Monday, January 28, 2013

Progress

50267 words written... and Valkyrie and Skulduggery are barely in it.

This doesn't mean, of course, that they won't be taking their usual starring roles in Book 8. Of course they will. But I've had to approach this one in a slightly different way than normal.

Because this book is about, essentially, total war, I've had to think long and hard about how the different sides would fight— such as what tactics they would use in both the short and long term. It means I can't chop and change sequences like I usually would. If they're written, then they've been written for a very specific reason, and I can't mess about with that. So I figured the best way to write about these military actions is to write them FIRST. Write the skirmishes and the battles and the politics and the arguments, and get it all down on the page. Then, once I have the military aspect taken care of, I go back and write my usual Skul & Val stuff around and on top of it all.

It's an interesting way of working, to willingly ignore your main characters for large chunks of writing time. I sincerely hope it works...

Oh, and sometime in February I shall announce the title. I've had this title in mind for YEARS. Some of the early alternatives were:

Skulduggery Pleasant: The Billingsworth Continuum.

Skulduggery Pleasant: Behind Gold Eyes.

Skulduggery Pleasant: It's War, Baby.

Skulduggery Pleasant: Revenge of the Screaminator.

Skulduggery Pleasant: When Warlocks Attack.

Skulduggery Pleasant: A Very Nice Picnic.

Skulduggery Pleasant: Brain-Puncher.

Skulduggery Pleasant: Gut-Eater.

Skulduggery Pleasant: Skulduggery Goes Camping.

Skulduggery Pleasant: Things Get Nasty.

Skulduggery Pleasant: People Gonna Die.

Skulduggery Pleasant: Readers Gonna Cry.

Skulduggery Pleasant: Horace.


And amazingly, the actual title is better than ANY of those! I know, right?

Monday, January 21, 2013

Twitter Rules

Well... that was fun.

My first time on Twitter proved to be something of an avalanche. You know, in a "oh my god run run run" kinda way.

I'll be using it to tell little stories here and there. Some of them will be Skulduggery related, some of them won't- such as the cute little axe murderer story from Saturday night. Some of them may even be related to the series I'll be writing AFTER Skulduggery. Ooooooh! (But I don't know about this. I literally just thought of that right there.)

I'd like to be able to post stories quite regularly, but I'm not committing myself to anything right now. Neither am I going to be using Twitter in the normal way. Instead, I'll be typing with my toes.

No, wait, that's not what I mean. I mean, I have rules. RULES! And they shall not be broken!

RULE 1: I SHALL NOT FOLLOW!

I only follow two people, and both of those just happen to be attractive lady fighters. That's a pure coincidence, I swear.

My point is, I am not going to open up Twitter every day and see a thousand different streams of tweets from a thousand different people. This will EAT UP MY TIME, and I cannot allow this to happen.

RULE 2: I SHALL NOT RETWEET!

I've seen requests for retweets on Ronda Rousey's page, and people actually get annoyed when she doesn't do it. I'm going to cut this off at the knees before it even gets started— no RT's for me.

RULE 3: I SHALL NOT REPLY!

Again, people get annoyed if you don't reply. They think you're being rude or disrespectful. They think you're ignoring them. While all these things are quite true, replying to everyone is just impossible. Also, it will EAT UP MY TIME. And I need my time for doing the thing you want me to do. Which would you rather— that I write more books, or reply to your tweets?

No, I can't do both. I can't. Shush. Shuttup. Stop. You're making this worse. Quiet. Shhhhhhhhhh.

And here it is, the final and most important rule of all.

RULE 4: I RESERVE THE RIGHT TO BREAK ANY OF THESE RULES AT THE SLIGHTEST WHIM.

I have spoken.

Wednesday, January 16, 2013

Stuff...

Apologies for the lapse in communication. A lot of stuff has happened/is happening and it's hard to find the time to Blog and think about business stuff and writerly endeavours. That said, I'm still hurtling through Book 8- I think I've got a third of it done, which is good news.

Let's see... Okay, on February 20th I'll be in London as part of the Imagine Festival. I''m going to be talking about the movies that have influenced Skulduggery, and showing trailers/scenes as we go. Expect a LOT of awesome 80's movies. You can book your tickets now.

On the 7th of March I'll be at the Riverbank Arts Centre in Kildare, interviewing Alex Barclay on stage about her fantasy novel for younger readers, Curse of Kings. Alex writes some of my favourite crime novels, and she's also a very good friend of mine, and you'll be hearing a lot more from me about Curse of Kings in the next few weeks.

On the 9th of March, I'll be in Derry, the City of Culture, doing... something. For 600 people. So... there's that. Book now! If you can find out what I'm doing. Because I haven't a clue.

In April, for The Maleficent Seven release, I'll be in Dublin and Cork and Galway and Stratford and Milton Keynes and, ulp, Norwich. Where SHE lives.


Oh, and last but not least, Twitter. Here is the official announcement:

I will tweet this Saturday, the 19th, at EXACTLY 9 PM Irish time.

Saturday, January 12, 2013

399

399 followers on Twitter and I never tweet.

But you know what?

At some point over the next few weeks... I WILL tweet.

But it's not going to be what you expect.

Monday, January 7, 2013

A New Post

"Write a new blog post," they say. Like it's that easy. Like it's that simple.

And what if I have nothing to talk about? What if there is nothing I WANT to talk about? Don't I get a say in any of this? Doesn't my opinion MATTER?

And of course the Twitter people are nudging me. Every. Single. Day. I can't escape them. They're getting into my head.

They're in my DREAMS...

I'm all achey. I've had a long day and I'm tired. All I want to do is go to bed- and yet going to bed before 2 AM always seems like a waste of time. Like there's something I could be doing, some work I could be getting done...

33,000 words done on Book 8, by the way.

This time last year (January 6th) I started KOTW. I had been hideously delayed because of work to the house I'd been having done, and the deadline was fast approaching. So this year, having 33,000 words done by this stage is something of a relief. I am, of course, assuming that I can continue writing at the same rate. So, er, hopefully I can.

Wrote a cool scene yesterday. It involves Fletcher. It involves blood. It involves AWESOMENESS.