New book announcement (and also parrots)

Hello, beautiful people (yes, even you), I hope you're doing well out there in internet land.
First of all, I am getting settled into my house in Kirkby Stephen. Still got a lot of decorating to do, not least because I bought some truly crappy paint that I tried out on one of the windows and I'm now going to have to remove. Seriously, it was like treacle. Some nice walking around here for the dog to look at while I'm carrying her because her poor old legs are tired.
Also, there are parrots. It's a truly surreal sight, seeing such a bright flash of colour go flying past against the backdrop of a cold, grey, wintry Cumbrian town (this place is a long way from resembling the Caribbean). They make a hell of a noise as well - get four of them in the same area and it's like a dozen cats trying to kill one another.
Here you go, in case you think I'm imagining things

View fullsize

They were on the chimney on my neighbours house. Very weird.
Also, I'm now officially announcing the forthcoming release of the sequel to Crystal Eyes - Sorrow's Herald, due out on the 10th of July!
The journey continues for Crystal and friends, trying to stay one step ahead of the Solanist preachers who are following their trail. With shooting, running, angst, more shooting, jumping, stabbing, fire, and even more shooting!
If you feel inclined to travel along with them, it's available for pre-order right...about...now! At least it's available from Amazon now, it's not quite filtered through to the other retailers yet but it shouldn't be long.
Here's a peek at the cover!

I'm also in the process of setting up the hard copy versions of both Sorrow's Herald and Heroes Wanted, soon to be available from Amazon!

Other stuff...I've been playing a load of Heroes of the Storm (Sylvanas for the win), and quite a lot of Elder Scrolls Online as well - definitely worth a look since it dropped its monthly sub fee.
Also, Star Wars trailer! WOO HOO! And that little droid thing was awesome, I badly want one.
Been watching Daredevil as well. Got a couple of episodes left I think. Man, it's good but it's not one for the kiddies - the whimsical, pithy Marvel of Joss Whedon it is not.

That'll do for now.
Later,
Al

7 days was all she wrote...

Reference to a Sting song there, because I exist at the cutting edge of popular culture!
Zeitgeist is my middle name.

Anyway, the reason for the song reference - it is a mere seven (7) days, one singular week from the time of writing this, until Heroes Wanted, my hilarious new fantasy novel, is unleashed into the big, wide world! Just in time for Christmas!
It's an interesting, stressful time, especially if you're as neurotic as me.
Will people like it?
What if no one likes it?
What if it sucks?
It sucks, I know it does, I should have set fire to my hard drive and forgotten the whole thing.
No, it's awesome - pull yourself together and have some self-confidence, man!
You can do this, you can totally do this.
...I need a drink.
Repeat until comatose.

So please pre-order it, and get your friends to do the same, if only to stop me turning into a gibbering wreck. Although if more people buy it, that's more people who might not like it - oh gods!
But this is marketing (or a feeble facsimile of it) and I'm meant to be encouraging you to buy it and spread the word so please just ignore that last bit.
Here's the animated trailer I made in which I butcher an American accent. 

So that was November

Did it rain? Yes, yes it did, though I saw no sign of Slash standing on top of any nearby hills with his guitar.
Obscure joke, right there. Well done/commiserations if you got that.

Anyway, November's done and it is now December! How the hell did that happen? It can't be December already, I refuse to accept that it will soon be 2015.
NaNoWriMo was a success! All fifty thousand words! They're not great words, honestly - it's very evident that it's a first draft. It will need much rewriting before it's fit for general consumption.
Which might be part of the explanation as to why my plan to tempt people into donating to my Movember page (which is still live - click here if my dumb moustache pics have entertained you enough to sling a few quid there way!) by letting people read the first draft as I was writing it was such an abject failure. Ah well, you live and learn.
Still, I think there's a good story lurking inside Ironheart and I'll drag it out one way or another.

Onwards and upwards though, and coming up next we have the release of HEROES WANTED, my new fantasy novel filled with fun and hilarity!
There's even a slightly dumb launch trailer, complete with a heinous attempt at an American accent, and here it is!

Halfway to NaNoWriMo!

Except not quite cos I'm several thousand words behind!
Hey all!
It's the 15th of November, the halfway point of NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month), so I thought I'd do a progress report. 
There is progress. Slow, painful progress. I'm at a point in Ironheart that I didn't plan out beyond a vague "put some stuff here" type of description and I'm having a bit of a hard time finding the words. I'm also, as mentioned above, quite a long way behind. It should be noted that this is absolutely not my fault - a friend came to visit and, when faced with the choice between writing or drinking and playing computer games... I was weak, internet, and I lacked the willpower to resist.
You can spot the days this occurred quite easily in this NaNoWriMo widget from their site:

Hint: red = bad
Anyway, I'm trying to play catch up now. The mathematicians amongst you will have realised that I really ought to be at 25,000 words at the halfway point, as opposed to the 19,000 I currently have.
You know, you can actually read what I'm writing if you want. The first chapter of Ironheart is here. It is only the first draft though, please bear that in mind!
The reason for this is that it's also Movember so, as well as producing some fine facial hair, I've made my novel available in the hope that you'll find it enjoyable enough to make you want to donate via the links on the pages. So far...not the most successful strategy. At all. In any way.
Still, hope springs eternal and I'm sure I'll get a donation any day now (hint hint).
I mean, look at this magnificent moustache. How can you not be tempted?

And yes, if you're wondering, that is a stuffed Paddington Bear teddy behind me.

Leaving aside books I've not finished writing yet, it's only just over a month until Heroes Wanted comes out - guaranteed (though not in any legally binding way) hilarity with swords and dragons and irate innkeepers! You should totally pre-order it! And then tell your friends about it!

Woah!!

It's been how long since I last updated this? I am a bad, bad man!
I honestly hadn't realised so much time had passed since I last posted anything.
So...how have you been?

What have I been up to? Well, I finished the first draft of my sequel to Crystal Eyes, and then wrote another entirely unrelated book (both of these will be out in 2015). I've also been tinkering and tweaking and generally dicking about with Heroes Wanted.
It's time to let go of that, however. For better or worse, I hereby declare myself to be done with Heroes Wanted. It is time to set it free. To be more precise, it will be time to set it free on Friday the 19th of December! Yep, that's the release date, but it will be available to pre-order from, well, now actually.
Behold, links!
Amazon UK
Amazon US
Smashwords
iTunes

More to follow!

And I heartily encourage you to pre-order it because every pre-order sale is counted as occurring on the release date, which in turn gives it a higher chance of increasing its visibility on places like the Amazon charts.
By the way, if you're a book reviewer, run a book review blog or anything like that, drop me a line and I'll send you a free copy.

I've also permanently reduced the price of my first novel, Crystal Eyes, to just 99 cents (or the local equivalent)!

In other news, I've added a new short story to the website - a piece of World of Warcraft fan-fiction called The Last Farm In Lordaeron. 
I've also added a gallery of the sketches I've been doing for Inktober.
I'm also in the process of trying to arrange a house move and gearing up for this year's NaNoWriMo. It's possible that by the end of this year I may just collapse into a heap on the floor, and not just because of too much wine.