Ok, so I’m a day later than promised, but better late than never.

Hang on a second;

SPOILER ALERT!!  DON’T READ ANY FURTHER IF YOU HAVEN’T ALREADY READ UP TO AND INCLUDING ‘SHATTERED’.

Don’t say you weren’t warned!

Ok, so I finally managed to complete the latest round of edits to books 1 – 5 of the Alpha Company Series, after three weeks of constant effort. Honestly, I thought it would take maybe a week or two, so by the end I was losing the will to live. But thankfully, book 5, Living was already in pretty good shape (I think), and I got through it in only three days or so. Was I ever glad to finish!

I actually started writing Book 9 the day after the final edits were uploaded for Shattered, the week before Christmas. I spent two days getting the plot fixed in my head, and I actually got the first chapter down in writing.

Then on December 23rd someone mentioned they’d seen a mistake in Book one, and that’s what prompted the edit-fest. So, I put writing on the back burner, and it became the carrot  I dangled in front of myself for more than three weeks. Finish the editing and you can get back to the writing.

So, you can imagine how excited I was on Sunday, when I finally pulled up the new file for Book 9 and re-read what I’d written. Within ten minutes, I was tapping away as if there’d been a five minute gap since I last picked it up, and not a three week break. I guess that’s because the plot has been so fixed in my head this last three weeks, it’s just solidified with time.

In fact, I’d go so far as to say that this is probably the clearest I’ve been on a storyline, at the beginning, possibly ever! Amazing!

I know my leading man (Jordan) and I’ll even tell you that my leading lady is going to be Abbey. Surprisingly (as this was never my intention) this book takes place back in the UK for the most part, and is mostly set during the last chapters of Shattered. In other words, the story takes place in the two months between Sam being rushed to London, and then heading back to Chicago.

I may have mentioned this before, but one of the things I like to do, is try and name a character after someone who has offered me help and support related to my books.

So far, I’ve been able to do that maybe four or five times, and it’s always nice to do. Bizarrely, I’ve found several people who’ve contacted me, already share names with some of my characters, so it’s been difficult to do for everyone.

My only rule about including someone’s name in my books, is that the character can’t be one who ever has a sex scene! Because that would be uncomfortable whichever way you looked at it!

I don’t normally say who my characters are named after, as apart from the handful mentioned, none of my main characters are named after anyone I know. But, in this book, I’m happy to tell you that my namesake character is going to be called Baxter, and he’s the adorable two year old son of our leading lady.

The person he’s named after is one of my band of volunteer editing helpers, someone who was an absolute blessing when it came to the editing on Shattered, not least because of the ridiculously short deadline I gave us.

I have a simple message for my Baxter –  Thank you!!!!!!!!! ;0)

(That probably won’t mean much to everyone else, but it will to them.)

Anyway, the one thing I don’t have at the moment is a proper title for the book. It’s sitting on my laptop right now, with the very unimaginative title of “Book 9 – Jordan”. Which is most unlike me, as the title is usually one of the first things I settle on.

I’ll keep working on it, and let you know as soon as I think of it.

I’m going to get back to my writing now, as I’ve got a plot buzzing around my head that just needs to get out.

(Sad to say (to my BFF), I still haven’t found a way to fit in those octuplets yet (see Happy 1st birthday post), but I promise, I’m working on it.)

If anyone wants to put forward a title for book 9 (one word), feel free to get in touch and throw in a suggestion, but please keep it clean! My mum reads my posts!

Bye for now,

Beth

xx