End of August round-up - Cozy Mystery and not enough time for life!
Sophie Maddon
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What's new?
Hi All!
Hope you're having a good day / week / month? I'm not one for chit-chat, so let's dive in!
Book news:
Wow, where do I start?!
The cozy mystery I'd mentioned in my previous newsletters seems like a good place, since so much has happened!
I finished the first round of edits and did one more read, to make sure it was all fine before sending it to the Beta readers...
Well, that didn't quite go as planned... the second read was painful, which I expected (who wants to read a whodunnit when they already know who's guilty?!), but I also found a few more issues... typos, unnecessary info dumps and "he said/she said" etc, plus one plot issue that messes up the final chapter, and a timeline issue (apparently my characters can be in two places at the same time?!). All in all, that's another 1k of edit notes to go through.
For the most part, it's easier than the first pass, as there's a lot of deletions and punctuation adjustments, but I feel like I'm letting my Beta readers down for not being able to provide the manuscript when I said I would.
In more positive news, I now have a title: A Slice Of Mystery, a series title, the Abigail Palmer Cozy Mystery series, and a blurb:
When you’re lucky enough to land on a project in your hometown, nothing can ruin it—right? That is, until your boss disappears and you’re given her job, the police suspect you, and the cheesemonger runs out of your favourite Gouda.
When socially-awkward IT consultant Abigail Palmer is sent to work on a local factory’s new computer systems, she’s looking forward to daily get-togethers with best friend Hannah and cozy nights with Jasper the cat—not being blackmailed by boss Lynn into investigating a threatening note.
Between managing the IT project, untangling lies, and trying to decode a cute colleague’s attentions, Abigail’s plate is full—though there’s always room for Fabio’s insanely delicious pizzas.
Perfect for fans of cozy mysteries and awkward heroines with a side of tech. Warning: may cause cravings for artisan cheese and late-night pizza.
What do you think? Do you like it? Would you read it? Would you tell your friends and your local bookstore about it?!
The cover designer is booked and scheduled to start work imminently, so fingers crossed this means I can start telling the world about this new book soon (you guys and gals are special, you get a preview!)
In other news, Your Knowledge Or Your Life? was in the Narratess sale last weekend and has done reasonably well. I'm hoping those buyers will enjoy their reads (And I'm slightly terrified too... wondering if that feeling will ever go away?!)
The next book I'll be working on will either be a Women's Fiction I have in my first drafts' trunk, or the second novel in my Abigail Palmer Cozy Mystery series!
Tackling the (out of control) TBR pile:
Not much reading done this month (unless you count my own manuscript!), however, I finally read two out of the three Austin Kleon books that had been on my TBR pile since November last year, so I call that a win!
Both Show Your Work and Keep Going are now on my writing bookshelf, and I have a feeling they'll be regular re-reads as I progress in my author-entrepreneur career.
I also managed to read Joanna Penn's latest edition of the Author Blueprint while on the train yesterday - more aimed at beginner authors, but I still took a lot of notes!
I also cheated, I went to the library last week and finished Janet Evanovich's Dirty-Thirty in a day... I feel like the books in her Stephanie Plum series have gotten repetitive over the last few years, but I still enjoy them!
Life news:
I've been so focused on editing A Slice of Mystery, the first Abigail Palmer Cozy Mystery that my life admin to-do list has been completely neglected.
I have managed to make that damson ice-cream, later than planned, but that's the plums fault, they took their sweet time to ripen (pun intended!). It wasn't bad, but the recipe I used involved using a lot of yogurt instead of milk (still had cream though), and in my opinion, it made the finished product too tart. I'll try again next year, but this time using a regular milk + cream recipe.
I feel like I'm running on empty, so I know I need to take a week off to recharge, after I'm done with the cozy mystery edits, and after that, *rolls up sleeves* it's on to the to-do list, which will involve a lot of cleaning, since I've been doing the bare minimum for the past few months!
How about you? What have you been up to? Is there a special task or project you really want to do but seem to never have time to start on? Tell me all about it!
Love, Sophie
