Are you dead, Alex?

I am not, in fact.

So what have you been doing? And why are you talking to yourself? Have you finally lost your marbles?

Well, I can’t completely rule that out–I may never have known where my marbles were to begin with. However, I have been working on the first draft of the next Trowchester book, and I now have that completed.

It’s been a struggle switching back to romance after having taken so much time off to write mystery and sci-fi, but I made myself cry a couple of times. So I consider that a good sign.

Now I’m going to let it sit for a week while I wrestle with Kindle Unlimited, Amazon Associates, Facebook Ads, setting up a newsletter opt-in bundle and such like. Then I’ll come back and do a second draft. I already know at least three scenes are missing, so they need adding. It’ll be about 75,000 words when it’s done.

Meanwhile I’ve been learning Photoshop and knitting. Not together, though!

Behold my first book cover made entirely in Photoshop (rather than Gimp.) The text options are so much better!

Oh, there’s another thing for me to do – set up a cover art blog. This year is the year I add Cover Artist to my three-different-flavours-of-author portfolio.

If any cover artists are out there reading, can you give me any advice? Yet again I am starting a thing before I know how to do it.