Onwards and upwards

Dizzy Izzy and the Singer has winged its way to the publishers and the hard copy of the manuscript has been filed in its ring binder and put away in the cupboard. I will soon have to extend the cupboard if I keep writing at the rate I am doing. I must admit I am loving every minute of this new career. Well I maybe can't call it a career yet as it isn't providing me with a living wage but I am loving the challenges it is bringing.

I intended taking a week or two off before making a start on my new series but within a few days of sending off Dizzy Izzy to the publishers the story was clamoring to be committed to paper. Once I began the story and was about 5,000 words into it I realised that this book was going to be a very different one to my others that I had written and this was going to explore social issues from a much more adult perspective. It isn't actually a sad story but it certainly will pull at the heart strings and make people really think as they read it. It will be fine for young adults 14-18 years old and if they are very good readers maybe as young as 12 but certainly no younger. It will provide lots of issues for discussion as we explore the hidden world and pain caused by abandonment, abuse and the healing process that Little Bear has to go through. There is no sex, violence, drugs or gangs in the book so will not appeal to some readers but hopefully to a large slice of the population. It will be a much larger book than the others and I think the whole story will be told in 2 books. I will keep you posted on that as I work through it.

I think I may look into employing a literary agent to take on this new book as I think it needs a different approach to publishing, marketing and promoting than my other 2 series do. I would like to think Little Bear became a book that sparked discussions in schools, in book clubs and other public bodies as I feel it has a message to impart. My greatest dream would be if someone took it and made a sympathetic film from it but as yet I have no idea how to get it into the circles it would need to be in for this to happen but who knows what is round the next corner.

I have already hit 15,000 words and it is flowing well but emotionally draining to write. I think I may need a complete rest to recharge my batteries once it is finished. I will still continue to write my Scruffy series and the Dizzy Izzy series and will be publishing a new one of each of them in 2019. The next Scruffy book will be called Scruffy and Teddy and the next Dizzy Izzy book will be Dizzy Izzy and her Travels or something like that.