A month ago (by complete coincidence, but time does fly) I posted this to Instagram…

And not long after I sent out a newsletter. Yep, I still send those. Nope, I don’t have a sign-up right now. Yep, I am an idiot.

If you missed either of those, though, here I am again saying it: the actual writing part (which I hear is important) of the sequel to Practice to Deceive… is done.

[pause for thunderous applause, mutters of “Finally” and “What does he want, a medal?”]

Er, but no, the book isn’t out yet.

What’s left to do then?

Editing. Boy, this has been slow. But I am editing, slowly chipping away. I tend to write very much close to final (partly why I’m so slow) but still, it’s been slower than I’d liked. Trying to up the pace.

Formatting, etc etc. Kindle version, PDF version, etc etc blah blah it’s very dull but it does take time.

Cover making. I don’t really want to pay a lot for a cover design, or have the awkward conversations around it so as I’ve done with other books, I’m cover designing myself. Naturally, I’m making it harder than it needs to be. Please ignore the hastily put together mock cover on the just-published-today-page on this site. It’ll be nothing like that.

Publishing. You know, pressing the buttons and doing the thing.

Back in July I was blissfully, stupidly telling myself I’d get allllll of that done in August. HAH! Well, here I am blissfully, stupidly telling myself (and you) that I’m… hoping… to get a bunch of this done before end of September. (This year.)

I mean, compared to the previous, um, near-decade it’s not that long to wait, right?

[ducks thrown objects]

It’s on the way. Really it is. Promise.