Happy New Year! With the year of change that was 2021 in the rear-view mirror, I’m hoping this year will see many exciting developments with my writing. I shall of course keep you fully appraised on this blog, so here are a few of my plans for 2022.

First and foremost, I am writing a new novel. It’s another gothic mystery, currently untitled, which I hope will sit nicely alongside previous titles such as The Birds Began to Sing and Phantom Audition. I won’t mention anything about the plot at this point, other than to say it is set in a fictional south-west England town and features a young journalist who gets drawn into a local mystery with links to her past. That’s deliberately vague, as I am protecting what I believe to be a pretty rock-solid story with a cracking finale.

Secondly, I will continue to contribute articles to Medium, though I might slow down a little in that regard whilst getting the first draft of the aforementioned novel on paper. Film reviews will continue to be available both on this blog and on Medium, but other articles on literature, film, music, television, and the odd rant, will be exclusive to Medium.

Thirdly, I aim to resurrect The Tangent Tree film podcast this year, with my co-host Samantha Stephen. Yes, I know I said I’d do that last year, but life threw a few spanners in the works. This year however, I hope to deliver on that promise.

Fourthly, I hope to publish at least one further anthology of short stories. This time they won’t be horror stories, but some of my more romantic pieces, and perhaps some fantasy, satire, and a couple of exclusives, akin to what I did with Infestation: A Horror Anthology last year.

Finally, I am taking another crack at the mainstream publication route with my fantasy novel Ravenseed and am actively chasing agents and publishers to that end. I had planned to do this last year, but again, life threw a few gremlins into the mix. At any rate, Ravenseed is a gripping, grown-up tale of love, lust, betrayal, and vengeance, primarily set in the Dark Ages, with a parallel story in the present (or rather, in 2019, to avoid pandemic references). I’m rather pleased with this novel, so I hope agents and publishers are similarly positive. Here’s hoping, and as always, I will keep you updated.