2018
Last year was not an easy one for a number of reasons, but I managed to release four novels - Treasure of Babylon (Avalon Adventures 2) in March, both Plagues of the Seven Angels (Cairo Sloane 1) and The King's Tomb (Joe Hawke 10) in July (after a couple of months in the UK) and Land of the Gods (Joe Hawke 11) in December.
2019
This year kicked off with the release of The Fifth Grave (A DCI Jacob Mystery), a fast-paced crime-mystery thriller centred on some folklore concerning the murder of four Danish sisters accused of witchcraft in Wiltshire in 1737. When another body is found almost 300 years later in the same woods during Christmas 2018, DCI Jacob starts a new hunt for the truth.
I wrote my first crime story (albeit with supernatural undertones) when I was eight or nine, and I've been a steadfast admirer of the genre all my life. It's not the first crime novel I've written (or even published) but it was nice to get back into the genre all the same. I have an arc of ten planned out very roughly, and the first three in greater detail. The second and third of these Sanctuary and The Devil's Den are both scheduled for 2019 and with luck (and lots of hard work) I can hopefully deliver them. If The Fifth Grave isn't your cup of tea but you know someone who might like it, please share it with them!
I have two or three other crime series ideas, including a PhD toting criminal psychologist (who knows Sophie in the DCI Jacob books). The general idea here is to have a sort of psychological cat and mouse manhunt between the protagonist and a lethal killer but set in various exotic locales, fusing the escapism of the adventure novels with the crime of the detective thrillers. Only one of these is sketched out and I'm sorry to say it's a question of finding the time, but I am very excited about this series if I can make it work.
Another idea I mentioned one year ago in this blog is that concerning a character I have called Blake. Unlike all of my other series, both adventure thrillers and mystery thrillers, Blake works alone and not in a team. For me, this represents an important departure in story-writing and I'm excited about it, but when I can find the time to write it is another thing (Blake has already had two false starts). The basic premise is not uncommon these days, thanks to the popularity of Jack Reacher and the legion of knock-offs he has produced (then again Reacher himself owes a fair amount to Travis McGee, to be fair), but I think I have enough unique ideas to make it original, and if not then I won't write it.
Hawke & Co.
I have planned in some detail the Hawke novels all the way up to 20, and they are fully plotted out and ready to go up to 16. I am really excited to get these done and shared with you, as the story has so many ups and downs and laughs and tragedies, but it takes at least two months, usually more like three or four to plot, write, redraft, edit and proofread a novel in a process that sometimes feels glacially slow. Having said that, I'm aiming to get The Orpheus Legacy (Joe Hawke 12), The Inferno of Hell (Joe Hawke 13) and Day of the Dead (Joe Hawke 14) done this year if time allows.
The Doomsday Covenant (Avalon Adventures 3), The Gods of Death (Cairo Sloane 2) and The Apocalypse Code (The Raiders 2) are also either partly written or lurking on my radar as well, but as above, it's a question of time.
Reviews
I want to take this opportunity to give a massive and sincere thanks to everyone who has ever left me a review. There are various underhand ways of obtaining reviews, but every single review, good or bad, on any of my novels is 100% honest.
In leaving a review, you are not only communicating to me your opinion on what was good or bad about the novel, but you are also helping elevate its place on the Amazon Bestseller Rank. The higher a novel goes on the rank, the more new readers see it, and this increases sales, which is why authors are always asking for us to leave reviews.
If a novel is not reviewed it will drop down the ranks and eventually stop selling, and if that happens an author cannot justify spending so many months on writing another, so it could be the end of the series. Leaving reviews is critically important to the evolution of any series that we enjoy reading and we cannot guarantee the future of any series if the novels don't get reviewed by those who buy and read them.
I also want to thank each and every one of you who has supported me on social media across the years as well. Writing is a notoriously lonely occupation and it's just fantastic when people email or contact me on Twitter or Facebook, etc. I genuinely appreciate it and thank you for the time you take to do so.
Signing off now, and we're just heading into a week-long heatwave of 40 degrees (104 degrees F in old money) - oh, joy. If I survive it, I'll be getting back into the novels straight away!
