I wished to tell you of a new book in the offing. Something that has been occupying my evenings and weekends. One of the many reasons I have not been posting on this blog as often as I should.
Any that read this blog who are writers (and I know there are a few), will know what I mean here. You have an idea that will just not let you go until you have explored it. One that you must pursue to the detriment of all your other commitments. A few weeks ago I started to write a short story for a fantasy anthology. I had nothing other than a line or two in my head, so I began with that line. A good opening for a story. Whether that line survives to the end is doubtful but possible. And I had a location in mind,
The Anthology of Short Stories was to be about places in Scotland and I had already set my mind on a location.
This was ab area I had written of before but truncated my tale of the area in favour of the story. Now I would get the chance to talk more about the area and the reasons that I love it whilst telling a new tale distantly related to the first.
Anyway, this whole idea drew my attention and so I started writing, tentatively at first but then with a fervor I have not possessed in my writing in some time. This simple idea will become a novel at some point. It grows larger by the day and the ideas multiply. I have the whole thing plotted out in my head even to the murder that draws the tale to an end.
Only a portion of the story is written at this time, and I have neither a title nor cover to start advertising the tale and so I have made one up to show you here. But it is likely that both the title and cover will change as the story takes shape.
As I explained the ethos of the developing tale to an author friend of mine her hint was to just run with the idea as she loved the thought of it. In a way it reminded her of one of my earlier novels "Nut Brown Eyes" but was decidedly different. "It cannot not hurt" she said "to expand upon the wonderful world you created in Nut Brown Eyes to encapsulate and explain more of the mysteries in the wilds of Scotland. I suspect that she is right and so I will continue with it as I am having great fun writing the tale. Please do note however that the cover and even the title of the forthcoming novel were just made up on the spot and are not likely to survive to the end.
Oh, and that line. The one line that kind of gave me the whole story was......
" I live in the pastoral lowlands now but once I strode the high lands; dark and fey and there, I met a girl, dark and fey as the land that birthed her.