What have I been up to lately? Well, besides the ongoing film articles and reviews that form a key part of my writing elsewhere, I’ve been hard at work on the first draft of my latest novel. It’s quite difficult to pen witty or interesting updates at this point in proceedings, since I’m naturally inclined to be tight-lipped about the plot, the title, and pretty much everything else. If you weren’t already aware, I can tell you this is a supernatural mystery thriller. It is also the first in what I hope will be a series, concerning the principal characters. However, each novel will be a standalone story in its own right.

I’m going to share more on this once the first draft is finished, but for now I’ll simply say this is probably the most ambitious long-term project I’ve undertaken as a writer, as there could be as many as twelve novels in this series. I’ve also penned a spin-off short story; a comedic mystery that contrasts the darker, scarier mystery of the novel. This short story is actually written by someone in the novel, so I’ve credited it to their character’s pseudonym. There will almost certainly be further short stories in this vein. Again, more on all that in due course.

As of today, I’ve written about 62,000 words (not counting the short story, which is about 9,000 words), and I estimate the final wordcount will be somewhere around the 90,000-word mark. I hope to have a first draft completed by the end of March, with the first round of initial revisions made by the end of April. I will then do what I always do and set the manuscript aside for a year, so I can review it with fresh eyes. In the meantime, I will work on other fiction projects.

That’s about it for now. Look out for further updates soon.

(Header image created by author in Canva.)