This week saw the release of my latest Agent Carrie Harris short story, Out of the Blue. Inspired from a simple vision of Carrie waking on a beach with no memory of how she got there, Out of the Blue is thirty minute read well received by the beta-readers.

With this book I’m trying something a little different. I give away a lot of free fiction, of course with the aim of getting people hooked on my writing, but rather than give this one away free, I will be giving it those who support me on Ko-fi.

Ko-fi is a service which allows people to make a small one off or monthly payment in return for early access and exclusive content. If you support me in any way through the service then you get an electronic copy of Out of the Blue, and if you become a monthly supporter you get 20% of signed paperbacks in my web store.

Here’s the short blurb for the book.

Waking in paradise with no memory of who she is, can Agent Harris piece together the true picture and retrieve her skills before it’s the last thing she ever sees?

So if you’re interested in supporting me, then here is the link.

https://ko-fi.com/gjstevens_author

WORK IN PROGRESS

Scarlet Rain – Weather Apocalypse Series – The current revision run is nearing its end. With 86k out of 92k words to go, I’m on the home straight. There’s at least another two revision rounds to go but those should be much quicker, plus I’m still concentrating all of my writing time on this novel, which will help speed things up.

Stopping Power – Agent Carrie Harris crossover short story – This is back from the editor and was well received. It should be about a week before I release with just the edit changes to agree and a proof read, plus a blurb to write. I’m very excited about how well this is received. If the response is positive by my existing zombie book fans then I will write a novel that carries on from when the short story left off. I’ve already written a 1,600 word outline.

Out of the Blue – The only other place people will be able to get their hands on Out of the Blue will be in the A6 booklet form I used for Harm’s Way. These are all order and should be with me next week. I couldn’t resist it!

Carrie Harris Short Story Collection – I now have 45,000 words across four stories for the collection and I’m going to target around 70,000 to 90,000 before I put them together for publishing in paperback and online as a boxed set. My vision is setting them out like a TV series, short and easy to digest. This is perfect for the action genre.

EVENTS

This weekend I will be in Thame, Oxfordshire at the town hall for my latest craft fair. I’m looking forward to chatting with readers and hopefully introduce some new people to my works. I will try not to compare it to the outstanding success of the last event, but that will be hard.

SOMETHING FROM NOTHING

I’ve been vaguely hinting at something exciting going on in the background after the event in Salisbury and it’s now time to let you know the story.

During the week after the event I received a couple of emails, both from people who’d bought OPERATION DAWN WOLF and thoroughly enjoyed it. The second of which was just before I went to bed and was the most exciting. The lady wrote that she was a talent scout for the film and TV industry and she had been talking to a producer about the book. She asked if I would like to send the producer a copy to see if she would be interested in optioning the story for development for the screen.

Of course I bit her hand off, replying that I would send a copy first thing in the morning. In the morning, after a fitful night of excitement, I sent off the book by email. To my surprise the producer replied straight away and we had a short conversation about my inspiration. After googling the names of the two people involved I was a little star struck to find their entries on IMDB and across the internet.

After a week of excitement thinking of what this could mean, whilst knowing there was only a small chance of it actually taking off, I received another email from the agent saying that the producer had started to read and was enjoying it, and planned to finish it when she could. This was great news as it was perfectly normal for interest to drop at this point. The first feedback was that the writing was solid. The agent was keen to manage my expectations, both on the time it would take to get back to me and what she would do if it was a no go from this producer. She had lots of plans to shop it elsewhere.

A week later I received another email. The producer enjoyed the book but didn’t feel she could develop it for the screen, but she had someone else she wanted to pitch it to TODAY for a different off-screen opportunity.

Although I was a little disappointed, I know what the literary industry is like for rejections and that the screen industry is a thousand times worse from this perspective. I’m still very excited to have someone else promoting my book for opportunities that I wouldn’t otherwise have access to. As each door closes I’ll keep you in the loop, but I can’t tell you about the new options until they either come to fruition or are closed off.

Either way, it’s something interesting to write about here at least, and it reinforces the idea that I should get as much exposure as possible. You just never know who you might be talking to.

On that note, that’s all for me for now and I will be back for an update next week. Comments and suggestions welcomed as always.