Draft 7 of my fantasy/sci-fi debut is done! + some surprise news

Hey friends!

After 7 painstaking months, draft 7 of my debut fantasy/sci-fi debut is done!!!

This draft has been a deep, structural edit. Chapters were moved, rewritten, reshaped. Details were woven deep to really lock in the story, and characters were brought out in a more strategic way. I went through each part of the book (there are 4 parts) to ensure that each part was *really* doing what it needed to do. My eyes definitely glazed over several times as I sweated over whether I’d really made the bad guys bad enough, killed characters at the right times (spoilers!) and heightened the stakes enough. I need readers to FEEL it!

I also had a very kind friend read a very rough draft during this phase (how lucky to have someone so wonderful offer their time!! Thank you to this person you know who you are!!) and the view of someone who has never dived into the story has been one of the most invaluable supports in this editing process. You get wayyyyy too close to your own story, and you need someone to go ‘hey I’m not feeling this!’ or ‘does this really make sense?’ to sense check what you’ve written. Writers never really write on their own (well, they do at the start) – they have editors, writing friends and beta readers giving them feedback the whole way through.

Yes, you can see some character names in the above image 😜 little spoilers for you!

The other exciting thing I wanted to share is that I am composing a soundtrack for the book! I’ve been a musician most of my life, having performed in all kinds of places (many pub gigs!), I taught piano and vocals for a few years there, I’ve recorded an EP and album in the past, and soundtracks have always been a big passion of mine. I listen to tonnes of film, TV and gaming soundtracks because there’s something so immersive about them. I absolutely adore them. I’ve always said if I could quit my job and do anything it would be to make soundtracks full time. And what better story to create a soundtrack for than my own!

I’m a few tracks deep in the composition phase on this, with many more to come. I really can’t wait to share it. I hear a lot of musical ideas as I write so it felt right to try and craft melodies and harmonies that aligns with characters and scenes in my book.

I literally don’t know how I’m doing all of this creativity at once, but I think the simplest explanation is I am absolutely insane.

Have a good week!