Daynote - Mon 5 May

It's a Bank Holiday Monday here in Scotland, so I'm having a somewhat languid start to the day, with some scrambled eggs on toast and a lot of tea. Might pop out for a walk later.

It's also, as of today, exactly one month until my paperback for A RELUCTANT SPY comes out. Here's a post about that.

The Kindle Monthly Deal continues - why not pick up an eBook or audiobook copy for a bargain price? Available both sides of the Atlantic!

ON DECK: I'm yet to crack open Scrivener (see the aforementioned languid start) but I had an excellent session with my critique partners yesterday evening that has me raring to go on this edit. In the way that it often does, it has gone from feeling like an insurmountable, inchoate blob of stuff that needs doing into a completely doable set of tasks with specific things I need to execute. That's largely because I sat down last night and broke down the work.

TOOLS AND PROCESS: I haven't had an edit letter yet, because PROJECT SCARLET has yet to go to my editor. But I treat questions and suggestions from my crit partners and my own review read in the same way, which is to rewrite them in my own words and break down every instance where I need to do a thing. So today I'll dive in properly on the third edit. I've got 4k to lose and a bunch of things to add, so we'll see how it goes.

LISTENING: I really enjoyed this panel from TBRCon about publishing in more than one genre. Some really interesting conversation about developing overlapping fanbases, doing IP work and the different expectations of readerships.

WATCHING: Caught up with the next three episode batch of ANDOR over the weekend. I am loving the cloak-and-dagger spy shenanigans in this season a great deal, since it is perfectly mixing my two great fiction loves - SF and spies.

READING: Read a bit of PLANETSIDE over the weekend, and a bit of INNOCENT GUILT. I'm also working on my mate's fantasy beta read.

LINK: Another excellent post from Phoebe Morgan on the question of recontracting (signing up to do another book or multi-book deal) with the same publisher.

UP NEXT: A chill day today, with a decent chunk of editing and then I'll likely be trimming our rather overgrown garden hedges, if the rain holds off. Then back into the routine for the rest of the week.

The clock is ticking down now towards my deadline. I'm pretty relaxed about it, since the book is essentially finished. But I do want to submit the best book I possibly can. So I'm going to take the time I have to polish and trim and polish a little more.

Onward!