Hello all! Just another update from me on what I’m up to.

As any of you who follow my blog should, probably, know, last month I FINALLY FINISHED THE FIRST DRAFT OF IN HIS DARKENED HALLS.

At last!

I spent nearly 4 years writing that, and its a monster (just shy of 300,000 words). I’ve not got round to redrafting it yet, as honestly at this point I need a good break from it. It was an incredibly difficult book to write and its swallowed a significant part of my life.

At the moment, writing wise, I am working on something which I plan on releasing this year, however, as it’s been nearly 3 years since I last put a book out! (derp)

I started writing a short story at the end of April, as I needed a break from writing the last few chapters of In His Darkened Halls. The idea was that it was going to be a short story, no more than 7,000 words long, featuring the gods Cu Náith the Warrior and Luw the Hunter from mythology of Luah Fáil (anyone who’s read my work featuring Harlin will probably recall those names), and their feud over the love of the goddess, Síle the Maid.

Well, that’s kind of out the window, as it’s now presently 33,402 words long and nearing completion. I’m anticipating a length of around 40,000 – 45,000 words, which will put it officially at novel-length! (A short one, considering my usual full-length word count)

As previously stated, it’s title is Horns of the Hunter, and will be part of a future series I’ll be expanding upon, called Tales of Luah Fáil.

So yeah, this story kind of just exploded on its own! I’m writing circa 1,200 – 1,400 words a day – the most productive I’ve been since 2015 – and I’m looking at getting this first draft finished in 2-3 weeks, which is pretty exciting!

I’ve been having a hell of a lot of fun with this book. It’s a bit lighter than my previous work, and features more of what you’d deem ‘traditional’, ‘high’ or ‘epic’ fantasy elements to it, i.e, magic, monsters, superpowers, supernatural, etc etc etc. But yes, for those of you who are a fan of my grimmer, more grave-in-tone works, I don’t think you’ll be disappointed by it. As I said, I’ve had a hell of a lot of fun writing this one.

I’ll most likely be handling the cover artwork myself, as I’ve done for my previous shorter works. I’ll also, for anyone who’s ever been curious, be drawing up a map for the island of Luah Fáil, based around the mythical time of its ancient gods of earth, tree and war.

I am beyond excited to get this one out, and hopefully it’ll help tide people over while they wait for In His Darkened Halls to be ready for consumption (it’s a first draft mess right now, unfortunately, and will be for some time yet).

So, I thought I’d leave you with a bit of writing research I’ve been watching for Horns of the Hunter – something that will give you a bit of an idea of what both the grimmer and more fantastical side of it will contain.

I’ll be back soon with an update when the first draft is complete!