Ros I feel like I’m going mad. I have turned the house upside down looking for the physical book of Nothing Becoming I swore I bought. I hope I find it somewhere because it was so brilliant and this extract has reminded me quite how great it was! Is there any possibility that I might have bought it on kindle and it somehow deleted itself as a result of some sort of publisher fuckery? I’m so glad we get to read more of the story thank you so very much for writing it!
Oh, I wonder if that's what's happened, Donna. When I changed agent it was on the understanding that we would 'unpublish' Nothing Becoming and put the book back together in its original form. I don't know if doing so would delete Kindle purchases; that seems so wrong. I really dislike this digital 'everything's rented' era.
I'm very glad to share it with you through this medium and to deliver the full story arc!
That is bonkers isn’t it, you do assume when you’ve bought something you get to keep it! So will the whole story be in this new volume ie the first book and then into the new material? I will buy it again if it appears in a physical form!
Yes, this is the whole story put back together. Once you've read the chapters that made up 'Nothing Becoming' you'll get the continuation too. So much to share with you!
Absolutely brilliant! I’m totally hooked! Your use of language and imagery is just delicious! I can see, and smell and hear the whole scene in front of me. Can’t wait for the next chapter!
Wonderful, I can’t wait to drop it. Of course I would love to just shove the book in people’s hands all at once, but maybe this drip-drip will be just the ticket in our overwhelmed lives. Looking forward to things adds to our joys, I think: on demand has killed a lot of anticipatory pleasure!
I like the idea of drip, drip. It gives me something to read without absorbing me all day and taking me away from what is supposed to be my writing time! 🤭
Fabulous, Ros! I was there and it was all so vivid!
And I am on tenterhooks to know how/if they're getting out of it and they are!!
PS one of my favourite books when I was little was the Ladybird Book of Pirates. I kept turning back to the pages about the women pirates and loving the fact that such badass women can exist!
I'm so pleased you're right there! I love writing in the first person present tense for the vivid qualities, pulling the reader in so they can live it too. There will be quite a wait from this point for you to find out about ALL the characters in the prologue because this is very much a bildungsroman in Part 1: the protagonist very much wanted to explain to me HOW she became a pirate, via her childhood and young adulthood, and a whole other life as a soldier, but hopefully you'll enjoy the journey to piracy (via footmanning and soldiering)as much as I did. And yes, the second half of the book is entirely at sea, and you'll meet the characters you see here one by one as the crew is brought together.
Ros this is amazing! I will dream of billowing sails and the crash of the waves...wow. And I have six friends awaiting hard copy after getting hooked on your story. Thanks for giving Mary Read a voice!
Ros I feel like I’m going mad. I have turned the house upside down looking for the physical book of Nothing Becoming I swore I bought. I hope I find it somewhere because it was so brilliant and this extract has reminded me quite how great it was! Is there any possibility that I might have bought it on kindle and it somehow deleted itself as a result of some sort of publisher fuckery? I’m so glad we get to read more of the story thank you so very much for writing it!
Oh, I wonder if that's what's happened, Donna. When I changed agent it was on the understanding that we would 'unpublish' Nothing Becoming and put the book back together in its original form. I don't know if doing so would delete Kindle purchases; that seems so wrong. I really dislike this digital 'everything's rented' era.
I'm very glad to share it with you through this medium and to deliver the full story arc!
That is bonkers isn’t it, you do assume when you’ve bought something you get to keep it! So will the whole story be in this new volume ie the first book and then into the new material? I will buy it again if it appears in a physical form!
Yes, this is the whole story put back together. Once you've read the chapters that made up 'Nothing Becoming' you'll get the continuation too. So much to share with you!
Absolutely brilliant! I’m totally hooked! Your use of language and imagery is just delicious! I can see, and smell and hear the whole scene in front of me. Can’t wait for the next chapter!
Thank you, Kass. I love to make a scene truly immersive wherever I can. Can't wait to share the next one with you!
Ros! I love it already. Your wordsmithing is marvelous, delicious! I was drawn in right away. I can't wait for the next chapter.
Wonderful, I can’t wait to drop it. Of course I would love to just shove the book in people’s hands all at once, but maybe this drip-drip will be just the ticket in our overwhelmed lives. Looking forward to things adds to our joys, I think: on demand has killed a lot of anticipatory pleasure!
I like the idea of drip, drip. It gives me something to read without absorbing me all day and taking me away from what is supposed to be my writing time! 🤭
👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏
Fabulous, Ros! I was there and it was all so vivid!
And I am on tenterhooks to know how/if they're getting out of it and they are!!
PS one of my favourite books when I was little was the Ladybird Book of Pirates. I kept turning back to the pages about the women pirates and loving the fact that such badass women can exist!
I'm so pleased you're right there! I love writing in the first person present tense for the vivid qualities, pulling the reader in so they can live it too. There will be quite a wait from this point for you to find out about ALL the characters in the prologue because this is very much a bildungsroman in Part 1: the protagonist very much wanted to explain to me HOW she became a pirate, via her childhood and young adulthood, and a whole other life as a soldier, but hopefully you'll enjoy the journey to piracy (via footmanning and soldiering)as much as I did. And yes, the second half of the book is entirely at sea, and you'll meet the characters you see here one by one as the crew is brought together.
Sounds fabulous! 😍
And who they are - sorry, I drop words when excited! What a great start to the day - thank you!!
Excited to read this! And looking forward to physical copy too.
A physical copy will depend very much on how this Dickensian experiment goes!
Ah, so the trick is to read each chapter as it's published here! Here's to a successful experiment.
Yes! Let’s see how it goes… and thank you!
Ros this is amazing! I will dream of billowing sails and the crash of the waves...wow. And I have six friends awaiting hard copy after getting hooked on your story. Thanks for giving Mary Read a voice!
That’s wonderful, Julia, thank you! I love the idea of sharing this with friends and having a mass read-along.