Status update... again... and what was the secret book?

... I know I know. It's been a while. I have a mixture of news, both good and maybe not-so-good. That is, if you're the impatient type. Here we go!

The Babysitter (not the title)

First Draft: complete
Reader comments: received
Editing: Happening now!
Publication: Before end of 2015... probably

I've been busy with other stuff (see below) so editing has taken a long time to get around to. I'm finally ready, and I'm finally doing it. The good news (so far) is that the book seems to work. We'll see what you think when it's done. Also I have a real title now, but I'll leave that for reveal for a cover or something.

Secret Book That Was Secret (er, also not the title)

First draft: complete
Reader comments: received
Publication: Early 2016

This is finished. Surprise! Two books in the can. And hold on to your hats because there's another surprise which is that this book is...

... a re-telling of Victor G's The Substitute... except from Darien's point of view.

If you've never read Vic's story, shame on you; good news is you can read it here. I regard it as an early classic of our 'genre'.

What you may know - either from reading at that link, or because you've got a good memory - is that The Substitute was never actually finished. However with Vic's full help and cooperation, I've finished out the story and retold the entire thing from Darien's perspective. Wondering who Darien is and why his perspective matters? Hint: he's the guy wearing a mask. Go ahead and read the original. I think you'll get an idea of what I could do with it.

Like I said, I doubt you expected that. There's a whole story behind why I came to 'reimagine' The Substitute, but I'll save that for another post.

That's it. I know I'm a slow bastard, but hopefully having two books worth of material should keep you happy for a while!

The last two years and oh hey I finished a book

No, not that one. No the other one. Yeah, that.

Alright, I forgive you for having no freaking clue what I'm talking about. Let's recap:

Last week - in the same cafe I'm writing at now, as it happens - I finished the first draft of what I've previously referred to as 'The Babysitter' (which is not the title). From the looks of it, it took about six years to complete, from first words to last. Of course, plenty of distractions along the way.

But more importantly, it's done. Finally. To say this thing felt like a millstone around my neck - wait, let's back up again.

In the summer of 2013 I finished Practice to Deceive, which had long been also known as 'Housesitting' in proto-form. I published it then too. I had been storing ideas up for a sequel (in fact, sequels, plural) but when the dust settled on it, I decided I wanted to finish off one of my other half-done projects instead of starting fresh on said sequel.

Eventually I settled on 'Babysitter' and started hacking away. And then, as usual, my world turned upside down. For not the first time in the last few years, I experienced a layoff, had to get temporary work, then job-hunt, get a new job, move house and then start said new job. Nothing like that to stop you writing for a while.

Unfortunately for me things didn't get much better. Over the course of 2014 I began, I now recognize, to slip into serious depression. Near the end of the year I left new job behind, and at last, got professional help for the depression. Starting 2015 I was in a better place in a lot of ways, but I still wasn't writing much.

It's taken a few more months to get anywhere close to an even keel. If you've ever heard me expound on this previously - I don't really believe in writer's block. However I now do believe that there can be legitimate and very real reasons that prevent you from writing. It's not the lack of muse, or lack of ideas, or whatever romantic reasons you attach to it. It's just the inability to write, and in my case, it was very much linked to depression.

I make you read this boring summary of my life for the past two years, give or take, to get you to this point.

So as I said, I finished a book. And it's not that one - the sequel to Practice to Deceive - it's the other one, 'The Babysitter'. (Which I previously published a sort of 'teaser' of, which really doesn't have jack-all to do with the actual book, so don't take it as a real preview.)

And like I say, it was a millstone. For those of you not into medieval allegory, it was a struggle, as you might have noticed before. A pain. Especially in the last section, and especially the fucking ending, not to mince my fucking words. I'm still not sure about it. Like the last book, now it's done I'm letting it sit. I'm letting it marinate. After all this is a first draft. It might be total bollocks.

By the way I say 'book' but it might end up being 'books'. I have a feeling it may be separated into two or even three. Partially that's because it's actually longer than Practice to Deceive. In normal paperback terms it's about two books in length. Partially it's also because of the self-publishing market (see my previous post on that) but also partially it's because I'm not convinced this will be everyone's cup of tea, so I want to give you an 'out' if you don't like it. It's pretty different from Practice to Deceive. Yes of course it still involves female masking and disguise and sex, but of course, however it's still quite a different story with a different couple of protagonists.

Hey for all I know, I might show the cleaned up draft to my test readers and they may tell me to lock it in a (digital) drawer for a decade and never reveal it to anyone. In which case this prick tease will have been for naught.

Anyway, the millstoney-struggle of this book has been partially why it's taken so long to do, although see also layoff, depression, job hunting and so on. It's definitely been part of why I've been so silent. But I'm hoping to be slightly less silent from now on. A promise I'll probably break.

What next? I'm not sure. In part I know I have to work harder on 'other' writing. My years are advancing (alright, I'm not exactly ancient but it has been - gulp - about 16 years since I started publicly writing this stuff) and I'm getting cranky about only being able to talk about my work with, well, you, you anonymous faceless (kinky) crowd, you. So I'll be taking time to write Real Stuff.

However, the masked mistress, she is a sly seductress. Even the other day, thinking about what I've scribbled on Practice to Deceive 2 - Electric Boogaloo, I wanted to keep going. Wanted to see what I could come up with next for Billy and friends. (Spoiler: I totally know. The whole book's plotted. Then again, so was Babysitter for a while and look at that bitch.)

My rambling point is probably; I won't stop writing entirely. That is, as long as you keep buying stuff occasionally.

Right. That'll do. I finished my lunch ages ago. I recommend this place. Wherever I may be.

Housesitting: finished... a first draft

About 6:30 this evening in a Starbucks, drinking a terrible 'skinny' Vanilla Latte, I finished the first draft of Housesitting.

I guess I finished a novel.

Here's how the final word count looked:

Green for go

As you can tell, I slipped a bit past my more extravagant projections. However, I don't think for a minute this is the actual word count of the final book. Next up is rewriting and editing. While I've rewritten bits and pieces of the book while I've gone along (and in a few places, huge swathes) the next time will be the first time I can look at the whole thing, as one piece, and edit with the entire plot in place.

The ending was tough. Not just because endings are tough ("What, I have to finish now? But they're talking! Can't I just let them talk?") but because it veered left and right, and I really wasn't sure how it was going to go. I'll admit it could have been shorter. Hell, it might end up being cut to ribbons. We'll see.

So what's next? Well, I'd expect editing and rewriting to take a couple of weeks at least. When I'm done with that, I'll probably be sharing it with a few people who I trust. And then... we dip into the crazy world of electronic publishing for the first time. And you'll be able to buy a copy.

Between now and then, as and when I find bits of the book I feel comfortable sharing, I'll probably throw them up here. So stay tuned. Questions are welcome obviously... oh and while I have you...

... can anyone think of a better title?

Oh and by the way! Only two days after deadline, how about that? Given the week I've had, I honestly think that's very little short of miraculous....

Only took six months or so

Issue 25 is finished. The arc is done, finally. I have no excuses for how long it's taken, but it's done.

I may even release it at some point.

Issue 20... is done!

About five minutes ago. Maybe not even that.

Right now - before editing, which could expand or contract this figure - 20,735 words, which I can barely believe, especially considering as far as I can tell, 13K of those words were written in the last week.

See what you can accomplish when the muse is with ya??

I've got a mix of feelings right now. It's been a big issue, but it's been a much bigger arc - I've been writing it for six or so months. Writing the last few scenes was kinda emotional. Don't worry though folks, I've left it on a suitable cliffhanger...!

All will be revealed... this weekend. Barring accident, injury, etc. Editing that many words will take some time, too!

Finished, and boy did that hurt.

Another issue done. Well, 'done' in the sense that all the words I wanted to put into it (13,059 of them, as it happens) are in it. That said, I haven't re-read it yet for sense or coherency. So sorry, faithful reader - no release today. But soon. By Tuesday, so I can say I'm on bi-weekly schedule, kind of.

As you might have guessed from the post title, this one took a while to finish. For some reason the last scene, a scene that would normally be gravy (a transformation) just took forever to do. I'm not entirely sure why. It might be because I was trying to give it a sense of importance that it didn't deserve. That's kind of hard to gauge though; after all, the transformation bits are generally why you're reading, so I'd imagine your reaction is probably "How could it not be important?"

Eh, I guess the point is when you feel like you've written this sort of thing every single different way you can think of, some days you just want to write "Then they got changed into a different outfit and went on their way". It's not as if I have actors or actresses in front of me giving me visual stimulation... instead it's all in my head, and I've got to make them do interesting things. Otherwise they just sit around with blank looks.

Anyway, it is done, and in the last few lines I threw a wrench in my own plot because I thought it'd be fun. We'll see... Future Ghostly might end up cursing my present self. (See what I meant about foreshadowing and plotting?)

Right. I feel like rambling on, so I think I'll go shoot some posts into the future to make it look like I never leave the keyboard. Thanks for all the recent comments by the way people; I appreciate it a hell of a lot, especially when I'm forcing myself to try and write one more line.

Very, very quickly...

Much to my own surprise, Spider-Girl 13 is done!

I'd been tapping away at this for ages in fits and starts, just getting a few paragraphs done here and there, maybe a scene at a time... and then last night I realised I was a scene away from finishing. So I just wrapped it up.

It's a bit of a 'wrap up' issue, and completes most of the dangling plotlines from the previous arc... and also establishes things for the next arc, which I know you're bored of hearing about right now - Crossover.

I'll do some clean-up on it in the next day or so, and hopefully will post before the weekend. Then it's back to Project T and whatever else the noggin decides it wants to write!

Have a great day or night, depending on where you are....

At long bloody last

Just wrote the last few words for issue #12 of BBTSSG, as you might want to call it. FI-NA-LLY.

I tell you, this issue has been an absolute bitch to finish. Even though from the looks of things it 'just' took me a month or so to write, it felt waaaay longer to me. The whole thing seemed to move along in fits and starts, and I mean literally - some nights I'd sit for two hours and write two paragraphs. First I didn't feel like the issue had enough, well, eroticism in it. Then, after I figured that out, I realised I had to go back and rewrite something in issue #11 that changed quite a few things in issue #12. Gaaawwwwwdddd! With all that crap in my head it's a miracle I can come up with new ideas.

Oy. So where does this leave me?

Well first of all, my early plans to keep at least a 'clear arc' between whatever I'm currently writing, and whatever I'm currently releasing, are shot to hell.

That's because right now, there's no bloody way I can dive into issue #13 and beyond - which starts the next big arc, codenamed 'Crossover'. (The way I was previously planning, I'd finish 'Crossover' before I'd even release the arc I just finished, which covers issues #9-12.) I can't do that though. For one thing, I have no idea where 'Crossover' is going, precisely. It's like I can see the target but I need to hit the bullseye. I need to re-plot the whole thing, figure out what the high points are, and hopefully get a handle on how many issues it might end up being. (Because one thing I am going to keep doing is completing arcs before I release them. If - God forbid - I give up on the series entirely, I don't want to do it in the middle of a half-released arc. I'm not that cruel....)

More importantly, right now, I'm just plain tired of writing this series. Issue #12 took a lot out of me - this arc as a whole, in fact. I still love the characters, love where they're going, but it's starting to feel a little same-y. The plot of 'Crossover' should freshen things up a bit, but I need a break, to let me recharge the batteries, get enthused for it again... so that it feels fresh when I write it.

So what about that break. Well, I have a couple of other things on the go. I have an old, half-completed story (called 'Love Hotel') which I dusted off recently and might well try and complete; it's maybe a third, perhaps half-finished, and after some intensive plotting sessions with a fellow author recently I know what I need to do to finish it off. It's a 'straight' (ie, no superheroes!), one-off story too... and pretty damn hardcore. So it'd be a real change of pace for me right now.

Second, I do have that Susan Storm mini-series idea... but I'd need to knuckle down and plot that a bit more carefully. I also now know, having finished issue #12, that I'd probably have to write issue #13 before I can get to it. That's because...

... issue #12 ended up being looooong. For the record, it's the biggest issue to date; over 12,000 words in total. Partially that's because I added all that 'extra sauce' to it (Yeah, 'slight twist', my ass), and partially it's because there was a lot of plot to get in. And there was actually even more to fit into it in the original synopsis. So that stuff, which is an essential bridge to the Susan Storm mini, will now have to go in issue #13. Which as I write this, I'm starting to think might have to be a standalone issue. Followed by the mini. Oh God, I'm rambling like a maniac.

Alright, one more thing and out. The nice coda to all this is my word count. Issue #12 takes me to over 100,000 words written for the series so far; that's the size of a decent novel. Pretty cool.

Now click an ad and get outta here. Issue #9 will be out before the week's over. Promise.

Time for a cold shower

Wow. It's always, always just wonderful when a story takes an unexpected turn and what results is so much better than what you planned.

I just finished Spider-Girl issue #11, and I was working in that whole issue towards a particular scene - yes, a transformation scene. I'd been working out in my head specific 'beats', specific moments that I wanted to do, but honestly with these sorts of things I just tend to let it happen, and let the writing flow. All that bollocks.

However, what I've found to my utter amazement several times now is that right in the middle of those scenes... I'll figure something out that's so, so much better than what I thought. Suffice to say in the scene that I just wrote, an incredibly kinky (Well, to my mind) idea suddenly jumped into the middle of it and made it soooo much sexier. Mmmmm... hmmm.

Sorry it'll be a while before you see it. But hey, look on the bright side; as I like to keep a respectable distance between issues I've released and issues I've finished, putting the 'finished' tag on issue #11 means you're that much closer to issue #7. Which I don't think y'all are gonna see coming....

Oh - happy Memorial Day if you're in the US. And happy, er... wet Bank Holiday if you're here in the UK. A perfect day to stay at home and read some dirty fiction.

At last

Put the finishing touches on Spider-Girl #10 last night, and I would have written about it then but finishing it had already made me late for a colleague's leaving do (nothing like a pressing, imminent deadline to focus you, folks!).

Anyway, it's done. At last. Even though my revision history says it 'just' took two weeks, it's been a (very) tough two weeks personally, and I've been wanting to Get It Done during all that time. So now it finally is. Phew.

With that over, this weekend I'm going to be releasing not one, but two issues of Spider-Girl. Not because I'm feeling particularly generous... you'll see why. I guess I am feeling sort of generous, but not in the way you're expecting. If all goes well issue #5 will be online today, and issue #6 tomorrow. So I hope you enjoy.

Speaking of enjoyment, thanks to those of you who voted in both my polls on issue #4... looks like I'm polling along the same lines. Next stop: running for office.

That's it for now, but I warn you, I'm feeling wordy. I may well be back later with more to say....

Gradual progress

So I finished Spider-Girl Issue #9 last night, which I'll tell you is currently called Double Life. Dun-dun-daaaah!! Yeah I know, that reveals practically nothing, but that's sort of the point... heh.

Took a little longer to finish than I expected, this issue, but I think that might be partially because it's a new arc, so I'm finding my feet with it - and the plot is totally new, too, as I threw out my original Enforcers idea and went with something different (as previously mentioned). I'm looking forward to where this arc's going, but this first issue (of four, probably, for the arc) is mostly just setup. The big payoffs will come in the following issues. Anyway, I wanted to let you know it's still rolling.

In other writing, I've also written a bit more recently on Project T, and that's looking better, too. It's been on the backburner for a while as I've concentrated on Project SG (Spider-Girl) but I wanted to get working on it again. I've replotted the ending, and it's a lot tighter than before... so I'll just keep plugging away at it. I'm planning to release this as one big piece, but as I'm maybe half way through it, with 15k words written, it'll be a while before it surfaces. What I'm absolutely not going to do is release half of it, or something. It's not a serial, it's one piece, and I'm not falling into the 'release a bit of it to get feedback' trap again.

If you're wondering what Project T is about, by the way... well I'm not going to tell you. I will tell you it's primarily focused on male-to-female masking, and that it's more 'R' rated (that's 18 for us Brits, and sorry, I don't know movie ratings elsewhere!) than SG. The story isn't exactly earth-shatteringly original, but I think it's running quite nicely, and I'm enjoying it. Tonally (Wanky Writer Alert!) it's completely different from SG, which is a really nice change when writing.

In fact, I think I'll go tinker with it now. Cheerio!

Good and bad news

Good news: I finished Issue #7 of Spider-Girl (aka Project SG) today. This morning, in fact. In fact, I arrived at work late because I was finishing it. Lucky for me I'm pretty much my own boss, so no-one batted an eyelid. Or questioned my erection. (Kidding. Just seeing if you're awake.)

Good or bad news, depends on your point of view: As I figured, the storyline that was originally plotted to fit in Issue #7 will now extend into Issue #8. (If you're wondering, I try and keep each issue at between 7,000 and 9,000 words, or so. The first two issues were shorter than this, but then I was finding my voice, characters, etc etc. Hence me going back to re-edit and expand.) Anyway - yay, more new stuff in Issue #8, but boo, that means....

Bad news: It'll be a while longer before I release Issue #3 and beyond, because I still want to finish this particular arc before I release anything new. Why? Because I said so. And also because when I've finished this arc, I have a strong feeling I will need to re-plot the next arc (which isn't, frankly, sexed up (!) enough) before I get to the fifth arc that I have planned, which in my opinion, is an absolute doozy. I really don't think you'll expect what's going to happen in it. At all.

(Shit, I'm starting to sound like Mark Millar. Must stop that. Sorry, in-joke for comics nerds.)

So just to balance this all out, let's finish with some...

Good news: I'll definitely work on editing/expanding the first two issues this weekend, and then will release them on maskingwriter. (Anyone else got alternative release venues they'd like to see? Let me know in comments.) So that should hopefully whet your appetite for the new stuff.

Gotta run. Vote in the poll if you haven't already. And remind me to talk about arcs.

The secret origin of Spider-Girl (part 1)

Well, I just finished another part of Project SG a couple of minutes ago. The ending got a little sticky there, but I think that was me this morning, not the ending. If that makes sense. You'll be glad to know, it involves masking....

The best moments in writing are really when you reach beyond yourself and tap into the elemental process that makes writing happen. Some people have called it magic, and I actually believe that's close to the truth. It's very personal, but it's also very real... it's what makes writing worthwhile. I got to one of those moments this morning, unexpectedly. Sometimes you have to just keep going even when you think what you're writing is terrible, because sometimes 'it' just happens, and you'll find you're writing better than you thought you could.

Enough of the philosophy though. Another part - or Issue - is done, and I think I'm overdue to talk about this bad boy. Or girl.

As I've said those of you with long memories* may recall I originally released two 'issues' of The New Adventures of Spider-Girl. Issue #2 ended up on a huge cliffhanger which I realised when I was writing, I really had no 'out' for, but like an idiot I wrote it anyway.

I think sometime after that I may have said in some forum or other that I was stuck on where to take the story, and Steve Zink - whose work, and particularly his level of output, I really admire - took the story and ran with it, producing an 'unofficial' Issue #3 which fairly neatly resolved things.

While it was great to see someone do something with my aborted plotline, and fairly flattering as well, Steve's story choices weren't the same as I would have made. That didn't make them any less valid, they just weren't my choices, and I always wondered where I'd have taken the plot next... if only I could write my way out of that cliffhanger.

It literally took me a few years to resolve, but then one day it hit me. With one simple idea linked to an original Spider-Man issue ("Didn't Spidey visit the FF in like, issue #1 of Amazing Spider-Man?") not only did I have the cliffhanger resolved, I had a resolution that gave me a massive springboard for future plots. On a long plane ride somewhere (as I vaguely recall) I started plotting Spider-Girl's future, and before too long I had the cliffhanger resolution and something like 20 issues worth of material, packed full of delicious identity-changing, disguise and masking focused goodness.

I even started writing the fabled (to me) Issue #3 right there on the plane - on a Palm IIIx no less - but then it all fizzled out again. Probably because I landed somewhere.

Which brings us pretty much back up to date. Next time - because a shower, shit and a shave beckons me before work - I'll talk a bit more about how I got stuck in another bloody 'plothole' at the end of my Issue #3, and how I finally got out of that. In the meantime, feel free to read my original two Issues and Steve Zink's 'alternate' Issue #3 right over here.

Enjoy. There's more where that came from.

* Don't blame yourself if you're thinking "I don't even remember and I feel like I've been reading this stuff for ages..." I'm not even sure myself but it looks like Issue #1 and #2 were written sometime in 2000. You know, back when we all lived in the future.

Done! Ding! Gratz!

Another part of Project SG* is done... woo! Largest part yet, which is surprising as I thought it'd be short... I'm just having too much fun.

I think the next part should write like butter too... er, does butter write? You get my meaning. Smooth like butter. Flow like butter. There's butter involved. Well, on my toast.

It's early dammit, and I'm on a writing buzz! More soon.

*What, no guesses yet?