Saturday, April 30, 2011

I wear fedoras now. Fedoras are cool.

Just have to say- Doctor Who ROCKS.

That is all.

Friday, April 29, 2011

Bah! Delays!

Okay, fine, I HAD wanted to unveil the new cover sometime this week, but obviously that hasn't happened. I've been assured that I'll be able to do it sometime NEXT week, though, so hopefully that'll work out.

In the meantime...

I'm feeling much better these days. I haven't gone back training yet- I haven't recovered THAT much- but I went in for a few tests on Wednesday and they have pronounced me fit as a proverbial fiddle and told me that I'm pretty much immortal, which I knew already. But still, always good to hear a second opinion.

I did an event last night with John Connelly in Easons in Dublin that was a LOT of fun. John is a crime writer by day, but at night he writes the wickedest books for younger readers- he's written The Book of Lost Things and The Gates, and has just come out with his new one, Hell's Bells. He read an excerpt from Hell's Bells and, for the first time ever, I read an extract from one of MY books. I normally don't read aloud because I have a stutter, and I much prefer to just walk around the stage and ramble on about cats and dogs and weird-looking children. But last night I thought I'd do something new, so I read, and it was actually a lot of fun- but what made it cooler was the fact that it was an excerpt from the new book. I decided that it wouldn't be an action scene or a chase scene, or in fact anything to do with the actual plot. Instead, it was Valkyrie at home with her parents and her baby sister- so there was a LOT of her dad being his usual oddball self, which really seemed to go down well.

Afterwards there was a signing session which, ahem, kind of went on until AFTER the store had actually closed... But the Easons staff were all really cool about it, even though they had to stay late, and they seemed to be having a good time while I chatted and doodled and signed. I even met some people who visit this Blog- so say hello in the comments section, dammit! Especially you, Elizabeth, who came up to me after I'd signed her books and asked for a hug. Awwww. I LOVE giving hugs. Elizabeth now has a special place in my heart...

I'm just looking at my calender here for May... Let's see... Okay, I'll be at the Brighton Festival on the 8th, then I'll be doing something with Children's Books Ireland on the 22nd, and I'll be at the Wicklow Festival on the 28th. So if you're around, drop by and give me a hug.

Wednesday, April 20, 2011

Update:

While I'm not one hundred percent back to normal, I'm certainly getting there. The medication I've been given seems to have scattered my mind a little bit, making it hard to focus- but there are only a few pills left, and once they're gone, my great and glorious mind shall return...

In the meantime, I just want to let you know that at some stage over the next few days, I'll be posting the REAL cover to Skulduggery 6 here on this Blog, and not Tom's sketch that has been doing the rounds on the interweb. Along with that, you'll also be getting the official title, which may or may not be what you're expecting.

At the moment, Tom is finishing up the cover and it's looking- no surprise here- absolutely amazing. You better have a bucket handy, because when the cover is revealed your heads are going to explode and your brains are going to need something to leak into. Which is, I'll freely admit, somewhat gross.

Wednesday, April 13, 2011

Bah. Woes.

Hello there.

Sorry for the delay- I was hauled into hospital last week and have only just got out. I'd never been sick before, so it was a whole new and thoroughly dull/painful/annoying experience for me, one that I hope I never repeat. I'm still not recovered, so it'll be a few days before I resume normal service, but I know how much my Minions need their chatting space- so chat away...!

Monday, April 4, 2011

Woes and Joys

Oooooooh your Golden God is not feeling well.

Your Golden God is SICK, Minions. I'm not used to being sick. I NEVER get sick. And yet, here I am, sick and feeling miserable...

So why am I posting, you ask? Am I looking for sympathy? Pffft. I need NOT your sympathy. Sympathy is for the WEAK. I post, not to share my woes, but to share my joys.

Book 6 is finished.

I have emailed it to my editor and agent, and it is currently printing out for Laura, and I now have a few days to recover from my illness before I read back over it and spot where it can be improved. At the moment, it's a long one, about 10,000 words longer than Mortal Coil. Whether it'll keep that word count after the rewrite, I don't know.

But it's done.

Friday, April 1, 2011

Whole Lotta Pages

Yesterday I passed the 110,000 word mark on Book Six. I have three days to finish writing and then do a quick edit, so the word count could go either way. Bear in mind, though, that Mortal Coil was about 105,000 words- so it looks like the new one will be even longer.

As I get into the last few weeks of writing a book, I tend to get a little bit paranoid. I start to wonder if, maybe, the thing I’ve written is not a book at all- maybe it’s just a collection of chapters that don’t fit together into one long story. Maybe I’ve been wasting my time. Maybe I should have abandoned this idea before I started writing, and headed off in another direction. What if it’s rubbish? What if it’s awful? What if nobody likes it?


And then I remind myself that I am, in fact, the Golden God, and everything I do is absolutely wonderful, so naturally Book Six is going to be brain-punchingly brilliant.

These last minute doubts are nothing new, of course. I always get them. I’m sure that practically every writer does. The only way through them is to have faith in yourself and your own ability, and to keep on going no matter how anxious you get. It’s not easy, to work on through your doubts, but if you ever want to be writer then it’s something you’re going to have to deal with, sooner or later.

It REALLY helps if you’re arrogant- because so long as you don’t take it seriously, arrogance can be a LOT of fun.

I wrote the last page this morning- or some of it, at least. I’m still going back through it all, linking things up, changing things, switching them around, writing and rewriting, so even though I’m on the last page, it doesn’t mean the book is finished yet. But ohhh, what a last page. The first trilogy ended with Skulduggery being sucked through a portal- an act that had severe consequences over the following three books. The end of THIS trilogy, therefore, needs to have the same kind of impact on the next three.

I’m not saying the endings are in ANY way similar, because they’re not. The Faceless Ones ended with the reader shouting “Oh God no no no NO!” whereas Book Six will end with the reader saying “oh... hell...” very, very quietly.