STUFF

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Well, it's been an interesting week. First, I saw the artwork for my forthcoming novel from PS, and it's very 'left-field' but fits perfectly with the book's mood and title. Can't wait till 'Canted Steps is announced. I've recently designed an advertisement campaign for the book, which Pete Crowther is going to use via PS Publishing. It's highly unusual, so we're doing it as an experiment. Keep an eye on http://www.pspublishing.co.uk/ for when it starts . . .

Second, progress on my new novel continues. I've now done 17,000 words and the plot, such as it is, is beginning to creepy and crawl. I think I've cracked writing novels now, but I'm not about to blather on about my technique. It works for me, but may not for others. I'm taking two weeks off work in June to catch the opening of the World Cup (will watch every game, even between pointless teams [and I don't mean England, you sarky sod] ) and through the day I'll work on the novel. I aim to get this one finished by end of June, which means I'll have completed two novels this year by midway through it. Then I'm starting another.

The next book will, I think, be a sequel to The Severance. That novel involves the escapades of a genre character called Stephen Hobbs who's a kind of alcoholic chain-smoking womanising academic who drops E's while reading Sartre. Indiana Jones with a whole bag of chips on his shoulder. Anyway, in the first book, he does some heroics and now he's back in a new adventure. These books will combine traditional horror sensibilities with my psychology background: smart-pulp, I call it, for want of a better description.

And can the boy write four books this year? Mebbe so. Cos the next thing I have in mind is another haunted house story to follow on from 'Canted Steps. I have the ghostly premise - astonishingly, something I've never seen done by anyone else, despite it being gasping for the taking. More soon . . .

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