This and that

I am in the middle of a fairly intensive library tour at the moment with at least one day a week away from home. I'm really enjoying being out on the road meeting readers, and it is great to see such a broad demographic, but it does mean that my writing time is being slightly squashed. I am preparing a couple of longer blog posts but in the meantime this is to explain why I'm not around so much - tour finishes at the end of April - and to add a few snippets of general information.

The picture at the beginning of the blog. Yikes - another headless woman (although she has her head to hand - see the stool!). No, it's not the next book cover, but part of a display put on by Leominster Library to mark their celebration of historical fiction. What a great idea! There would have been more photos but my husband went out to the car to check on the dog, who's part of the tour team, and forgot about his duties as cameraman.

Talking of covers. I am told that my work in progress about Mahelt Marshal and Hugh Bigod is going to have a new look cover. My publishers are considering their options at the moment. While the existing ones have sold very well and created a brand image, it is perhaps time to move on. The Time of Singing Paperback will have the same cover style, as will the re-issue of The Running Vixen, but then who knows? I await with excitement, interest, and trepidation.

And talking of The Running Vixen: I am just working on the first batch of edits of the rewrite.
It has been very interesting revisiting something that I last worked on around 1990 and as with The Wild Hunt, I've found that my verbosity has somewhat diminished since the early days. Part of the Running Vixen involves The Empress Matilda and I am finding that in this early novel of mine, she is slightly different to the woman I am going to be portraying once I begin writing the Empress's story. Perhaps The Running Vixen brings out her harder traits, although she is only a minor character.

I am currently building up a picture of the Empress Matilda in the Akashic Records and it's proving to be magnificent material - spot on with the history, but showing the Empress and her relationships in wonderful depth. I'll post a couple of examples in a future blog. It really is terrific material.

Meanwhile with the work in progress, I am nearing the end of draft 2. With a bit of luck, I might have it ready for the hard copy edit by the end of April or early May. It's not due in until September, but since the hard copy edit is only another layer in a long process, I'm still going to need the time.

More anon when I have a moment! In the meantime back to the edits!