Launch Days, Fresh Covers, and Contest Fever

 

The Writer’s Diary

​If you’re reading this on the day of posting—Monday, 2nd February—then, all being well with KDP release schedules, it is officially a "celebratory brew" day in the pond. We’ve reached a major milestone for a past project just as the starting gun fires for the next one.

​Here is what’s happening in my writing world this week.

​The Concorda Files is Live on Kindle!

​I am incredibly chuffed to announce that The Concorda Files is officially available on Kindle and Kindle Unlimited.

​This story started its life as my 2025 Open Novella Contest entry on Wattpad, where it fought its way onto the shortlist! Moving it from a web-serial to a formal ebook release has been a major goal of mine since reaching the shortlist.  Seeing it finally ‘out there’ in the wild is a fantastic feeling.

​To celebrate the launch, I’ve given the book a total visual overhaul. I’ve updated the cover and moved away from the original light-coloured aesthetic in favour of a gritty, high-contrast look that fits current sci-fi thriller trends. It feels much more aligned with the tone of the story now.

​If you want a taste, I’ve updated the Wattpad version to include the new cover I've created and a one-chapter preview to give new readers a glimpse into the world.

​The ONC 2026: Choosing the Next Path

​The 2026 Open Novella Contest officially kicked off yesterday, and I have spent the last 24 hours mulling over the prompts. This will be my sixth year. 

​I’m entering this time around with a bit of a 'choose your own adventure' mindset. I have six potential stories currently vying for my attention. It’s a bit of a creative standoff between concepts like "Population 842" (a rogue space station AI story) and an urban fantasy set in modern-day Manchester that currently has the working title of "The Tenth Circle."

​The final decision depends entirely on which prompt speaks the loudest. I have a rough map for a Sci-Fi Crime Thriller and a solar-system-spanning 'HFY' epic, but I’m leaving room for the prompts to surprise me. Sometimes the best stories come from the ideas you didn't see coming.

​Pausing the Veil

​To give the ONC my full focus, I’ve made the difficult decision to pause work on "Sanctorum’s Veil." I’ve left the story sitting at Chapter 12—just over 15,000 words in. It’s currently at a bit of a cliffhanger, and leaving my characters in the lurch is tough, but I’ll be returning to it with fresh eyes once the ONC madness has settled.

​Over to You

​Are you participating in the ONC this year? Whether you’re writing or reading, I’d love to know which prompts are jumping out at you. Drop a comment below and let’s talk shop!

The Writer’s Diary: Close Shaves and Digital Adventures

Updates ... updates ... updates

It’s been a busy fortnight in the home studio. Between narrow escapes in my current manuscript and preparing old projects for new horizons, the "writer’s itch" is in full effect.

15,000 Words into the Veil

I’ve officially crossed the 15k mark on my current work-in-progress, Sanctorum’s Veil. I’ve just finished Chapter 12, and things are getting tense. My main character and his companion have just had a heart-pounding encounter with a new threat, narrowly escaping by the skin of their teeth.

There’s a specific kind of magic that happens around the 15,000-word point—the world feels solid, the stakes are real, and the characters are starting to make decisions I didn’t necessarily plan for.

A Sneak Peek at The Concorda Files

As I mentioned in my last post, I’m working on getting The Concorda Files (my 2025 ONC shortlist novella) onto ebook platforms. To bridge the gap, I’ve updated the story on Wattpad to act as a three-chapter preview.

If you missed it during the contest last year, or if you want to see what all the fuss was about before the full ebook drops, you can go and read the opening chapters now. It’s the perfect primer for the world-building I’ll be expanding on soon.

New Project: The Corrupting Bloom

In a slight pivot from pure prose, I’ve started developing a solo D&D game using Twine. It’s titled The Corrupting Bloom and is designed as a series of eight separate, interconnected adventures.

I’m considering hosting it on itch.io once it’s ready. There’s something fascinating about combining narrative storytelling with the mechanics of a tabletop RPG. It’s a great way to flex different creative muscles while keeping the world-building sharp.

The Calm Before the ONC Storm

Finally, I am keeping a very close eye on the calendar. The 2026 Open Novella Contest announcement is imminent! The contest officially begins on 1st February, and I’m eagerly awaiting those prompts.

Will I stick to my Sci-Fi/Crime idea? Or will a specific prompt take me in a completely different direction? The anticipation is half the fun.

Swapping Resolutions for a Roadmap

Happy New Year

We’ve all been there. It’s the first week of January, and the pressure to "reinvent" ourselves is everywhere. But if I’m honest, I’ve never been one for New Year’s resolutions. They always feel a bit like a deadline with no brief—all of the pressure, with none of the creative joy.

This year, I’m stripping away the "shoulds" and focusing on the "coulds." Instead of rigid resolutions, I’m looking at 2026 through the lens of Writer Goals.

🗓️ An Unexpected Reading Month (and a Releasing of Guilt)

The Pressure of No Writing

This past month has been a whirlwind. If I’m being honest with myself, the word count column is looking a bit sparse. Actually, it’s looking non-existent.

I’ve spent the last four weeks firmly rooted in the land of the old day job in FinTech, dealing with the relentless march towards the Christmas break, and juggling all the necessary family commitments that come with December. When I finally collapsed into my armchair in the evenings, the last thing my brain could do was focus on anything that required me to think too hard.

And the guilt, let me tell you, has been knocking pretty loudly.

The Problem with Zero Word Counts

As writers, we often tie our sense of productivity and self-worth to that daily or weekly word count target. When that number hits zero, it’s easy to feel like we’ve failed, like we’ve somehow let our ambition (and our characters) down.

But sitting here now, looking back, I know I need to shift my perspective. Yes, I didn't write. But did I stop being a writer? Did I stop absorbing the world and learning about the craft? Absolutely not.

The Power of Passive Practice

Instead of writing, I did an awful lot of reading. Specifically, I’ve been devouring a ton of short science fiction and managed to get through one fantastic novella thriller.

And reading, as many writers will say, is simply passive practice. It's the writer's equivalent of a runner resting but still going over race strategy, or a musician listening intently to a symphony. It’s necessary input, a foundational activity that feeds the creative engine.

In the last month alone, here's what those shorter formats have been teaching me:

• Pacing in the Small: The short sci-fi stories have been a masterclass in efficiency. They can teach how to establish an entire world and a high-concept idea in just a few paragraphs, forcing writers to think about where we can trim the fat in own own expositions.
• The Novella's Sweet Spot: That novella I read was a great example of focusing on one core theme and executing it brilliantly. Novellas done well can show how to deliver the depth of a novel without the sprawl, and they require incredible narrative discipline.
• Emotional Weight & World-building: I've been absorbing how these authors use sharp, concise prose to handle vast ideas—and in some cases how to spectacularly fail. The good bits can show how silence, implication, and perfectly chosen technical details can be far more powerful than pages of description.

I’ve been absorbing sentence structures, understanding narrative arcs, and seeing how other storytellers handle exposition versus action, all through the lens of one of my favourite genres. This isn't wasted time; it’s research. It’s vital, subconscious learning.

Releasing the Guilt

So, as writer's we need to tell ourselves that it is alright to formally set the guilt aside.

The day job pays the bills, and being present for family during a busy time is a priority that we all shouldn't have to apologise for.

And the reading? That was me filling the well.

Next month, the goal will be to slowly shift from passive practice back to active creation. I’m not going to beat myself up for the lull; I’m going to be grateful for the time I had to rest my writing muscles while simultaneously strengthening my critical eye.

The stories are still there, waiting. And now, I'm hopefully better informed.

Diary Entry: My Brain is a Creative HMO, and Nobody Pays Rent (Especially the Day Job)

I'm utterly convinced that my brain, right now, looks like a crowded whiteboard in a crisis room. I have so many projects vying for my attention that I’m genuinely afraid to go to sleep, convinced my characters will start fighting in the hallway.

The fun part? All this happens after I've completed my actual day job. For 35 hours a week, I safely trade dragons and branching narratives for debugging and deployment, working as an Automation Specialist in FinTech. I spend my days building perfectly logical, testable systems, only to come home and try to make sense of the illogical, non-testable chaos of my own imagination.

The volume of creative work is at the same time exhausting, thrilling and probably a strong indicator that I need to investigate better time management—or possibly therapy.

Maybe both. 

The "Crick" Heard 'Round the World

A Lesson in Universal Language

​

As a writer from Greater Manchester, I'm always looking to inject local flavour into my prose. Sometimes, though, I hesitate, worried that a phrase I grew up with might be too much of a regional colloquialism—a true "Mancunian-ism" that would stop a reader from, say, Texas or Australia in their tracks.

​That was my exact fear when I posted a single sentence on Threads and asked for feedback:

​"The crick in his neck complained at him as he tried to sit up and reach for the phone."

​I have always thought that the word "crick" - a word I've used since childhood to describe a sharp, nagging muscle spasm that only occurs in my neck was firmly rooted in North West England. I braced myself for comments suggesting a more standard term like "stiff neck" or "spasm." And I got a small number of these. 

However, the responses I got, and am still getting as I write this, are/were astonishing.

​The feedback is overwhelmingly clear: "crick in the neck" is understood globally. Replies have poured in from around the world. I'm honestly struggling to keep up, and I'm determined to read every one of them. Replies from the US, Canada, Australia, and across the UK all confirm that this was a perfectly clear and universally evocative term.

Diary of a Writer: The Sanctorum's Veil and the Power of a Strategic Retreat

Frustration, No Words and Fewer Ideas

It’s been a frustrating few weeks. If you’ve been following my journey with Sanctorum’s Veil, my urban fantasy novel set in Manchester, UK, you’ll know I’ve been wrestling with the dreaded middle section. This is the part of the book where the shiny promise of the opening fades, and the gritty, complicated business of actually telling the story begins.

The Chapter 7 Conundrum

Specifically, I’ve hit a wall around Chapter 7. Every time I open the file, I just stare at the screen. I know what’s supposed to happen—there should be a big reveal about the history of the hidden magical faction—but the scene feels laboured and dull.

After wrestling with it for days, I finally had a moment of brutal honesty: Chapter 7 doesn't work because Chapter 6 doesn't earn it.

Chapter 6 is where the protagonist, Sam, has a tense, quiet conversation with his old school friend. It’s meant to be a moment of reacquaintance, a catch-up and a way to help the protagonist see the wider issues. However, I think I’ve been using it as a clumsy information dump, trying to wedge in details that should have been spread out much earlier. When I try to write Chapter 7's big event, it feels unearned because the emotional groundwork from the preceding chapter is shaky.

This is the sneaky way novels fight back: when the foundation is weak, the entire structure above it starts to lean.

Declaring a Strategic Retreat

I realised the only sensible thing to do was declare a strategic retreat.

I closed the file. I didn't save any changes. I didn't promise myself I'd look at it the next day, or the day after that. I just walked away. It has been three weeks now.

Sometimes, our brains, when pushed too hard on a specific problem, just keep spinning the same answer. The only way to get a fresh perspective is to give your subconscious time to process it, far away from the laptop.

My break isn't about avoiding the work; it’s about respecting the process. It's about letting the noise of "I hate this chapter" settle so I can hear the quieter voice of "Try this instead."

I’m currently focusing on reading more urban fantasy to refill the well and remind myself what great atmosphere and plotting feel like. I'm also planning to outline Chapter 6 and 7 again from scratch to strip them back to their core purpose.

If you’re stuck on your current WIP, remember this: A break is not a failure; it’s a necessary tool. The story isn't going anywhere. It will be there, waiting, a little wiser and more patient, when you return.

What’s your go-to method when a chapter refuses to behave? Let me know in the comments!