles of his political schemers and the more general bitterness of a sell-sword working for dragon riders, he finds room for a broad spectrum of emotions ranging from unexpected tenderness to a berserker rage than man and dragon may share (though in other ways they’re very different).‘

From the sublime to the bland, it’s hard to pick a quote from the SFX review. “Not the instant classic that some have suggested, but promising enough and neatly set up for a sequel?” Hmmm. “A promising set-up. Whether the rest of the book lives up to the initial idea is less certain?” No, not that. “The plot moves along briskly and surprises occur?” Gee. Three stars. Guess for one reviewer we did a lot of taxiing around the airport but never quite took off huh? Never mind: The world could do with a bit more depth? Yes, OK, fair cop. But Prince Jehal’s motivations are opaque? Really? I thought they were just shallow, that’s all…

I suppose the most useful (although sadly lacking in Oscar Wilde references) is actually Fantasy Book Critic, which is a fairly lengthy and explicit (and happily generally very positive) review and includes the book blurb, some background and links to other online reviews (with varying degrees of hyperbola). Gollancz has discovered another winner? Yes, I’ll take that as a last word.

There’s also a complete list of all the reviews I’m aware of (good and bad) here.

But back to Oscar. Thank you Locus. Thank you very much. And now I shall away to my hatter, for I feel my head has become greatly swollen…

Now in its 8th year, SCI-FI-LONDON is expanding on the popularity of the film festival and filmmaking workshops by opening up a new stream of events called SCI-FI-LONDON LABS.  The labs will comprise several panels of invited guests, recognised leaders in their fields, to discuss aspects of science and literature with the SFL audience.

That’s me. Yes, folks, a recognised leader in the field of… something. Or maybe it’s a polite way of asking for people to help set up the tables.

There are a number of subtle differences between the draft cover image for The Adamantine Palace posted up on this website and the actual printed cover art. Some sort of desperately trivial prize (yet to be determined and entirely subject to the whim of the author, although suggestions will be listened to) will be awarded to the first person to write in and correctly spot the differences. Yay!

The first printed copies of The Adamantine Palace arrived in the post this morning.

They’re GORGEOUS!

Almost down to three weeks to go. Still no printed copies.

Have bought new bookcase in anticipation.

Order of the Scales definitely past the half-way mark now (67k). Have been killing off characters to relieve tension of impending publication day. Am slowly running out. May have to have extended dream-sequence in which most of cast are massacred and then turn out not to be dead after all.

The Adamantine Palace is a month from publication, and chez Deas, the air is filled that thick cloying electric air that comes before a storm as we[1] wait for the printed copies and, perhaps more important, the printed reviews.

So thank you, Sci-Fi now, for A blisteringly well-written tale and An inspiring debut and, most importantly, the Must Read Now! sticker. I now await the rest of the reviews with a little less trepidation.

Sci-Fi now comes out on the 19th (I think). For the three people who read this blog who didn’t already receive the excerpt via The Grand Master, it’s on page 82. For the rest of you (Simon, Jon), Order of the Scales continues to hum along (61k words) and the dragons are starting to be really fun.

[1] When I say we, I mostly mean I. I sense a certain amount of tension from my other half, but that could easily be an adverse reaction to having a tense author prowling around the place. Or it being half term.

All of a sudden, nothing is happening. After the frenzy of activity in January… quiet. My attention is… wandering.

Order of the Scales progresses (56k words).

It’s been a bit of a slow few days. I’ve had lots of fun moving chapters of OOTS from one place to a different place, looking at them from all angles, trying them out somewhere else, but actually writing new words… no, not much of that. I never used to write like this, with all this moving stuff around malarkey. I was strictly a start-at-the-beginning-and-keep-going-until-the-end sort of writer. The rot set in with King of the Crags, so when my editor comes back and tells me it’s all a dog’s breakfast and can I please rewrite it from the bottom up, we’ll all know why… And I’m hoping this will now be sooner rather than later on account of the Snow and Simon being stuck at home with nothing else to do, along with most of the rest of London.

I did write a short piece lamenting the demise of the dragon from iconic monster to fluffy cuddly toy. Curse you Anne McCaffery (but only a teensy little bit, because I thoroughly enjoyed Pern when I was younger and it was new).

I’ve had several mails now asking where and when books can be sighed. I caught myself yesterday rolling my eyes, thinking oh no, not another one. And then I took myself outside, gave myself a good slap and stuck my face in the snow until I woke up and remembered how awesome it is that anyone at all is even asking. So: There are no hard plans for any signings at the moment, but I will be at Eastercon. If anything else is arranged, you’ll hear about it first here, and when it’s definite, I’ll put it up on the home page. There, is that fair?

After the thrills of last week, nothing very much new has happened, so in the meantime I offer this for your amusement.

Order of the Scales has reached 49000 words, King of the Crags is with Simon-the-editor and The Adamantine Palace is only abouit a fortnight away from being printed (yay!)

Also on the subject of trials I have a sore wrist from signing 400 book plates. Apparently I only needed to sign half that number, so presumably my editor thinks that my writing hand needs to lose weight. Or maybe with sufficient exercise it might be able to type quicker. Or for longer. Or something.

Signing your name 400 times is a really, really dull thing to do. I have a new-found sympathy and respect for people who have to do this sort of thing on a regular basis.

Oh, and I did it on a plane. If you’re the one who’s plate says ‘wheeee…’ underneath, that was when we took off. I was a bit fed up by then, so sorry about that.

Pillaged from the interweb

“Suzanne McLeod got Mark, Karen and I invited to David Devereux after party at the Phoenix Club as part of the launch of his new novel, Eagle Rising. We had a brilliant time and got to chat with several of the authors and we were introduced to a new rising star at Gollancz, Stephen Deas, whose upcoming novel, The Adamantine Palace, is to be published in March 2009.”

Stuff like this makes me want to jump up and down and wave my hands and go “SQUEEEE!” like some girly teenage cheerleader type. Of course, I only do that on the inside. On the outside, I merely frown. Or more probably put on some expression that ends up looking like a constipated Klingon. It had never occurred to me until now, though, that other people might get that same sensation merely from being in the august presence of the new dragonlord. It’s a frightening thought; after all, I too was only there because a proper author, who’s actually got a book that’s printed and in shops and that you can actually buy and stuff like that was kind enough to invite me

Rising star? I think I’ve gone up a cap-size. Possibly two. Squeee…

Fortunately there’s always the occasional blast from the past (a pleasure, Mr Proven) to remind one of ones grubby goth-biker history. And if that’s not enough, I’m quite certain I can rely on certain other parties to fill the house with scornful laughter at the very thought of such nonsense.

So that’s that silliness sorted, right?

Yes, folks, construction of the Death Star finally completed (several days ago now, but I’ve been away), as very poorly pictured below as the junior construction supervisor puts the finishing touches to Darth Vader’s rest chamber (or whatever it is). There might have been lots more pictures and all sorts of silliness involving inappropriate posing of mini-figures (especially after Senior Construction Supervisor finally retrieved gold-bikini Princess Leia from behind a radiator). But for the time being, you’ll all have to exercise your imaginations instead. I’m toying with a Star Wars mini-figures photo contest of some sort, but that would be: a) Immensely sad and b) Almost certainly done somewhere else and better.

Death Star Construction

Oh, and in lesser news, King of the Crags got delivered to Gollancz too.

PRESS RELEASE – FANTASY DEBUT CHOSEN AS BOOK CLUB EDITOR’S CHOICE

Stephen Deas’ debut fantasy novel, THE ADAMANTINE PALACE, has been chosen as the Editor’s Choice for February 2009 by the SF & Fantasy Book Club.

The book will be published in the UK by Gollancz in March.

Contact John Jarrold for further information: e-mail: j.jarrold@btinternet.com

Yes, I can proudly announce that the Death Star took a great leap forward last weekend and is now approaching completion. The detention block is done, as are the throne room and the turbolaser turrets.

In a few moments accidentally spent writing stuff, King of the Crags got largely finished too.

Simon, this is for you…

Someone died last night. At least, I think they did. Actually, they might have been dead all the time. I’m not sure one way or the other and it’s quite hard to tell. And given that they’re an entirely fictional creation existing only in my head and on bits of virtual paper, it’s a bit weird.

See, as well as the published reviews, I’ve had a little stack of informal comments back from people who’ve read The Adamantine Palace. “I’m really looking forward to finding out more about X” was an early comment that caught my attention. That’s interesting, I thought. Not much chance of that given that X is dead. Admittedly, X dies ‘off-screen.’ I didn’t actually write it. I could bring X back if I wanted to! Wow! The god complex that lurks in one of the community flats in my head woke up and cackled for a bit before the men in the white coats turned up with some sedatives. No no. X is dead and gone, I thought. Leave it be.

Abd then, a little later, came another casual comment. I like the way you weren’t afraid to kill off characters like Y and Z. There wasn’t much doubt about Y. Y gets eaten by a dragon. There’s not much coming back from being eaten by a dragon. But it was a bit surprised to learn that Z was dead. Alarmed, in fact, as Z was a moderately significant character with multiple appearances throughout Kign of the Crags. How could Z be dead? I was still writing them. They were still walking and talking. Wouldn’t I have noticed if they were dead? I don’t recall having the undead feature in my plot. Not yet, anyway.

And yet, on reflection, they might well have been right and I might be wrong. Z might well be dead. Which will mean excising them from the whole of King of the Crags, which is going to be a right nuisance.

I’ve had characters do things I didn’t want before. I’ve had characters insist on dying when they were supposed to stay alive. But a character getting snuiffed out and then pretending not to be dead for an entire sequel? This is new territory. Who’s in charge here?

Happy new year everyone. I don’t know whether to class this as a ‘news’ post or a ‘critical failures’ post. A critical failure because this post was supposed to go up yesterday. In fact, my whole year is already one day out of whack on account of having had two New Year’s parties cancelled on me at short(ish) notice and then spending most of the day in bed with a migraine anyway. So yesterday was our ‘celebration’ day in this house. All in all this holiday season hasn’t been that great. We had a very nice Yule celebration on the 20th, Christmas itself was overrun by the little people, the smaller of whom seems to have regressed to being two again and throwing ‘I want’ tantrums left right and centre. The bigger one knocked a tooth out, root and all – still don’t know quite how he did it, and we’ve managed to see precisely one couple of *our* friends. With a bit of luck that will change shortly. So the holiday season gets a big thumbs sideways this year. The kids had a great time. The rest of us, I think, are just relieved that it’s all over.

However, on the plus side, number one son’s favourite song is currently The Knights of Cydonia by Muse and number two has developed a penchant for Space Lord by Monster Magnet, so at least driving is fun now.

In the midst of all this, some surprisingly useful writing has happened. The reworking of King of the Crags is under way and I’m about a third of the way through. It seems like it’s going really well. I’m pleasantly surprised to find that it’s quite a good book in the first place (or so it seems to me, but I always remember everything I write as being rubbish until I read it again). But what’s really making the difference is the addition of a little extra material. I won’t say that this has come about as a direct result of the early reviews because to some extent it would have happened anyway. Still, the reviews have made me think about some things more than would otherwise have happened, so thank-you reviewers, all of you so far. You have made The King of the Crags better (and fractionally longer – sorry Simon) than it would otherwise have been.

the Order of the Scales is on hold at about a third of the way through while I deal with the rewrite. A certain Total Recall inspired scene is now imminent. Or not, as the case may be.

No New Year’s resolutions this year except to finish King of the Crags, Order of the Scales and the construction of the Lego Death Star (in no particular order) and to actually read some books written by other people this year.

Happy Christmas everybody.

First reader finished King of the Crags a couple of days ago. Main criticism: More background detail needed (and do something about Character X).

At the same time I’m about a quarter of the way through Order of the Scales (about 35k words I think). I have discovered that in order for this book to work, it’s either going to have to be about half as long again as the others, or else two things need to happen: Firstly the history of the dragons (up to a point at least) and of the alchemists and their function in the realms needs to be well established in previous volumes. The Adamantine Palace quite deliberately didn’t do this, so The King of the Crags now pretty much has to. The second thing is that Character X serves no useful purpose other than to give the reader a vicarious thrill when he/she/it finally becomes dragon food. Well I guess you can have that in book two just as easily as book three.

So the rewrite will begin shortly, and it will take a while and King of the Crags will wind up a little longer and a little calmer than The Adamantine Palace and probably be the better for it. Submission to Gollancz is now expected sometime in January, a mere six months ahead of schedule

Rar!

OK, first of all, in repsonse to those who have asked, the construction of the Death Star is proceeding slowly but steadily. It is a little behind schedule but as yet there have been no Sith Lord visits to chivvy us along. I’m sure the school holidays will get us back on track.

Right. This from the publicity manager at Hachette Australia.

‘I was utterly absorbed by this fast moving and action-packed fantasy of Machiavellian characters, political intrigue, deceit, conspiracies, murder and dragons!! Deas has portrayed a society that is rotten to the core, much in the same way as Morgan did in The Steel Remains. We are presented with all-too-human characters, bent on gratifying their own selfish needs for power and control. In their hunger to rule, they have enslaved Dragons to serve their own needs… Dragons are drugged by alchemists who administer potions to make them do their owners bidding… I have to admit that I was barracking for the dragons, in particular Snow, wanting them to burninate them all and revolt! Deas has written a modern, fact-paced story, with short punchy chapters, full of action and interest, which move from character to character… This is another brilliant Gollancz debut!!’

Burninate. Has a ring to it…

And now I want to read The Steel Remains.

A lot has happened this year. The Adamantine Palace was mostly written this year. I got to see my first cover and my first reviews. A rather pleasing US rights sale was made. I’ve met lots of new and interesting people, many of whom have said nice encouraging things. It would have been hard, up until today, to have said what had made me glow with pride the most. And then there was today, and now there can be no doubt. Having received a promotion to a higher reading grade at school, my nearly six-year-old came out with this statement:

“When my teacher said it was reading time, I used to think that was really boring, but now I realise that it’s really fun.”

Yes. YES! Because it IS! I think that’s the coolest thing anyone has said to me all year. I have a smile on my face and a spring in my step that should see me right past Christmas.

In other, far less significant news, Order of the Scales has reached about 25k words, first reader claims to be within a week of finishing reading King of the Crags which means I can get back to working on that soon, and The Adamantine Palace is apparently destined to be editor’s choice for the BCA Fantasy and SF bookclub in February. This is all cool, but not as cool as a little boy who has discovered that he loves to read.

Oh and speaking of fun, TAP has been called a “Fast, sharp, ruthless read” by Joe Abercrombie, a man whose opinions should be heeded and whose books should be read. Lots. By everyone. Because they are most definitely fun, and of the highest order.

I heard today that a Hollywood producer had taken a look at The Adamantine Palace and decided they couldn’t see it as a movie. I suppose I ought to be disappointed, but I’m going to take a glass-half-full view of this and spend the evening bouncing up and down going “Wow! Hollywood actually took an interest!”

Obviously (in case there are any other big-shot producers out there reading this), The Adamantine Palace would make a very fine movie, and it should have John Malkovich in it as Speaker Hyram at the very least. However, we’ve not gotten very far when it comes to casting everyone else. Now, maybe having the right cast would improve the chances of a movie actually being made, so I propose the following partial cast for your amusement: I have to admit, though, that I do see The Adamantine Palace more as anime. Sex and monsters! Rah! (and I also realise that I have failed to include Johnny Depp. My bad).

Prince Jehal:      Joaquim Phoenix, James McAvoy or possibly Paul Bettany

Queen Zafir:      Scarlett Johannson

Speaker Hyram: John Malkovitch

Queen Shezira: Helen Mirren

Princess Jaslyn: Ziyi Zhang

Princess Lystra: Lauren Ambrose

Kemir:               Diego Luna

Sollos:              Jason Statham

Rider Semian:    Javier Bardem

Lord Meteroa:    Jason Isaacs or maybe Alan Rickman

Lady Nastria:     Tilda Swinton

(This is now the mk.3 list).

Casting is now in progress for King of the Crags. Names in the frame for new characters include Christian Bale or Viggo Mortensen, Rusell Crowe, Tomas Kretchmann and Helena Bonham-Carter. Luke Goss, an alternative Jason Isaacs role and David Bowie are all being lined up for book three

Let it not be said that I treated myself to any kind of well-earned rest, having finished the proof-read of The Adamantine Palace and the first draft of King of the Crags all in the same month. No indeed, for I have hereby this day commenced on The Order of the Scales, despite stringent vows not to until at least January.

Bah.

Although there’s something to be said for getting on to the last book of the three. A ‘book one’s job is to loudly kick the door to the party down and shout stuff along the lines of “Hey! Y’all! Look at me!” and other such subtlties. A ‘book three’ gets to run out into the back garden with a fistful of fireworks a go “Hey! Look at what I brought!” and generally make as big an arse of itself as it likes on the grounds that by that stage everyone has either gone home or is so drunk they really don’t care. Poor old ‘book two’ is stuck in the middle and has to mingle its way around the party, introducing itself and getting to know people, making friends and being vaguely apologetic for the mess it made of the door on the way in, while all the time having to be extra careful about the bucket of fireworks it brought with it in case one catches a spark from someone’s cigarette and goes off accidentally in a crowded hall.

I now have this deep dread that none of the above makes any sense at all.

<synopsis>Middle books. Tricky buggers.</synopsis>

<sigh>

Maybe I should just go to bed.

The proof copy for The Adamantine Palace arrived a while back and I’ve finally made my way through most of it. This is a strange experience. Having left it alone for months, and in the meantime written King of the Crags and seen all the ARC reviews come out, I find I see it in a different light. Proof-reading has turned out to be a weirdly different way of reading text, too. It’s amazing how some mistakes have gotten this far (one clear search-and-replace error, for example, crops up several times. Stopping to read every single word in every single sentence it become glaringly obvious, and yet somehow if I read normally, it becomes almost invisible).

It was pointed out to me last night that I haven’t added links to some more recent reviews. There are a few more out, so here’s the current summary (obviously I pick and choose my quotes

“The book is an entertaining mix of Pern and Westeros, with the knowing characterisation of Abercrombie and the endearment of Novik.” SFFworld.

“The Adamantine Palace is a fast, furious and entertaining book that grabs hold of the reader and whisks them off like a rollercoaster. The dragons, as promised, indeed kick ass.” The Wertzone.

“…full of everything that I like about fantasy right now; strong characters, a complex plot and loads of dragons.” Graeme’s Fantasy Book Review.

“In short: dragons, intrigue, poison, mercenaries and a Big Dark History. If you like that sort of thing then this is definitely worth a look.“ Sandstorm Reviews.

If there is a general complaint, it seems to be that the book is too fast and too rapid-fire and skims on the background detail for the sake of pace (which it does, and deliberately so). King of the Crags is, I think, a little more measured. Not that I deliberately set out to be so, just the way it came. Or maybe I should leave that for the reviewers to decide…

Anyway, back to making a mess all over the proofs and then I guess it’ll be time to re-write King of the Crags again before I send it to Simon for some proper editing, and while we’re at it, I’ve made a start on The Order of the Scales. Although I don’t dare go too far with that, as there’s a certain scene I’ve promised to write for the Orion publicity manager if he managers to pull off an absurdly ridiculous request (I might just write it anyway, Jon).

The closer we get to publication date, the more I chew my nails. I shall have to write quickly, before my fingers become bloody stumps.

Win a signed ARC for The Adamantine Palace and a host of, er, possibly even more cool stuff in the great Patrick Rothfuss charity spectacular! There’s a pretty awesome thing going on here.

And the proof of The Adamantine Palace arrived this morning. Arguably more personally exciting, but of lesser global importance…

Pop-quiz, hotshot:

You’re a newbie author for whom things are going unexpectedly well. You have a number of reasons for celebration. You’ve finished the first draft of your second book well ahead of schedule. You’ve sold your US rights for more than pocket-change. Your first royalty cheque came through not all that long ago. It’s time to reward yourself. Time to give yourself a little pat on the back for working so hard. Do you:

a) Take youself off to Las Vegas for a long weekend and go mental?

b) Carefully invest in a high-interest savings account and plan to pay off your mortgage over the next six trilogies?

c) Hire a babysitter and take your wife/girlfriend away for a luxury evening of champagne and caviar ?

d) Not bother with the babysitter and take someone else’s wife/girlfriend out instead?

e) Buy a Lego Death Star and spend the next few days feverishly building to the exclusion of all else including food, sleep and sex?

I shall say no more except to point out the bit about the first draft of King of the Crags being finished again. If I start asking for Lego Star Wars mini-figures in exhange for signing copies of anything, it’s sheer co-incidence. Or it’s for the kids. Yes, that’ll do, it’s for the kids, right?

The one (and only) big advantage of being sent to far-away places in service of the day-job is suddenly finding myself with lots of free time at very strange hours of the day. Even in sub-urban Los Angeles, there really isn’t a huge amount of touristy stuff that I want to do when I’ve just woken up a three o’clock in the morning. Actually, mostly what I want to do is have breakfast. However, it’s also turning out to be a fine time to get some writing done, and so King of the Crags has raced ahead. Word count is sitting at 113k and the book is very nearly finished (the very first draft, at least). With a bit of luck it’ll be done in time for the proofs of the Adamantine Palace to arrive next week. It’s not going to be any longer than The Adamantine Palace, but the chapter count is a little lower which might please a few people. There’s more dragon, too, but you’ll still all have to wait until book three for certain mysteries to be resolved.

And the other America news is that a deal has been struck and The Adamantine Palace and all its little friends will be being published in the US as well. More when I know it.

Oh man, what a long couple of days it’s been, and for more reasons than I’m going to go into here. The restructuring of King of the Crags is largely finished. Acts 1-3 (that’s about 88k words) are good to go. Wordcount stands at 96k, although the last few thousand may still get dumped and reworked. Finished by the end of this week? Not a chance but it won’t be much later than that.

Now I need ice-cream, coffee, sleep and to watch reality TV folk eaten by zombies.

It seems I can’t resist the urge to rant at the foolishness of others or (frequently) myself. This sort of nonsense has no place in the News archives, which are are purely intended for book-related updates. Therefore the new thread ‘Critical Failures’ has been created, which can be accessed via a link on the body of the homepage. If you go and have a look at what’s there, remember: no one forced you.

King of the Crags is, has metaphorically, been disassembled into component parts which are all spread across the garage floor. A certain restructuring of the first three acts is now underway, after which the trajectory of the final act may be sufficiently different that it needs to be scrapped and done again. We shall see over the next few days…

(wordcount currently 95k, but this doesn’t mean much right now).

The first reviews of the Adamantine Palace have begun to appear, on The Wertzone and SFFworld

“…traditional-style fantasy, but written in a contemporary manner…”

“…characters and storylines are not so much flying past but feel like they’ve been blasted out from a minigun like the one Blaine had in Predator…”

On the 11th October 2007, this appeared in my in-box:

“I had a phone call yesterday… Very occasionally a publisher will have a general idea and ask if I feel there is anyone they might discuss it with on my books. Simon [Spanton] is keen to discuss intelligent dragon fantasy – not busty girl with sword on dragon, but something that would appeal broadly, including the intelligent fantasy-reading audience… Is this something you would be interested in?”

The Adamantine Palace and the dragons within were first conceived the following day, exactly a year ago. It seems a long, long time ago.

Anyway, back from work-related travels yesterday with no idea what timezone I’m in. Everything is a blur. The cover proofs arrived while I was away. They’re subtly different from the draft I put up a while back, but you have to really look to spot the differences. They’re also shiny and glittery and gleamy

I still managed to get some real work done while I was away. King of the Crags is up to 85k word and I’m still hoping (without a great deal of optimism, I must admit) to have the first draft finished by the end of the month.

Rumours of impending reviews are starting to arrive. It’s kind of scary knowing that the bound proofs are out there, being read by people who have absolutely no reason to be anything other than honest about what they say.