IT’S BEEN A WHILE. I’ve been neglecting my online presence, something modern-day indie writers are ill-advised to do. Out of sight, out of mind, out of book sales!
But, I’ve been living life, staying fully engaged with family affairs and outdoor activities. And I’ve been deeply focused on my next book, One Year One Mountain. For most of the last two months I’ve been making revisions to it, prompted by the beta reader feedback I received, weighing up what to keep, what to cut, and what to fine tune. But I’m finally done. The result is a book reduced from 127K words to 113K… and a book that’s a far tighter and more compelling read (I hope). Nothing critical has been lost, but stories, themes and ideas have been strengthened.
I’ll now pass the book on to my editor, Alex Roddie, for a professional structural edit, and while he’s working through it I’ll also prepare book proposals to send out to agents and publishers. For me, as a writer, it’s an exciting time. I feel as though I’m standing on the edge of a ‘proper’ writing career. I also have a new book project to start, and aim to throw myself into it and hit the first draft hard. It’s possible it’ll leave me neglecting my online presence once again. If that happens I hope I’ll be forgiven for it!
I’ve been out and about a great deal, mostly locally – maintaining my daily nature habit. I’ve managed a few high country backpacking trips, including a two-night summer solstice outing to a quiet side of a big hill I now know well. For the rest of this post, I’ll let the photos and brief captions tell the story…
