October Roundup

This month, aside from two awesome weekend trips up to the Hunter Valley, I’ve been doing NaNoWriMo prep! I’m not sure I could ever be described as ‘ready’ to jump straight into a first draft for a new book, however I am really excited to be starting a new novel. More details about this book down below, but first here are the updates on my current works:

Book Updates:

Laura the Explorer

Nothing new to report. The book is still sitting with the publishers after submitting the changes to them at the end of June. Trying not to count the days.

Kalileia

(Notice the slight name change??) This final edit/redraft is DONE!! I’ve been so super excited about this book, and it feels amazing to be able to call it finished (for now!). I know now from experience that a book is never really ‘done’, however this draft I am confident that it is as good as I’m able to make it.

So – that brings me to my next plans for the book. While self-publishing is a path I’m still really keen to explore, the reality is that in self-publishing I’d need to commit at least 4-6 months to preparation & marketing strategy. At the same time, I have some pretty major life events happening in the next 4 months (and let’s not forget Christmas) which also need a lot of planning for. So, with the reality that I won’t be able to give a self-published book the time it needs for at least the next six months, I’ve decided to try my luck with traditional publishing again – although with this novel, I’m focussing my efforts on the wider global market. And let’s be honest – a part of me really does want to see if any of my books are ‘good enough’ (or at least marketable enough?) to attract the attention of an agent/publisher.

In submitting my work, however, I’m only sending it to a select few agents that I really would like to work with (mainly because they also rep some of my favourite authors!). So by exploring the traditional publishing route I am still being a little cautious.

Kalileaia Book 2 AKA NaNoWriMo 2017 Project!

It’s haaaaappening!! November is about to kick off and with it comes the sequel to Kalileia! Excitement! Fireworks! Wish me luck!

I’ll be posting updates during November on my Instagram, but otherwise – fingers crossed my November Roundup blog post comes with a great big NaNoWriMo winner badge!