Nick Kyme

I received this rather nice box the other day in the office, my cheeky sample copies and thought you might like a peek…

It’s basically filled with the up coming releases from yours truly, so that includes Legends of the Space Marines (and the Salamanders short story ‘Hell Night’) and Fireborn, the first Salamanders audio. It was Christmas had come early!

…I’m pleased to say that ‘Hell Night’ has been approved for publication and given the green light. My editor even said it was the best thing I’d ever written, so colour me pleased.

With no redrafts or corrections needed, it’s frees me up to work on some thorough plans for the second and third Salamander novels (two is pretty much nailed down and three is almost at the fully-fledged stage too) and then start thinking about my Empire army novel (which is not on the agenda).

That should keep me busy…

Okay, so after slogging like a beast to get ‘Hell Night’ done for my Tuesday deadline I realise, upon looking at my diary, that the deadline isn’t actually until the 1st of June – so, err… next week.

See? Dingus. Yes sir, I am guilty as charged.

What it basically means is, I’m finished early – woo hoo! It’ll actually give me a little more time to read through the first draft and make it all minty for my editor. I’m sure he’ll appreciate that. I don’t plan on doing much, except reading through once and finessing. I think there’s a temptation sometimes when you’ve discovered a bit of extra leg room you didn’t think you add to stretch yourself too much and start overdoing it – ‘If I just move this…’, ‘If I just tweak that and that…’  Not for me.

Mentally, I’m done with this right now. Going back and using my time for anything except a read through wouldn’t only be counter productive, it also takes a step onto the road of the bane of every writer – the persistent editor. I’ve got an editor; let him worry about that stuff. I’ve nailed my story (okay, so it’s a bit over – there’s still no flab, I tells ya), I just need to polish it so its nice and shiny.

With the ‘extra’ time I have, I’ll likely start working up some synopses so I’ve got my next few projects ready to go when I am. Nothing worse than hanging around whilst someone is reading your synopsis or chapter breakdown (my apologies to any authors that I do that to – get ‘em earlier next time and remember the three h’s: harangue, harangue, harangue.)

Until next time…

Although I took some advice, and laid off the writing a little this weekend, I still managed to get stuck into ‘Hell Night’, my latest short story for upcoming anthology Legends of the Space Marines.

I’m about 7,000 words in (done over a few nights and weekends) and loving it so far. This tale features the Salamander characters from ‘Fires of War’ and Salamander, but is based around a mystery, rather than an all-guns blazing assault or rescue. As a kid, I always liked mystery stories. I suppose I have that kind of mind set which likes unravelling the hidden and exposing the truth. As an adult, it’s probably why I’m a crime and thriller fan, a genre replete with mystery.

Regarding the Salamander chronology I’ve established with both the initial short and the novel (this one will be released after the novel), ‘Hell Night’ takes place before ‘Fires of War’ but is much more a stand-alone tale. I won’t say any more, save that my inspiration for the short was derived from a neat little book (I say ‘little’, it’s actually fairly massive) called The Lore of the Land, which is full of historical little tidbits concerning mysteries and fables etc. Funny how the cogs can be set in motion.

I actually had the idea for the story (in essence, the Salamanders weren’t my initial protagonists – I didn’t really have any at first, just a concept) a while back, so it’s nice to find an outlet for it. Tends to happen quite a lot with me; I have a bunch of short story/novel ideas that I put on the back-burner as they’re not right for a given project, only to find use for them later in an unexpected forum.

Not wishing to go into detail as it’ll spoil it, I’m very happy with progress on the short so far. I’ve left things mid-flow so I can come back to them tomorrow evening. It feels like I’m starting to get a second wind, so I want to capitalise on that and get the words in while the getting is good, so to speak.

Hopefully, I’ll be finished by the end of the bank holiday weekend, so I can look forward to a short break and then the next project.