A Blog Hop

Before we go any further, and I unveil my plans for the next blog post series – which I am ambitiously naming THE ZODIAC POSTS – I’ve been handed something fun to blog about.

Charlotte Ashley, writer, bookseller, collector and historian has tagged me in a blog hop! Basically, this means that I get to answer four questions that she has set me, and then I will tag three others and set them questions. Fun times!

Without further ado, here are my four questions and rambling responses:
1) How different is the current (or final) draft of your novel from the original? What changed and why?

DONWIGHT is quite different to THE BOOK OF FATE, because although I really might put Fate and Nicodemus back in as the prologue/frame, I realised that the story itself was too clunky in terms of its mechanics. You don’t need two frames for the narrative, for example – you had Fate, then the Faerie Kings – and I thought that given the need to market the book, it really needs to be saleable which means, not so niche and more accessible in terms of narrative style. Not only that, but I felt the novel length was too long in the original form. There are things that don’t need to be n there until later, and characters who should be given more page time (like Fyn and Bard). I have NEVER liked Tristan and Lars as characters, because, when set against the stronger, well-rounded characters, both of them seem two-dimensional. So I set out to fix that, and ended up re-writing the plot to accommodate my character changes. Tristan has had to go completely, and that means I have more room to explore other characters who had more dramatic potential and an even more interesting backstory (which is more relevant to the plot). I’ve also shifted the emphasis on the main shadowy antagonist… whose identity has changed to tie up some rather interesting threads in the Faustine family history I never addressed in the original version.

2) If you could pick one book you’d like to see your book shelved next to, what would it be and why?

Oh my… well… any, to be honest. I’d be happy to see it on any shelf. Maybe Umberto Eco’s Name of the Rose – that would be really cool. It would make me feel like it’s a thinking fantasy. 😉

3) If you could write anywhere you wanted to, where would you go? What would your writing space look like?

It would have… um… coffee… an unlimited supply of coffee. And all my books in one easy place. Also a window and sun. I’m easily pleased.

4) Your novel sells, becomes a best seller and you now have ten million dollars. The first thing you buy is…

Mosquito nets and pharmaceutical investment in lesser researched (read: not as lucrative) diseases, like leprosy, which affect a vast number of people in the Third World. Because the sufferers of these diseases are dirt poor and can’t afford the drugs they need which would quickly cure them, the drug companies don’t produce them or really research them, and it’s largely up to medical charities and foreign aid to fill the gap. Malaria, spread by mosquitoes, is also easily treatable, and yet mosquitoes kill over 725,000 people a year compared to “dangerous” animals like sharks, who kill 10 people a year. If anyone missed it, Bill Gates declared a Mosquito Awareness week to raise awareness. I’d love to also invest in literacy programmes and access to education. Lots of money would go to LitWorld, for example, and their Stand Up For Girls programme in particular, which is awesome. If you want to contribute to this, you can donate directly, or buy a copy of the Library of Dreams anthology – all profits of the anthology go to that programme.

For myself? I don’t know… mew. A new cooker would be nice. 😉

Who’s next?? I’m tagging some pretty interesting people to continue this blog hop –

Maya Starling, an NA fantasy author whose work (and dragons) I love, and who is currently looking for representation…

Robert Thier, historian and historical fiction writer, whose medieval adventure The Robber Knight is available in English, but who also writes in his native German…

…and finally,
Alex Rosa, the talented romance author of Emotionally Compromised.