After constantly referring to it over the years, I finally finished my fourth and most demanding novel and it's at the printers now. I don't recall feeling so emotionally drained by my three earlier books. Hafan Deg was both a joy-ride and a slightly obsessive journey. But it's done. If you write, you'll guess what I've just been through.
Once I'd PDFd the manuscript to the printers, I swore I would get straight back into that London crime novel I was working on -- remember Winnowing? Thought it would take my mind off things, didn't I? It didn't, and I had to put it aside for now. Until I've (corrected?) approved that printer's proof copy of Hafan Deg, I can't think about anything else.
I'll let you know when the new book is released -- figure early October, unless there are some serious issues.
Here's the brief back cover blurb, for your interest. It could change, of course. Not much room to get too eloquent there.
Karen Miles is a successful London book
editor, a single mother in her late fifties. She seems to have it all, good
income, beautiful West London apartment, regular travel, two adult children she
is proud of, and the occasional man. She appears in control, confident, yet she
is deeply unhappy, unresolved issues from the past re-emerging. As her days
become more deadening, she acknowledges that this is not life; this is merely
existence. A derelict house, 'Hafan Deg', in North Wales, where she and the children
vacationed many years earlier, becomes the catalyst for her transformation. A
touching and sometimes irreverent study of an older woman's struggle for reconnection and validation.
Talk again soon.
Confession: Those comments I never received? Kept nagging you about it? My comments folder was full. I had never deleted one in the fourteen years I've been here. Today I deleted over 500 and the comments box works again. My sincere apologies for being such a twit.