Tag Archives: Fey Flame

Story Ideas: Places

For the past few weeks, I’ve been adding a podcast to my range of content. This post is directly linked to this week’s episode titled “Story Ideas: Places”, where we look at a quick and easy way to jump-start your creative juices.

By the end of the activity, you should have a full story written up, and we’re also encouraging pupils to submit their stories to be read on the podcast (details on how to do that will be available below). With this in mind, I hope you enjoy this writing activity and read to the bottom to find details on how to submit your story to be read on the podcast.

Writing Activity Resources

Teachers

This week’s writing activity is pretty simple, but it should prove useful for those moments when a story simply isn’t coming to you. There are classroom sheets to go along with this activity. You can click here for a direct link to the Canva presentation, or download a PowerPoint version here.

Pupils/ Students

The activity sheets for this writing activity are pretty simple, and are designed with the expectation that there will be additional jotter or digital writing as well. A black and white version is available here, a colour one is available here, or you can get access to a Canva project edition (that you can edit) here.

Play along podcast episode (if you prefer)

You can play the accompanying podcast episode alongside the classroom presentation. I’ll call out the next section so you know when to change slides. (In future episodes, I’ll try to be more direct about this with something like ‘turn to the next slide’ after each section).

You can also pause at the end of the prompt on each slide to leave time for writing. All in, this will probably add up to about a 1-hour classroom activity. You’ll find the Spotify version of the podcast below, and links to it on other podcast platforms in this linktree.

On With the Activity (From here on out, this will match the content of the podcast)

Today, we’ll be looking at a writing exercise that focuses on setting and place in your storytelling. With this in mind, I thought I’d try something a bit different and begin the episode by reading the first chapter of my first book, “Jack Reusen and the Fey Flame”.

In this chapter, I played with the idea of setting. First, we look at how familiar places can become uncomfortable when we notice things that we don’t remember seeing before. Then, we look at what it feels like to feel lost, truly lost, and what our reactions to this feeling can tell us about ourselves.

You’ll see the meaning of the setting change a few times in this chapter. I hope you enjoy listening to the sample chapter, but whilst you listen, keep an eye (or ear) out for any times where the setting is moving the story forward.

(You’ll get the full chapter reading in the podcast episode. If you’d like to read the rest of the story with your class, you can also pick up a Kindle copy by following the links at the bottom of the page for purchasing, or reading for free through Kindle Unlimited, on Kindle in your country.)

The Writing Challenge

You’ll have seen a lot of focus on setting in the little excerpt I’ve just read, and now it’s your turn to experiment with a story setting.

You’ll have a full story by the end of this activity, but the direction we take may be a little different from the way you normally set up a story and I hope you enjoy it.

Story Ideas: Places

Being creative is a really useful skill in life (not just for storytelling) so learning tricks and techniques to get your creative side working is never a bad thing.

Today, we’re going to look at a quick technique that I use. It should help switch on that creative part of your brain and prepare you to create a fantastic story.

We’ll start with place as it’s sometimes neglected a little in storytelling. Starting with the place can sometimes launch you into a new story in unexpected ways.

Part 1: Somewhere different

Think of where you’re writing right now. Is there a place that could be the most opposite you could possibly imagine? Somewhere absolutely nothing like where you are sitting at this moment?

What is that place like?

What’s the weather like there?

Is it a safe place, or is it somewhere perilous?

If you were to sit down and write in this new place, what would you be writing with?

Would it be a scroll of paper with a feather quill and a bottle of ink, or would you be writing on a futuristic tablet with an AI that talks to you as though they’re the cleverest being in the galaxy?

Part 2: A stranger

OK, now you know a lot about this new place, so let’s take a look around and see if there’s anyone there.

Who are they? Are they a human/ an animal/ an alien/ or something else?

What are they doing?

What mood are they in?

You now should have a setting and your main character. This isn’t everything you need for a story, but it’s a good start.

Part 3: Getting to know people

Now ask your character a few questions. What are their interests? What are their skills? What are their main fears? What would they like to be doing this time tomorrow?

Take your time with your character. Ask weird questions, but even ‘boring’ questions can give you ideas for your story. What might your character eat for breakfast? Where do they sleep? You might be surprised at the direction their story takes.

Part 4: Go and write

You now have two out of the three basic parts of a story; the last one is called ‘plot’.

What will happen to your character next?

Will something surprising happen to them?

What will they do as a result?

Will they be happy in the end?

Write your story in a digital format, or in your best handwriting, or draw some amazing pictures to make up a ‘comic book’.

When you feel your story has reached a natural end, please be sure to share your stories on the Celebrating Stories portal.

As the weeks go on, we’ll start reading one or two of your stories on the podcast each week.

You’ll find links to share your story on the classroom slideshow, which you can download over on the website. Alternatively, you’ll find a link to it in the episode notes for this podcast episode.

Your story could be the next one we read on the podcast!

Go here for the Google Form to submit your story (click this link). You can share handwritten stories, digital text versions, or even pictures.

Thanks for popping by

As always, thanks for tuning in to listen to this week’s episode of Lit Up With Green Flame, and for coming here to read the more extended version on the website. If you haven’t already, please don’t forget to subscribe on your favourite podcast platform.

We’re on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Audible, Amazon Music, YouTube Podcasts, and many more. Just go to your favourite podcast app and search for ‘Lit Up With Green Flame’ (click here for the linktree that lists how to find us on your favourite podcast platform, just click on ‘Lit Up With Green Flame Books Podcast’ button to find the link). Subscribing is free, and you’ll be sure to catch the newest episode as soon as it’s live.

I hope you pop back next week when we’ll be looking at the strange world, and wild life of Roald Dahl (since it’ll be his Birthday in just a couple of weeks, he would have been 109 years old this year on the 13th September).

Also, if you’d like another writing activity to try, you could look at the one we did on Magical Realism a few weeks ago. You’ll find a link to that here.

Thanks again for listening in, and I hope you don’t mind the slightly longer episode this week.

All the best, John

Good Gracious it HAS Been a While!

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Jack Reusen and the Chilren of Fate sneak peek cover 2 I have been away from here for far too long. The perfect proof of this occurred to me a few weeks ago when someone who had attended one of my first-ever school talks (as a pupil) drove past me in Crieff High Street in a learner car.

Not only does that make me feel ridiculously old but it also highlights just how long I’ve been working on getting book three of the Jack Reusen series done. So I thought it was time for a very frank and honest update.

As of this afternoon, I am editing p167 of 202 of the final (post-editor, so it better be final) draft of Jack Reusen and the Children of Fate.

Karen, the illustrator has created a stunning cover for the book as well, and I’ve been in communication with the printers regarding pricing and print times for the first run (the first run of prints unfortunately always costs more and takes longer).

(Spoilers for book 2 ahead…)

This new addition to the Jack Reusen world follows Jack after he, his family, and his uncle’s cottage and garden landed in the heart of an ancient magical woodland within the world of Fey.

You’ll get to spend longer in Fey than you have in any previous Jack Reusen book. You’ll meet a strange new character who seems to be following Jack from inside his own mind. What’s more, you’ll get to learn more about Fey and how it’s connected to the Matter World. It’s a big story without being too big a read and I hope you enjoy it.

(…Book 2 Spoilers END)

There are twenty-one chapters in this new book (if you include the epilogue) and I’m currently editing chapter sixteen. I’m getting through about a chapter per day and I have some time off work so I may even get through more than that.

So, with only five chapters to go, I think it’s safe to say that I should be finished editing by the end of this week.

After literally years of plodding through drafts, I can’t believe I can say that the book will be ready in a week!

Jack Reusen and the Chilren of Fate sneak peek cover Print turnaround can be as much as a month. However, as soon as I can get it uploaded, the book will be available digitally to read via Amazon Kindle (you can either read this on a Kindle reader or you could download the app and read it on any Android or Apple device).

I’ll obviously be back on here at each step of the process to keep people updated (especially once there are print copies available too). However, I promised myself that today’s post would be brief and to the point so that I could get back to work on the editing.

Wait What’s Happening?!

In brief:

The final draft of Jack Reusen and the Children of Fate will be done by the end of this week.

The digital edition should be available sometime next week.

And finally, at long last, the paperback edition should be available to buy in late April.

More to come…

fey-flame Extra Note: I also have plans to get an audiobook version of the first book out. This would take the form of either a podcast or an Audible audiobook, to be released sometime in the next few months. This is dependent on getting my office/ recording space in proper order so expect updates on that too.

For now, thank you so much for stopping by and please accept my apologies for the long (long long long…) wait for this next book in the series.

I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I have enjoyed writing it. It’s been a labour of love. The first version was very long. The delay has mainly come from trimming it into the reader-accessible version we now have.

I always want to create books that are as accessible to as many sorts of readers as possible, and I am really happy with the story we have now.

Thanks for stopping by, below you’ll find the mandatory self-promotional book plugs but you can skip these if you’ve already read the stories so far.

Thanks for stopping by and I’ll be much quicker to get back on here again next time,

All the best, John

***

Read my books digitally for FREE

Photo by freestocks.org on Pexels.com

If you’d like to catch up on the first two books in the series you’ll find details on where to get these digitally (and potentially read them for free) below.

As always, you can get hold of print versions of the first two books from Fun Junction Toy stores, as well as by buying directly on this site (I’ll even sign a copy for you before it’s posted out). To buy from this site using PayPal, follow this link and click on the buttons for the books you’d like to buy.

Kindle Unlimited

All of my books are free to read for those with an Amazon Kindle Unlimited membership.

Kindle Unlimited currently offers a free trial for two months so you can see if you like their service.

After that, your membership would cost just £7.99 per month and you can cancel any time you like (including before the end of your two-month trial membership.

You said I could read your books for free?

Both of my main children’s fantasy books (The ‘Jack Reusen’ books, for 6 and up) are available on Kindle Unlimited. Here are the links for Amazon UK for ‘…Fey Flame‘ and for ‘…Spark of Dreams‘. On top of this, you can also find a short Christmas story I wrote a few years back, as well as my dark fantasy book (10-12+) ‘Marcus‘ (set in and around the old abandoned Victorian school in my home town of Crieff).

These are all available to read for free (even as part of your free trial) with Kindle Unlimited. What’s more, it’s always good to know that people are reading (and hopefully enjoying) my books.

If you’re in the USA, Kindle Unlimited has a similar free trial and you can find all of my books on my Amazon Author page.

A little more about my own books:

Once you’ve signed up to Kindle Unlimited, you’ll see that both of the Jack Reusen books come up as ‘free’, so you can read the whole adventure so far, for nothing.

‘Jack Reusen and The Fey Flame‘ introduces you to the land of Fey, as creatures (and other things) make their way through to the ‘matter-world’ (basically our world). Jack and his family have to discover a way of closing a collection of ‘breaches’ between the two worlds to make their world safe again.

‘Jack Reusen and the Spark of Dreams‘ is a slightly different kind of adventure. People are losing their ability to dream. Every night more and more people lose the certain something that makes human beings so good at solving problems and creating things; the spark of dreams. Jack discovers that he could be the key to understanding what’s causing this change, and he may even be the only person who can solve it and bring back the dreams and imaginations of hundreds of people.

I hope that both of the Jack Reusen books give you and/or your kids something to enjoy as you read them. Let me know what you think.

As always, thanks for stopping by my site, and I can’t wait to share even more details of my newest book,

All the best, John

Reminding an Author about writing: Visiting Braco Primary School

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This post is long overdue. I normally like to post about a school visit within a few days but I’ve been swamped with writing/book related work over the past couple of months.

Finally, I have a little breathing space so I thought I’d pop on and talk about my visit to Braco Primary School.

I was lucky enough to get to talk to the whole school. The children were brilliant, welcoming, and they asked some really interesting, and surprising, questions (like ‘Do you talk about ethics in your books?’ and ‘How does an author make money?”).

Everyone likes a story

I don’t always talk to younger year groups, as the Jack Reusen books are aimed at children aged 7 years and up. However, I came prepared with a wee story I wrote a while ago called ‘Drip the Bogey Ogre’ (you can read the whole thing by clicking this link). The primary ones and twos were lovely and we had a fun five minutes or so talking about my shoes as well (I wore my multi-coloured shoes).

From there I went on to talk to the older school. There seems to be a collection of would-be authors in the older school and they all had questions about improving their writing and about aspects of the writing process like motivation and inspiration.

I hope I didn’t sound too repetitive but one thing I kept going back to was the fact that writing is like exercise; you need to do it regularly to be in good shape, and you have to have good quality ingredients to put into it.

With writing, you get out what you put in

Just as a healthy body comes from regular exercise and good nutrition, so too does a healthy capacity for writing come from writing regularly and consuming only good quality books.

These sorts of things always have more impact when you use an example. I shared an experience from when I was writing ‘Marcus‘ last year. At the time I hadn’t written a horror story for young adults (12 and up) before so I started reading around to get a feel for the topics and limits associated with that age group.

Some books I read were fantastic but there was one (it will remain nameless) that was less so. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed the story but I didn’t see what it was doing to my writing until editing time came along. It turns out that the chapters I wrote whilst reading this particular book were some of my worst, characters grew flat and I found it hard to get my bearings. Much editing was needed before they went public.

This was my takeaway advice for Braco Primary’s writers; do everything you can to make sure that what you are reading is good. Combine this with paying attention to the world around you in your own way. Understanding what your own point of view is will enable you to find your own voice. However, you’ll find that, only by reading work by experienced and talented authors, will you be able to make that voice as articulate and coherent as it can be.

Thank you for the enthusiasm boost!

Not only was my visit to Braco Primary an enjoyable one but their questions and enthusiasm for writing gave me a much-needed boost in the midst of this year’s NaNoWriMo (something that’s always welcome).

Thanks again for having me Braco Primary. I hope you enjoy the first two Jack Reusen books and I hope to have book three ready in the near future.

Falling for the Villain

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Not long ago I had a twitter conversation with ‘Amber Medley‘ (a fellow NaNoWriMo writer). The basic idea was how to move forward in writing (tackling the dreaded writer’s block). I suggested a technique I use where I take a character out of the book and look at what they do in different settings.

Eventually the conversation moved on to how we draw believable characters, especially villains; viz. not writing a bad guy who just goes ‘Mwahahahah!’.

The interesting point that came up was the fact that the more human your bad guy gets, the easier it is to like him/her and, as a writer, you typically don’t feel you should like your villain.

I have a confession to make. Originally the primary villain of ‘Jack Reusen and the Fey Flame‘ (the ‘Wishmaster’) was going to be the overarching bad guy for the series. The ‘Wishmaster’ was to follow Jack throughout the book series, building in malice and in his capacity for harm in natural stages until Jack would have no choice but to face up to him in a huge final showdown.

This sounds dangerously close to the story of another non-magical boy who discovers he can do magic and faces off against a deadly foe. You can imagine my relief then when, at some point in November 2014, I sat down with a cup of tea, started my writing for the night and, for the first time, was properly introduced to my ‘Wishmaster’. I had gotten him all wrong.

He was still just as dangerous, still as malicious, and cruel, but then I started to realise what had brought him there; a need to share his gifts with others and his discomfort at finding that others actually got by fine without his gifts. He had grown resentful of these people’s lack of gratitude and I suddenly understood who he was and the story he needed to need to tell me.

I still couldn’t let him take over my first book, and I still needed him to take a back seat for ‘Jack Reusen and the Spark of Dreams‘ but I made him bide his time. I knew his story now and I knew where he was going to have to go. He would remain a frightful memory for Jack and his friends for a while. After all, their story was just beginning. However, I was sure to set aside space in ‘Jack Reusen and the Children of Fate’ and, to an extent, in ‘Thea’s Quest’ (Book 4).

I grew to care for my villain and in doing so I grew to enjoy what I was writing a lot more. It gained more depth and I found it easier to connect with all of the characters (even bit players).

During my twitter conversation the other day ‘Amber Medley‘ pointed out the fact that she was worried about growing to like her villain but if I hadn’t grown to like mine I don’t know if the books would have moved forward at the pace they did. Perhaps sometimes it pays to like the villain.

Neil Gaiman

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During my wade through a world of words I somehow managed to finish Neil Gaiman’s book ‘Stardust’. To be honest I’m surprised that it took me this long to pick it up, it’s a fantasy book about a town that lies right beside an opening into the land of the fairies. Familiar as this sounds it’s miles away from my own books in plot, themes, characters, and most of all tone.

It’s a book that’s definitely not for kids and as fun as it was for me to read, at times it could be quite jarring to go from reading Gaiman’s work and then delving into writing the wold of Jack and Thea. Sure there’s magic, other worlds, odd creatures, etc. but ‘Stardust’ was so much more adult that I had to be careful to remember to tone down the themes in ‘Jack Reusen and the Children of Fate’.

I normally make a rule of not reading while I’m writing so that I don’t get caught up writing in somebody else’s style but I was half way through ‘Stardust’ when NaNoWriMo started and I found that I needed some type of diversion whilst writing this time. I think I managed to keep the books separate in my mind probably first and foremost because of the main theme of each. Where ‘Stardust’ is a stand-alone adventure into a slightly Victorian take on the fantasy genre, ‘Jack Reusen and the Children of Fate’ is a modern disaster novel set in a fantasy setting.

I feel like I’ve had a chance to play with some of my favorite movie genres whilst writing the Jack Reusen books. ‘The Fey Flame‘ is a world building book with a big villain but beyond that I’ve had a chance to play around with some other ideas. ‘Spark of Dreams‘ was my take on the zombie genre (but toned down a lot to cater for children of seven or eight years old and up). Next, in ‘Children of Fate’ we get an ‘end of the world’ themed story (don’t worry, everything is kind of alright in the end), after that we have what I’m thinking of as book three and a half, it’s a Christmas/Yule story and for now that’s all I’ll say about it.

Book four is all Thea’s, in many ways (and yes I know this sounds totally nuts) she seems to be helping me write it but overall it will be a quest, one that takes her through many of the other nations to be found in Fey, it’s a strange place and it’s becoming a huge pile of fun to research.

Anyway back to Stardust, if you’re a fantasy reader like myself I imagine you’ll get a kick out of Stardust. The one unusual aspect I noticed about it was just how rigidly Gaiman sticks to the ‘show don’t tell’ rule for writers. Basically we’re supposed to explain the worlds we create using the characters reactions and by highlighting that world using carefully described action sequences.

Ordinarily writers do a good job of this but in fantasy the rules are often relaxed. It’s not easy to build a world in the first chapter or two of a book without having to occasionally allow the narrator to explain what’s going on. J. R. R. Tolkien basically writes a history of Middle Earth in the first few chapters of ‘The Fellowship of The Ring’. It helps you get to know where you are but it’s not the easiest thing to get through.

To be fair to Tolkien he was writing his books at a time when the modern fantasy genre was in its infancy (Tolkien being it’s godfather after all). A lot of modern fantasy harkens back to Tolkien so in a way he was doing a lot of world building for all of us. That said we don’t all deal in elves, orks, dwarves etc. and even if they did there’s still a sizable chunk of the population who still wouldn’t know what these races are. As a result many modern fantasy writers still have to explain the people of their worlds and describe what they can do.

Gaiman doesn’t really do that, you simply see the characters do what they do and it’s up to you to gauge what they are capable of and to establish what power level they have. Sometimes when two characters meet for the first time it can be surprising to realise that you may have misjudged just what that character is. ‘Stardust’ is a fantasy book but if you’re expecting a big expository element in the first chapter or two you’ll be waiting a while, the story just starts and it’s up to you to keep up. It’s an unusual yet refreshing experience for a fantasy reader and I definitely recommend it (I should also point out again one more time: ‘STARDUST’ IS NOT FOR KIDS).

Anyway, thanks for reading, and feel free to add suggested reads in the comments below (I’m editing now so the ‘no reading’ rule has been officially dropped). Next up for me is Hiraeth: a Burden (the second book in the Hiraeth trilogy), again not for kids but definitely worth a read, it ‘s a modern-day fantasy set in Wales, Ireland, England, (and a wee bit of Scotland too), and focuses on an underground (not literally) group of Druids who hide their true nature by means of working for the lifeboats service.

Let us know if you’ve come across any particularly good reads, after all the nights are fair drawing in (I don’t really remember having a summer) and nothing completes a chilly night-in better than a good book. All the best, John

Printing has begun!

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The proofs for ‘Jack Reusen and the Spark of Dreams’ have been approved and sent to the printers (there were a couple of technical issues but I’ve cleared them up). Unusual things happen to almost every main character in this book and I’m looking forward to hearing what readers have to say about it.

I’ve given hints about what the Spark of Dreams will be like at least a few times so I won’t repeat myself here, though I will hint at one little bit of information from the very end of the book. After a quiet few weeks sorting books and helping library patrons, Bob the librarian will meet Granny Reusen. If you haven’t read the first book that won’t much sense, and might sound a lot less interesting than it is, but trust me, it spurs on a really cool story line that I’m writing right now for book three.

I know this wait has been a lot longer than I promised, I just wanted to make sure the story would work properly and I feel like it’s there now. I really hope you enjoy it. I’ll keep you up to date on where the books are and when they’re likely to arrive, and if you want to pre-order a copy you can do that by clicking this link.

I’ll hopefully have more news for you very soon, thanks for being patient with me, all the best, John

Write your book at a virtual writers camp

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In just a few days I, and thousands of others, will embark on the beginnings of a mindboggling cacophony of stories. July is the month for Camp NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month), where you pledge a word goal and a genre and then look forward to the weirdly competitive edge that your writing has been missing.

I say ‘weirdly competitive’ because there’s no sole winner, and you find yourself routing for precisely the people who are doing better than you. In a slightly masochistic way, you’ll find yourself enjoying the successes of those who challenge you challenge you the most. As you push yourself to smash your daily recommended word count, there they are, always a couple of hundred words ahead, but without them you’ll drop back to a hundred and fifty words a day with an ‘at least it’s something’.

NaNoWriMo gives you results; do it right and you’ll finish the month with a solid, real, piece of work but it doesn’t work without a couple of ‘spotters’. Thank goodness it’s virtual, allowing you match your wits with people on other continents just as easily as you can with someone you can meet with for a coffee and a ‘word sprint’ (where you write as much as you can in a set period of time, basically racing each other). I already have a friend in the states set to join me on the adventure, and I welcome any other writers or would-be writers who fancy getting that book finished once and for all.

Please consider signing up, it’s a genuine rush watching that word count go up by significant leaps each day. It’s the movement that pushed me on to launch the Jack Reusen series, and absolutely anyone can do it. Sign up in readiness here, set your word count goal, pick your genre (by no means does it have to be a children’s book) and get cracking. Honestly, if you do it right you will have that first draft done by August.

If you fancy some support along the way, feel free to follow and chat to me on my personal Twitter account. I look forward to sharing the highs and lows of writing a book with whomever of you feels up to it. All the best, John

Comrie Primary

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Today I was at Comrie Primary School for a book talk. It was lovely to revisit my first primary school, and odd to see how different the school looks now I’m not four feet tall.

By the sounds of it there are a good few budding authors among Comrie Primary’s pupils and they had a lot of interesting (and some very practical questions) about writing.

That’s the fun thing about these kinds of events. Aside from getting a bit of feedback on my writing, these talks definitely help me build self-awareness as an author.

How do you make a character? Why do you write in this genre? What should someone do to become an author?

It’s tough sometimes; some of these questions are relatively easy to answer, yet I feel a little under-qualified to answer others.

What do I do if I want to be a writer? I was tempted to answer ‘you write’ but that’s too glib (and dangerously close to sarcastic) an answer for a budding young writer. The truth is that there doesn’t seem to be one way to ‘be a writer’ but even that would be an unsatisfying answer.

Instead we got into discussing some surprisingly practical elements of the writing process: from sentence structure and grammar, to royalties and the earning potential of writing. It was a surprisingly thorough discussion to be having with primary school children.

I’ve just been informed that the pupils have decided to create illustrations of some of the characters from the book. I look forward to seeing the results and will hopefully get a chance to share them on here if I can.

Of course; if you know any children who have read the book(s) and who feel like sending in pictures of characters these are more than welcome (adults can send things in too if they like).

I love doing school talks so if you’d like me to come to your school please get in touch and we can try and arrange something.

As always, thanks for reading, all the best, John

Some summer holiday reading

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If you have a kindle (or something that can run the kindle reader app) then you can get hold of both of the Jack Reusen books (and a whole heap of books by other authors too) by signing up to a month’s free trial of Kindle Unlimited over at Amazon, here’s the link.

Once you’ve signed up you’ll see that both of the Jack Reusen books come up as free, so you can read the whole adventure so far, for nothing.

I hope that both of the Jack Reusen books give you and/or your kids something to enjoy over the summer holidays. Let me know what you think, all the best, John

And…they’re off!

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Another wee sample of Karen’s artwork

‘Jack Reusen and the Spark of Dreams‘ is ready! The artwork is done, the text has been edited, all files have been sent off to the printers, and now comes the waiting. (Though the wait won’t be too long for the kindle edition, which I’ll have ready sometime tonight.)

The process for print editions is fairly simple; first they send me a digital proof (which I expect to receive sometime early next week). After this comes approval of the proof, which is kind of an odd thing to do actually; basically I send them an e-mail saying ‘yes I like my own book, send me lots’. Once I’ve told them I like my book it can take seven to ten working days for them to to print up a bundle and send them to me.

I’ll probably end up posting a lot of updates on Facebook and Twitter once I’ve got a tracking number, so if you follow either account expect to see lots of posts about UPS on the day the books head my way.

To be sure that you get hold of one of the first copies you can pre-order one by leaving a comment below (they’re £6.99) and you can either pick them up at Fun Junction, get me to deliver them to you personally, or if you’re further away I can post one out to you.

Writing this book has been a totally different experience than the last one. Knowing that people have read the first, that some readers might be emotionally invested in certain characters (no I haven’t killed anyone, nor do I plan to), and knowing that there are many more books planned, has meant that I’ve had to be very careful with this one.

There are some scenes that had to be big and dramatic and they change characters in ways that might take them a couple of books to recover from. That’s what all these big delays have been about (I originally planned on having the book out in April). The trickiest part has been the fact that two key story lines run from just one early scene involving Fynn and Thea.

They come out of the event changed, but getting the balance between developing a character in that way, and just all-out changing them is difficult. Every change I made to that one scene (you’ll see what it is soon) had a heavy ripple-effect throughout the book, at times it was like playing Jenga with a sledgehammer. After a lot of work I think I’ve got it right and I hope you guys enjoy the journey that both of these characters go on.

‘Jack Reusen and the Spark of Dreams‘ is darker than the Fey Flame (though not by a lot), my proofreader/editor left me a note about three quarters of the way through the book that simply read ‘this is freakin’ scary!’. Don’t let this put you off though. I’ve left a lot of the scarier scenes open in a way that lets the reader fill in the gaps with their own imagination. This way, readers at my eldest son’s age (seven in a few weeks) will likely find these parts a lot less frightening than their parents.

Overall the story is based around what the world would be like if people didn’t dream, imagine, or come up with new ideas. Some of this is a little scary but mostly I wanted to deal with how important imagination is for everyone. Jack has to navigate a city that doesn’t dream and it doesn’t look like a nice place to live.

I’ve said before that there are ‘zombies’ in this book, but they aren’t undead, flesh-eating monsters; they’re innocent people who are sleep-walking through life and have lost something important because of it. Jack goes through a crisis of confidence but we all know that in the end he’ll have what it takes to help them.

Thea hasn’t been left out either; she gets to be an action hero in this book. Her fight scenes were some of the most enjoyable things I have ever written (though you’ll have to get a fair bit through the book to see them) and I’m really looking forward to seeing what kind of girl she develops into in future books.

Sorry for the long post, as you can probably tell, I’m a little excited about launching the latest Jack Reusen book. I really hope you like it (when the books finally get here). I’ll keep you updated here and on the Facebook and Twitter accounts about when to expect them. In the mean time I’ve got a school book talk to prepare for. I’m off to Comrie Primary on Monday (my school between the ages of five and seven) and I’m really hoping the children there enjoy their introduction to Jack and his friends.

All the best, thanks as always for reading, cheers, John

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