I am loving the story-prompts from the previous post/competition. The challenge is going to be not writing a whole paragraph… Keep the suggestions coming!

While I work on the queries so far, have a read of my answers to the ‘Next Big Thing’ challenge that’s been doing the round of writers lately. I was tagged by Tom Lloyd, a writer whose books sit on my TBR shelf, awaiting my release from Arthur C Clarke Award judge-duties, which is currently taking up all my reading time.

So here are the questions we’ve all been answering –

What is the working title of your next book?

My next book is ‘Defiant Peaks’, published in the US 27th November and in the UK 6th December 2012.

Where did the idea come from for the book?

So far I’ve written a dozen books in three series set in the world of Einarinn, and it’s been firmly established that wizards don’t get involved in warfare. So the idea here was… what if they do?

What genre does your book fall under?

Epic fantasy – but if you think that means simplistic swords’n’sworcery, square-jawed heroes rescuing damsels in distress, think again. These days epic fantasy is multi-layered and thought-provoking, taking on the genre’s early assumptions about heroism, politics, gender and a whole lot else, within the framework of action and adventure.

What actors would you choose to play the part of your characters in a movie rendition?

I can never answer this. Overall, I’d like to see unknowns take the lead roles, so viewers come to the characters without preconceptions, as we did with Luke Skywalker, Han Solo and Princess Leia all those decades ago. Famous actors doing cameos for the high-level wizards? That could be a lot of fun. But the problem with me saying, ‘how about Ralph Fiennes for so-and-so, or Judi Dench for her,’ is some people will go ‘ooh yes,’ some people will go ‘oh, no’ and some people will look puzzled and go ‘Voldemort? And ‘M’?’ So I will leave that up to everyone else’s imagination. Until HBO come knocking on the door…

What is the one sentence synopsis of your book?

For generations the edict has held, that wizards don’t get involved in warfare, but there’s always someone who thinks the rules don’t apply to them…

Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?

It’ll be published by Solaris Books, in the UK and the US.

How long did it take you to write the first draft of the manuscript?

Six months for the first draft and then two more to turn that into the final draft sent to my editor.

What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?

Over the years, reviewers have been kind enough to compare my writing to Robin Hobb, George RR Martin, Kate Elliott, David Gemmell, Stan Nicholls and Barbara Hambly’s fantasies. We’re all looking at the core strengths and themes of our beloved genre from new perspectives.

Who or what inspired you to write this book?

I’ve already mentioned the ‘what if wizards do get involved in wars?’ prompt. As to who , this trilogy has definitely been inspired by my readers. A good many have been asking for a story exploring elemental magic more deeply and showing more of Hadrumal, the wizard city. Quite a few have wanted to know what happened next to the characters in my short story, The Wizard’s Coming (now available as a free ebook). Those emails definitely focused my thoughts as I contemplated my options at the end of The Lescari Revolution.

What else about the book might pique the reader’s interest?

Have a good look at the cover art. Just what do you think that wizard is doing? Bear in mind that he is the Archmage, most powerful of all the wizards who’ve showed just what devastation they can wreak, if they see fit, in the first two books of this trilogy…

Good Monday morning. The sun is shining and we’re back from a much needed family holiday – our first break of the year thanks to inconvenient overlaps of my work, husband’s work and sons’ school/college timetables making any kind of getaway before now impossible. It was a good holiday – of which more later. First I really had better tackle the email and post that’s arrived in our absence.

Happily I can take my own time doing that. I delivered the final draft of Defiant Peaks, aka The Hadrumal Crisis Book 3, to my editor at Solaris the day before we went away. I await his verdict with interest. Meantime I have some short story commissions to drag forward from the back burner where they’ve been simmering for the last few months. One SF, one fantasy and one… somewhere in between.

I am also idly contemplating a few Einarinn short stories – specifically detailing events/episodes which I refer to in Defiant Peaks but where I had to resist the temptation to include them in full. Doing so would have significantly delayed and/or distracted from the main narrative thread and besides the points of view would have been all wrong. We’ll see – maybe early next year, if I can work out how to write them without being too spoilery for the novel itself.

One other thing I did just before we went away was have a chat with Sandy Auden about Defiant Peaks and that’s the basis of this interview with SFX which will hopefully whet appetites from Defiant Peaks.

Next novel project? Nothing to announce as yet – I’m having a few conversations with a few people and we shall see what we shall see.

Right, I had better get on with that email and post then.

Life continues busy… Congenial in Cambridge was indeed splendid fun and this weekend I am off to the annual St Hilda’s Crime & Mystery Weekend in Oxford, to enjoy erudite papers and genial discussion, this year considering humour in crime fiction. And yes, obviously, when I put these things in the diary, the firm intention was to have delivered Defiant Peaks before now. Ho hum. Last lap starts Monday and at least I’m on track to deliver it without pulling any all-nighters. A few late nights, perhaps, but it’s been that sort of year.

Meantime, you may be interested in a piece I wrote for Erin Pringle, an American writer I met at the Phoenix Convention in Dublin the year before last. A very nice lady and a very talented and interesting writer as you will discover at her website/

She’s hosting a summer series of articles where various writers from the US and the British Isles are reflecting on our relationships with libraries. They make fascinating reading and my piece is now live, something of a memoir about my local branch library when I was a kid in Poole, Dorset.

Enjoy!

So if Darkening Skies, the second book of The Hadrumal Crisis trilogy is published in the US on 28th February and in the UK on the 1st of March, what happens on this leap year day of 29th February?

Well, for a start, you can go and read the opening chapter, wherever you might be, over on the Solaris Editors’ Blog.

I’ve also done an interview with the Solaris chaps talking about this book and trilogy as well as what I write and read more generally. There’ll be a few more guest blog spots here and there over the next week or so as well.

In addition, I’m celebrating along with the fabulous and talented CE Murphy, whose new book Raven Calls is also published this week, with a joint launch party at the Irish Writers Centre, Parnell Square, Dublin on Friday evening, by way of kicking off the fun at P-Con IX where I’ll be spending my weekend along with an array of great writers, great fans and many good friends. I’ll be discussing issues of gender in writing and publishing, internet piracy and the erosion of writers’ rights, and running a writers workshop alongside George Green of Lancaster Uni. By way of lighter topics, a group of us will be tackling ‘I didn’t get a letter from Hogwarts so I left the Shire to become a Vampire Jedi: how do authors avoid writing this book?’

Next week, when life calms down a bit, I’ll see about a book giveaway competition. Why so busy? Well, apart from the above, I’ve been working on a redesign of my website, which will see a whole new blog-based set-up, with a fair bit of additional background material about my writing added to what’s already been available, along with my articles, review, diary and other such stuff. At that point, this interim blog will go into mothballs.

I am indebted to Cheryl Morgan for all her help with this website relaunch, at the same time as she’s been tackling the publication angles for the forthcoming Further Tales of Einarinn ebook. There’s just a few final t’s to be crossed there and that’ll be available soon. Then we finalise an ebook of Turns & Chances, the Lescari Revolution novella. Meantime, of course, the Lescari Chronicles and both of the Hadrumal books to date are available in the eformat of your choice from your preferred supplier.

Right, I had better get back to finalising an Einarinn Gazetteer for the new site…

… after I’ve admired Clint Langley’s fantastic artwork for Darkening Skies one more time…

For more insights into the writerly life, or at least my part of it, check out this interview with Bob Neilson of Albedo One posing the questions. He plans on making this a series of interviews, so make sure you bookmark the page.

Then there’s Dolly Garland’s Bookshelf Snooping over on Writer Revealed, where you’ll find a varied selection of writers sharing their book memories and current enthusiasms -er, mostly at more length than me, I now see.

right, back to work here!

There’s a new interview with me now available at The Zone an SF, Fantasy, Horror and Mystery site well worth a visit and a browse for news, reviews and interviews.

Jim Steel of Interzone was asking the questions and very interesting they were, including some I’ve not been asked or even thought about before, Enjoy!