Remember how I kept talking about that epic fantasy monster I had written, and how I’m not publishing it yet, for reasons? Well, those reasons are gone.
(If you really want to know: I sorta thought it might be fun after all these years to try submitting to a publisher again. It didn’t work out, and I’m honestly more relieved than disappointed. All the time through the waiting-for-their-reply period I wanted to withdraw my submission, because right now, I’m still, and will be for the next few years, balancing the part-time writer on top of the full-time mother job. I write my stories when it feels right, and when and if the family lets me. That’s how and who I am, and I can’t imagine life differently. I can still try for rich and famous once the kids have moved out.)
Either way, I remain the master of my own disaster. Which means I’m right here, right now, kicking off the publishing process. I might go for a little more professional this time around, like, send it out to book bloggers and stuff, garner a few reviews and all, but whatever I’ll do, you won’t have to wait too much longer.
Now what is the book actually about? Why did writing it take so long? Good questions. Let’s start with the second.
I started writing it in spring 2020. The pandemic had just about begun, the first lockdown had descended upon us, everything was shit, and all around me authors were turning to dystopia. Not me. What I needed was a hero. Not the unlikely or reluctant type, but someone bred for heroism. Someone to get me through it all. An embodiment of hope. Thus, Lord Ash was born. A simple soldier, pressed into service at the early age of six. A man of Mountain folk ancestry, with skin as gray as slate, who suddenly finds himself the personal bodyguard of the King’s firstborn son and heir…
The entire story weighs a little over 142k words, and with all the lockdowns and homeschooling and whatnot, I guess the question why it took so long (two years, to be precise) is answered.
I’ll tell you more in a bit. Watch this space xx
Oh, and this is a first idea for a cover. I might even use it.
Angelika Rust 