Possessing Rayne is now officially published, and I've sent off the sequel, Fire and Rayne, to my publishers, having hung onto it for weeks for lots of fiddling and tweaking. Worram I going to do NOW? I'll think of something. It's a bit hard to let go though. My editor has just got back to me and said it's 'cracking'. Relief. Now I wait for her long list of comments and queries ...I quite like that reworking stage though. It's challenging.
Do go to Turn2page1.com, a brilliant site for teen readers, and check out the interview with me all about Possessing Rayne. And if you're quick you could win a free copy! There's another interview and competition on www.myfavouritebooksatblogspot.com, which is a fab site with Young Adult presence ....
Still thrilled about winning three awards - the Angus, the Southern Schools, and the Renfrewshire Teenage Book Award - for Leaving Poppy. These are the first prizes I've ever won. Who would think such a nasty girl could clean up so well ....
My book-before-last Leader of the Pack is doing better than my publishers expected, heehee! They were worried that the boys depicted in it were so rude and nasty no one would like it, but it's selling! It's about intense tribalism in a boys' rugby team spiralling out of control - and how the captain is torn between loyalty to his team and love for his girlfriend. I did lots of research for it, eavesdropping on my son's team, and I really hope it will be read by BOYS as well as girls! If the pink on the cover embarrasses you - cover it in brown paper?
Thank you so much to everyone who's given me feedback about the experimental chapters that I wrote for a proposed fourth book in the Diving In series, called Art History. I've been getting some lovely emails from America, too, now the books have come out there. Most of you wanted more! I wrote in Art's voice, and I loved making him very different to Coll, and describing things like her nearly 'bombing' him in the swimming pool from his point of view. But my old publishers didn't like it - they said Art was too dark, mean and negative, and they also thought explaining what he thought spoilt his mystery in the original books. So it never got finished.
I've been badgering my new editor with your responses and she's just decided that she's going to give the trilogy swanky new covers for 2009, and I've agreed to finish Art History as a website tie-in. So soon you'll be able to download the whole thing, and find out if Coll and Art really do work it all out! I'm looking forward to doing that.
To read the original chapters, click on the banner at the bottom of the page. At the end, there are some extra bits that I wrote as the mood took me. I tend to write like that - basically in chronological order, but if I get inspired to jot down a later scene, or just a few lines, I put them at the end of the file and fit them in later. It works for me!