A lot can happen in twelve and a half years.
Back in March 2003, I got an email from my agent, Dorothy Lumley (since sadly passed away), telling me I had scored my first book deal with Tor UK, a new science fiction imprint created by Peter Lavery. Over the next twelve and a half years I wrote ten novels, starting with Angel Stations. The tenth, Survival Game, came out in hardback in the late summer of 2015. During that period, I went from writing part-time to full-time. I spent the last part of 2015 putting together detailed proposals for two new books, respectively titled Echogenesis and Proxy. My then-editor got quite excited about them, particularly Echogenesis.
By then, I had a new agent. Word came from him a few months later, in October 2015, that Tor/Pan Macmillan had decided not to make an offer on either Echogenesis or Proxy. This was no reflection on the part of my editor, who was eager to acquire the books. The decision was made elsewhere within the company.
So after twelve and a half years, I found myself without a publisher.
But the terms of the previous contract still held, and I had just delivered a re-draft of Survival Game, so there was still work to do: after some further editing it came out in hardback in 2016 and this year in paperback. Like the book it's a sequel to, it got some pretty great reviews. In general, all my stuff gets decent - even, dare I say it, excellent - reviews. Extinction Game even scored a 'starred' review in Publisher's Monthly. But even good reviews aren't always enough.
Once Survival game was done, I had to figure out what to do next. Now, being Scottish, and therefore of an inherently miserable nature, I had assumed throughout my career that I was always just one short step away from doom and penury, and therefore made a point of saving every last penny against that day. It's a sensible strategy, and one that paid off (a little on-the-side book doctoring helps somewhat too).
I had to consider whether or not to talk about all this here on my blog. Back when I started, writers were often reluctant to discuss such matters. Things have changed since then, largely, I think, because of the internet. Writers compare notes online or even run surveys to get a sense of mean income by genre, or generally just talk about these things openly. But since it's unlikely I'll have much out this year apart from the recently published paperback of Survival Game, I wanted you to know why.
Different people deal with bad news in different ways. Some put the pen down and stop writing and do something entirely different with their lives. Some just keep writing. Based on an entirely subjective survey of writers I've met who got stuck between deals for a while, five or so years in the wilderness is not untypical.
In the meantime, I kept writing.
Since I got that email in October 2015, I've written in excess of 180,000 words of fiction: four short stories, two long novellas, and a full-length novel. The novel, Echogenesis, is being shopped around by my agent as we speak. So is a novella, Ghost Frequencies. A second novella, Devil's Road, was just recently completed (why I've been writing novellas rather than full-length novels is a matter for another blog).
In some ways, not having a book deal has been remarkably freeing. For once, I can write what I want to without having to worry about whether it fits Tor's idea of what I should be writing.
Over the next couple of weeks or months, I'm going to talk about some of the things I've learned over that twelve year period I was under contract to Tor. I'm also going to talk about my plans for the future, and where a possible future book deal might fit into that. I'll also talk about some of those recently completed projects, and some of the ones I'm considering working on over the next year.
And, of course, there may be avenues which don't necessarily involve traditional publishing. That's something else I'll be thinking about, although certainly for now my intention is to get a traditional publishing deal for Echogenesis and other books.
So as they say, watch this space. I'll even maybe have a little more time to blog in future. If it's been a bit sparse, that's only because I've been busy writing books and novellas.
In the meantime, if you like my writing, you might consider dropping a few pennies into the 'buy the writer a coffee' link over there on the right. It's always, always appreciated and it's nice to be reminded I'm not writing into a vacuum. One never knows what the future might bring, but hopefully this is little more than a relatively brief pause in my writing career.
Expect more posts in the near future.
Back in March 2003, I got an email from my agent, Dorothy Lumley (since sadly passed away), telling me I had scored my first book deal with Tor UK, a new science fiction imprint created by Peter Lavery. Over the next twelve and a half years I wrote ten novels, starting with Angel Stations. The tenth, Survival Game, came out in hardback in the late summer of 2015. During that period, I went from writing part-time to full-time. I spent the last part of 2015 putting together detailed proposals for two new books, respectively titled Echogenesis and Proxy. My then-editor got quite excited about them, particularly Echogenesis.
By then, I had a new agent. Word came from him a few months later, in October 2015, that Tor/Pan Macmillan had decided not to make an offer on either Echogenesis or Proxy. This was no reflection on the part of my editor, who was eager to acquire the books. The decision was made elsewhere within the company.
So after twelve and a half years, I found myself without a publisher.
But the terms of the previous contract still held, and I had just delivered a re-draft of Survival Game, so there was still work to do: after some further editing it came out in hardback in 2016 and this year in paperback. Like the book it's a sequel to, it got some pretty great reviews. In general, all my stuff gets decent - even, dare I say it, excellent - reviews. Extinction Game even scored a 'starred' review in Publisher's Monthly. But even good reviews aren't always enough.
Once Survival game was done, I had to figure out what to do next. Now, being Scottish, and therefore of an inherently miserable nature, I had assumed throughout my career that I was always just one short step away from doom and penury, and therefore made a point of saving every last penny against that day. It's a sensible strategy, and one that paid off (a little on-the-side book doctoring helps somewhat too).
I had to consider whether or not to talk about all this here on my blog. Back when I started, writers were often reluctant to discuss such matters. Things have changed since then, largely, I think, because of the internet. Writers compare notes online or even run surveys to get a sense of mean income by genre, or generally just talk about these things openly. But since it's unlikely I'll have much out this year apart from the recently published paperback of Survival Game, I wanted you to know why.
Different people deal with bad news in different ways. Some put the pen down and stop writing and do something entirely different with their lives. Some just keep writing. Based on an entirely subjective survey of writers I've met who got stuck between deals for a while, five or so years in the wilderness is not untypical.
In the meantime, I kept writing.
Since I got that email in October 2015, I've written in excess of 180,000 words of fiction: four short stories, two long novellas, and a full-length novel. The novel, Echogenesis, is being shopped around by my agent as we speak. So is a novella, Ghost Frequencies. A second novella, Devil's Road, was just recently completed (why I've been writing novellas rather than full-length novels is a matter for another blog).
In some ways, not having a book deal has been remarkably freeing. For once, I can write what I want to without having to worry about whether it fits Tor's idea of what I should be writing.
Over the next couple of weeks or months, I'm going to talk about some of the things I've learned over that twelve year period I was under contract to Tor. I'm also going to talk about my plans for the future, and where a possible future book deal might fit into that. I'll also talk about some of those recently completed projects, and some of the ones I'm considering working on over the next year.
And, of course, there may be avenues which don't necessarily involve traditional publishing. That's something else I'll be thinking about, although certainly for now my intention is to get a traditional publishing deal for Echogenesis and other books.
So as they say, watch this space. I'll even maybe have a little more time to blog in future. If it's been a bit sparse, that's only because I've been busy writing books and novellas.
In the meantime, if you like my writing, you might consider dropping a few pennies into the 'buy the writer a coffee' link over there on the right. It's always, always appreciated and it's nice to be reminded I'm not writing into a vacuum. One never knows what the future might bring, but hopefully this is little more than a relatively brief pause in my writing career.
Expect more posts in the near future.
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