One of the scariest things for me about pushing the ‘publish’ button on But By Degrees was that I needed to keep this going. So I’ve published a book that I’m really happy with – so what next? I’m not a one-book writer, nor have I ever tried to be. That’s why, over the last five or six years, I’ve been developing various novels so that, once I finally hit that button, I was raring to get going on the publication process of the next one.
When people ask me how many novels I’ve got ‘in progress’, so to speak, they often do a double-take. To be honest, I thought it was more than normal to have numerous ideas and to try writing them but, maybe, I’m too stubborn to stop with ideas. I do try and make it a rule to finish a first draft once I’ve started it. Generally, if I’ve labelled something as a novel-length idea, there’s something in it, even if turns out to be miles away from what I first conceived.
So here’s the look of my editing board at the moment:
At the top is ‘Valerie’, the next novel I intend releasing early in 2017. That’s basically what the star means and, as you can see, I’ve got something of a traffic light system going on. The amber novels are those where I have a clear idea of where I’m going next. Liz/Eve is actually the only other novel on that list with a title – ‘Nights at the Majestic’. That may end up being my third release, depending on how the next few months pan out.
As you might imagine, the drafts in red are those I need to think about. In fairness, I’m just about at the end of the second draft of Carys/Pippa and I know vaguely where I’m going with Lauren/Shelley, Izzy/Erica and Vic/Gabby. However, they all need massive amounts of work.
The projects in purple are those with unfinished first drafts. I know that I said above about finishing drafts but these two have special circumstances attached. Kathy/Gill needs rewriting in a different POV and Jess/Naomi was my abandoned NaNoWriMo 2015 novel when things got a little too much for me last year.
Whichever way you look at it, I’m not bored and I’m not a one-book writer by any stretch of the imagination. Every time I finish a draft, I’m immensely proud of myself. I know it takes all writers a lot to get those words down on the page and, whatever happens to those manuscripts after that point, it’s an achievement.
My next job is to get stuck into ‘Valerie’ edits and see what happens there. I’m confident that I can end up being as happy with my second novel as I am with my first.
