Twenty-Two Years in the Making
I have finished another book. And, no, I did not write it in the two weeks since publishing The Exodus Connection. This is the one I have been hinting about in previous posts, the first novel I attempted after moving to Britain: The Brighton Virgins.
The story involves Alexis Marsh, an American living in Britain, who is essentially blackmailed into searching for the daughter of a government official. The daughter has been brain-washed by a religious cult and Alex, who had escaped from a religious cult as a teenager, is able to infiltrate this paranoid and increasingly dangerous world until she finds the most dangerous person of all—the one she is trying to save.
(Anyone who has read Finding Rachel Davenport may recognise Alex as a major secondary character in this more light-hearted outing.)
I have no idea what prompted me to write the novel, or where I got the plot from—aside from the obvious “American cult-escapee now living in Britain” experience—but I began writing it in January 2004, finished it in February 2005, and spent the next two years rewriting it to try to get it into shape. I did acquire an agent, and the agent said some good things about it (including “Well written and beautiful descriptions”), but she also pointed out some structural issues.
While I was able to see the structural issues, I was not, at that time, able to fix them. However, when, on a whim, I re-read the latest version, I realized that A) it was a well-written book with an interesting plot, and B) I knew what to do about the structural flaws.
It took a month or so of rewriting, revising and robot-reading to get it into shape, and then my wife helped me design a cover. The folks I use are good, but they do like to put scantily clad women on the covers, and it took us a few tries to steer them down a different path.
And so, The Brighton Virgins, twenty-two years after its inception, is now available on Amazon.
Additionally, (and here is where I find out if anyone actually reads these posts) having stated in the past that I am not interested in selling books but am only interested in people reading them (because, until someone reads a story, it does not exist), I now propose to prove that premise.
I have sent copies to my sister in Arizona, who is a fan, as well as my Oregon correspondent. But I would like more. So, if you want a copy of one of my books, send me your address and I will mail it to you, wherever you are. Free. And that doesn’t mean free if you agree to be a beta reader, or if you leave me a kind review. I mean free. You’ll get the book; do what you will with it. I hope you will read it and enjoy it. I hope you will pass it on to your friends or encourage them to purchase one themselves. Or do nothing. Up to you.
Obviously, this is a limited offer. I only have so many books on hand, so it is on a first come, first served basis.
And now, having finished editing and uploading the books (I also revised Finding Rachel Davenport by changing the font from 10pt Times New Roman to a more readable 12pt Garamond, and setting the ISBN to a UK, instead of a US, ISBN, because I know you were worried about that) I can now move on to my other project, which I hope to finish by the end of summer, after which I will move on to the project that has been on hold for about a year, waiting for me to finish The Exodus Connection.
As always, thanks for reading.