This time last week I dreamed of finishing up Wren book 5 edits, but anticipated getting halfway, and that is exactly what has happened. I’m currently sitting at chapter 27 in the edits – I probably could have done more but for whatever reason procrastinated instead. I think I’ll be done in a week. It’s good, is my thinking so far. The engine looks tuned, and once that’s rolling in the background Wren gets to have some real fun. Promotion Today I have two decent-sized promotional pushes going on. The boxset of books 1-3, which has never had any kind …

This last week has been consumed with editing Wren 5 Firestorm. In the first half of the week I worked on the final few chapters which I’d blitzed out in a rush. I had been worried they wouldn’t be so hot, would need a lot of reworking, but they were pretty solid. The latter half of the week I started from the beginning. This is the heavy draft, for the deepest ‘ironing’ out of plot wrinkles. One thing I’m finding with all these books, I hit tangles around chapter 8. It’s the point where the opening fight is over, and …

After a hectic 2 weeks of writing, matched by the crazy American election going on in the background, Wren book 5 is done! This one is political, no doubt. Presidential politics, inauguration, mass rallies in Washington – as I was putting the finishing words to the final chapter, Joe Biden was finaly eking out his lead in Pennsylvania. The two felt absolutely entwined. I thought I might, coincidentally, finish the book on election day. I almost got there. Each day after I got a few thousands words a day, until Friday when it capped off, I logged back into CNN, …

The main news this week has been fresh words laid down on Firestorm – and they’ve been very revelatory for me. Last week closed out at 56,000, and this week closed at 64,000. That’s 8,000, which may not sound impressive, but it really felt like a lot. We covered a couple of major steps forward that I had to wind up to, and which even now need a fair bit of work. Deep backstory coming into play in beautiful, unexpected ways. I love it when things that I only fuzzily envisaged years ago click into place as if they’d been …

This has been a good week for getting back on the writing horse – averaging around 2,000 words a day, taking the count up to 56,000. That’s about 10,000 for the week, which is great. Words A lot of big stuff. Deep backstory that has underpinned the whole series, kind of the ‘mythology’ if you will, coming to the fore. It’s exciting for me. For a long time I’ve known the Apex had an incredible hold over his followers. I hadn’t broken out how. Now I’m doing that. It’s pretty cool how tech is playing into it. I’m psyched to …

I’ve been mummering on about the genre of Saint Justice and my Christopher Wren series for bleeding ages, so finally the time has come for me to announce the new, please-to-God-be-right cover. Feast your eyes: What do you think? I did a lot of testing to get here. I shared it alongside another, more standard vigilante thriller cover that the excellent designers at Damonza produced (for $500), with a range of different audiences: My ARC team – they came up pretty much split on this and another My writer’s marketing group – they preferred this one FB ads via the …

Along the way in my recent investigation of the thriller genre (reading Baldacci’s Memory Man, Gregg Hurwitz’s Orphan X, Mark Dawson’s The Cleaner), I first called these books ‘cosy thrillers’. Now I’m refining that to ‘male romances’. What does that mean? Well, they’re fantasies for men, just like romances are fantasies for women. What does a romance do? Romance – a lady gets a good man, happily ever after Male romance (thriller) – a man protects a single mother and her son from bad men, has sex with her and moves on I suppose these are evolutionarily-based human directives. The …

Aaaaand, I am back into writing. Hoo-fucking-rah, am I right? Today I plugged back into Wren book 5 for a cheeky 1500 words, which puts the count at 35,500 total. Basically halfway done! And it feels it, too. Couple of major movements left, we’ll be all set. To boot, I spent a few hours throwing out ideas for another thriller series. One that is less literary, more of a ‘cozy’ thriller, with more black and white issues, more a superhero ‘fantasy’ vibe to the main guy’s life. Thus far it’s at 9,000 words. I’ve got the story going forward. The …

I’ve been reading up some more on the difference between literary and genre, and found a way to express that feels true for me, as the guy who writes it. When I’m writing, I want to feel like I’m on an adventure. I’m exploring a new space. Maybe it’s the human condition. Maybe it’s a social issue. Maybe it’s how far a plot/character thread can go. I don’t know exactly where it’s going, and I don’t know exactly what the end is. All of these unknowns are what make this kind of writing so fascinating for ME. I’ve always just …

Maybe I write literary books. I’ve heard people say this before. My writer friend Matt has said I’m a literary writer yearning to write genre. I took it on board, thought I understood it, but yesterday the same idea hit me deeper than before. First, let’s look at what ‘literary’ writing is, and why I have resisted embracing the label for so long. Here are 6 features of literay fiction according to Wikipedia: A concern with social commentary, political criticism, or reflection on the human condition. I definitely do this. With Wren the social commentary, political criticism and human condition …