Anyone who’s followed my nonsense over the past few years would probably have found it quite frustrating. I’ve quit writing, then come back. Then I launched a thousand projects, only for them to fall dead a few months in. I graduated from Oxford with a diploma in Creative Writing, only to grind my writing to a halt. I started a million-word science fiction epic, then only got a third of the way through releasing it.
There are a few different reasons for this, not least of which is a realisation that I’ve probably been struggling with ADHD for all of my life. Of course, given that I live in the festering bin fire that is these un-united kingdoms, I can’t actually speak to a health professional about that, but that’s beside the point. My brain is basically a chaos agent, one that’s REALLY FUCKING GOOD at planning, not so good on the following through.
Wedded to any alchemical imbalances that may or may not exist within my brain is a growing frustration with the creative ecosystem that now exists online. I started a podcast about creativity with Kev Harrison which had the tagline ‘there’s never been a better time to be a creative,’ only for that central thesis to be eroded by vulture capitalism, the unleashing of AI, and the constant descent of social media ecosystems into festering sores on the arse of society. Hell, I’m writing this post on Substack, a network I left only six months ago because of all the nazis because it no longer seems possible to find any slice of the internet that *isn’t* run by and for the explicit benefit of the resurgent far right and the billionaire class that supports them.
Blimey, this is a cheery post, eh?
There’s one other part of this soup. I’ve been giving this writing a good old college try for over a decade now, and that was the period I gave myself at the start to make it work. As in, be able to make a living off it. The truth is, writing books, making podcasts, designing covers, and running a small online business — all of it is HARD. Bits of it are great, but a lot of it is not. That was what drove me to quit for a while.
What brought me back, I realise now, was the small matter of UNFINISHED BUSINESS. The Sunset Chronicles was only a third of the way through, I’d written two new books in a series that nobody had ever seen before, and Bleakwood felt like the very definition of untapped potential.
Since coming back to writing, I’ve found myself jazzed to get back to playing in some of the worlds I’ve spent years creating, but far less enthused about doing anything with them. I feel like I’ve not got much gas left in the tank when it comes to being a writer. Of running a business. I have no tolerance for marketing, and no desire to get onto the publishing treadmill (get an agent get an agent get an agent). So I’ve come to a decision.
I’m quitting. For realsies. But before I do, I want to finish what I’ve started. All of it.
For the last few weeks I’ve been going over everything, and I’ve planned out a way to get every open loop closed and released by the end of next year. That’s Sunset Chronicles finished completely, four books in my vampire series Darkness Rises, and five seasons of Bleakwood. After that, I’m done.
I want to be able to walk away from it knowing I’ve done everything I can, finished everything I started, and able to get on with the rest of my life. I am already thinking about what other things I can do. Maybe I’ll learn guitar. Maybe piano. Perhaps I’ll get REALLY REALLY into Lego, or fishing. Or maybe I’ll buy a campervan and drive to the wilderness like in Into The Wild. That turned out alright for that guy, right?
Since making this decision, I’ve been really enjoying my writing again. For the first time in a while I’ve been working on more than writing project at a time, and I’ve been getting back into the world of the Sunset Chronicles in a really big way. I’ll have more to post about all of these, how it’s all going to work, and what you can expect moving forward over the coming weeks, but here’s a rough guide as to timings.
If you want to follow along with me on this journey and you’re getting this in your inbox, then, well, good news! You don’t need to do anything. If you’re looking at this online, why not stick your email in the prompt at the bottom? You’ll get all the news sent right to you, as well as some exciting extra stuff I’ve got cooking…
One last thing — since I’m only going to be doing this for the next 18 months or so, I’ve decided I can’t support the completely free ebook model. But for the moment all of Blood on the Motorway and the first season of Sunset Chronicles are still free on all the webstores. I can’t say how long that’ll last, but if you want to grab them before they go back up in price, head to my website and follow the links to your favourite webstore.
Until then, happy reading,
Paul