213 - October 24, 2021 - Black Death Survival, Dawn of Assassins, Bernard Cornwell

Jon Cronshaw's Author Diary

Welcome to Jon’s author diary for the week ending October 24, 2021.

I have had a crazy busy week.

Black Death Survival is now live!

Visit: geni.us/blackdeathsurvival to get your copy.

If you’re a fan of dark, gritty post-apocalyptic tales about ordinary people in extraordinary times, get your copy now.

If you’ve been following my writing career for a while, you’ll know what a rollercoaster this story has been for me.

It was very close to being abandoned, but I hate leaving projects unfinished.

What this means is I’m at the point where the only live project I have is the Dawn of Assassins series.

So, that’s going to be something new for me.

We’ll see if I can cope!

As well as doing everything to do with the book launch, I also finished my redraft of Dawn of Assassins.

I ended up adding about 3,000 words to the manuscript, and tweaked the ending slightly.

This wasn’t as difficult as I thought it would be, but I’m happy with what I’ve done.

Which reminds me, I now have to covers back for the first three Dawn of Assassins books.

They look amazing.

After some feedback about the second book, that is no longer going to be called Murder of Crow, but trial of thieves.

This fits better with the story and won’t see my book competing with a bunch of others with the same title.

So, I’m looking at releasing Dawn of Assassins early next year, followed by Trial of Thieves, and Crucible of Shadows.

I’m writing it as a trilogy, but it has the potentially longer series.

As well as all the writing stuff, I had my friend Russ come to stay last weekend.

We spent most of Saturday drinking and coming up with ideas for his Dungeons and Dragons campaign.

I’ve not played D&D since I was a kid, but I do love worldbuilding and designing characters.

So, I had a lot of fun doing that.

I also went to the first in-person meeting of the Morecambe and Lancaster Speakers Group.

I joined the club during the early days of the pandemic and this is the first time we’ve met in person.

I had a really good time and it was great to meet people I’d known over Zoom face to face.

In terms of reading, I read the Burning Land by Bernard Cornwell. This is book 5 in his Saxon Chronicles series.

I really enjoy these books.

Great characters, great action scenes, and an excellent story.

I also read a writing craft book called the Creative Compass. This discussed the different layers of the writing process.

It was interesting to see how the technique pretty much mapped my own.

Though every time I read about the traditional publishing process of sending out query letters, waiting for months, and hoping an acquisitions editor will smile upon you seems so antiquated and unnecessary.

I’d definitely recommend the book if you’re interested in the actual process of getting a book down.

Next week is the October half-term.

This means my wife and son will be at home and that I will be having a much-needed break.

Do remember to get your copy of Black Death Survival.

If you go onto my YouTube channel, you can watch me reading the first chapter.

So, until next time.

Cheerio.