the journey from brain to bookshelf
A few weeks ago I reported with much excitement on the cover meeting I’d had with Jo Fletcher Books. As I said then, the concept they came up with managed both to fit the brief perfectly and to be not at all what I expected, to reflect the story while giving nothing away. I was stunned and delighted and I couldn’t wait to share it with you. And now … I can.
Gemsigns will be published April 2013
Posted by Stephanie Saulter on August 29, 2012
https://stephaniesaulter.com/2012/08/29/gemsigns-cover-reveal/
Now that I’ve caught up on my sleep and had a natter with the neighbours about the appalling weather, some news! I pitched up at my publisher’s office on Tuesday and was whisked away to lunch by the lovely Jo Fletcher herself, with my agent and Jo’s editorial assistant and publicity director in tow. I knew I was going to get an update on how the cover art was coming along; I didn’t know they were going to whip out, oh a dozen or so, iterations of the cover of my book!
Complete with title: we’re all really happy with Gemsigns (so kudos to editorial assistant Nicola Budd for the typo that turned it from just ‘okay’ into ‘ooh, cool!’ There are some very good accidents in life.) Complete with my name, obviously, but I still had a moment of shock seeing it there, a thrill up the spine, a sense of surreality. Blimey. I did that.
The cover itself was also a surprise; it wasn’t what I was expecting, although I don’t know what I was expecting. I’d had a rant early on about how repetitive cover art gets, especially in the SFF world; I do not want to bring yet another bloodied hero with a broken broadsword on a blasted battlefield into the house, nor am I any longer intrigued by sleek spaceships illuminated by lasers/phasers/whatever against a backdrop of endless night. Not that any of those visual tropes could even remotely be applied to Gemsigns, but I didn’t want it to be bland and noncommittal either. Give me something that looks designed, I said, something striking, something different.
Boy, did they ever.
All the versions were variations of the same basic idea. Four or five I discarded immediately, to sighs of relief; I just disliked them, the professionals had already judged them a bit too YA. It took a few seconds longer to discard the next round, and the next, as the distinctions became more subtle; but in very short order we were down to The One. Which is hard, and alluring, and mysterious, and doesn’t look like anything else I’ve seen in quite some time.
Oh, and red. It’s very red.
The picture I took with my phone has been resoundingly approved by friends, but I can’t share it here just yet. Once the required tweaks are made (slightly heavier lines on the title font, a little more shading here, a little less there) and the final final version is approved, bright shiny PDFs will be dispatched for posting. I can’t wait.
Posted by Stephanie Saulter on July 15, 2012
https://stephaniesaulter.com/2012/07/15/gemsigns-it-is-and-a-really-cool-cover/
It’s been a month since I said I’d try to post at least a couple of times a month. Heigh-ho. There’s one rash promise scuppered a-borning.
The book is going well, I think. I probably won’t know for sure for another month or so, when I can see if where the opening I’ve constructed is taking me is where I intended to be. Or is even remotely interesting. (I assure you that these are quite distinct, though hopefully not mutually exclusive outcomes.)
I keep thinking it’s harder than the first book, although looking back that one certainly didn’t feel easy at the time. But it is a technical challenge of a different order entirely. I have to reintroduce a world and characters that I’ve already established in Gemsigns, in sufficient detail to orient new readers and to remind those for whom some time may pass between books; but not in so much detail that I am essentially repeating huge chunks of Gemsigns. I have to try and preserve at least some of the secrets of Gemsigns, so that this book doesn’t entirely spoil that one for those who may come to this first.
Some of those secrets so fundamentally inform what happens next – what I’m writing now – that I can’t post excerpts without undermining the pleasure that I hope you, my potential, prospective readers, will get from Gemsigns. I’m meeting with my publishers in a few weeks, and I’ll talk to them about posting a few extracts from Gemsigns now and then. Which, in addition to hopefully generating interest and feedback, will also boost my blog output with little or no extra effort on my part.
Yes, I know that is a completely self-serving and cheeky reason, but don’t beat me up too badly. Please. I was novel-writing until 1 o’clock this morning, and I suspect I may not have had enough coffee.
(Progress report: 20,000+ words, chapters 1-6 complete, plus another long-ish and crucial scene which will go … somewhere. Soon. All major and most minor characters – some of whom are new to this book – have been introduced; plots and sub-plots are up and running. Fairly happy with the prose, although I do have to watch out for seepage: I read a Philip Pullman novel a few weeks ago and for a moment I too was writing retro Victoriana; then an Iain Banks novel and suddenly there was a fair bit of existential angst; now GK Chesterton and an invasion of Edwardian rhetoric. The good news is I can spot and block it pretty quickly. But it is interesting.)
Posted by Stephanie Saulter on June 17, 2012
https://stephaniesaulter.com/2012/06/17/angst-and-the-second-book/
It feels faintly ridiculous to write a blog post about not writing more blog posts, but that’s what this is. I’m working on my second novel, and I tend not to read or write much of anything else when I’m in that mode. I guess I turn into even more of a recluse than usual: an intellectual hermit, sealed into my own little bubble of creation. When I was writing Gemsigns last year I’d go days without talking to another soul.
I suspect this isn’t all that healthy, so I’m going to make an effort not to become entirely uncommunicative. There’s also the little matter of the editorial, production and promotional processes leading up to the publication of Gemsigns next March. Indeed, I’m lucky that I do have another book to write by then (manuscript due in April), otherwise I think I’d be completely distracted by what’s already happening and what’s to come. As it is I can’t help feeling a little stunned by something like this. Thank you, Jo Fletcher Books. It makes me feel … it makes me feel … well, wonderful. And like I’ve got to really make sure the second book lives up to the first.
So if you notice me not writing here, rest assured it’s because I’m writing elsewhere. I’ll try to pop in at least every couple of weeks to let you know how I’m getting on, wrestle out loud with literary problems, and share any other news and views. I may post a bit more often to my Facebook page; I’d be chuffed to bits if the people who like this one liked that one as well.
(Oh, and in case anyone’s interested: not counting the reams of notes, character sketches, random phrases and lines of dialogue, the word count for the new book currently stands at 4,800. That’s Chapter 1, most of Chapter 2, and a crucial scene that will form the core of Chapter 3. Given that the target is roughly 100,000+ words and 30-ish chapters, it’s still very early days.)
Posted by Stephanie Saulter on May 17, 2012
https://stephaniesaulter.com/2012/05/17/writing-not-blogging/
I now have an agent. A literary agent. Someone who thinks my novel is good enough to sign me up and try to sell it. Someone who thinks my writing and characters and storyworld are good enough, in fact, to ask me to sketch out ideas for another two. Just in case a publisher might be interested in buying not only the one I’ve written, but a couple more I haven’t. (Apparently this can happen, even to new writers. Who knew?)
It’s difficult to describe just how seismic this feels. And how sudden. The Chronicle of the Writer is supposed to be a long, dusty, desolate journey, punctuated by rejection, fraught with self-doubt, seasoned with the salt of inky tears. You’re supposed to take at least a couple of years to write the thing, a few more to polish the manuscript and your courage, before you set forth into a hostile wilderness where no one reads your submission or returns your calls or – heaven forfend – wants to represent you. And I had already cheated; while the idea that became the book had been slowly developing in the back of my brain for several years, with occasional eureka moments as parts of the whole came clear, I only started properly writing it last April. I finished in October. Even though it was about as good as I thought I could make it without the services of a professional editor, when I sent it out in early January I still had the uneasy feeling of being way, way, way ahead of schedule.
So I was all set to get knocked back, as custom dictates, and indeed a few rejections had started to trickle in. But then I got a request for the full manuscript, and within a week the offer, from a publishing veteran no less. It all feels a bit miraculous. So now, of course, my innate superstition (which I claim not to have but which, let’s face it, we all have to some degree) is kicking in. Surely I can’t dodge my period in purgatory. Things can’t keep going quite so incredibly well. Can they?
Well, maybe they can. Because I’ve spent the weekend thinking about those other two books – setting out possible scenarios, core themes, central conflicts. Writing them up for my agent. Before, although I had created a world sufficiently complex and populated to generate many more stories, I had barely allowed myself to contemplate them. Now I’ve been given leave and licence to do just that. The stories are starting to take shape. Not only have I secured an agent; I have also, through some strange hoodoo, acquired agency.
Maybe I skipped a couple of steps to get here. So what? I’m looking at it this way – whatever time I don’t have to spend in the Slough of Submission, I get to spend writing. That can only be a good thing.
Posted by Stephanie Saulter on February 12, 2012
https://stephaniesaulter.com/2012/02/12/from-an-agent-agency/
My new novel, Sacred, is all about them. Publication info will be posted as soon as I have it.
In the meantime check out Gemsigns, Binary and Regeneration, available wherever good books are sold.
The 3rd Book of the ®Evolution
The 2nd Book of the ®Evolution
The 1st Book of the ®Evolution
The 3rd Book of the ®Evolution
The 2nd Book of the ®Evolution
The 1st Book of the ®Evolution
Stephanie Saulter 