Tag Archives: balik’s story

Done!

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“It was only recently, as I opened up to Cassie and saw something more, that I had begun to live. She had filled my hollow shell with life and awakened emotions in me that I thought were dead. Cassie was literally my life now. I turned my back on everything I had once been and walked out the door.”

This is one of my  favourite quotes from The Rainbow Maker’s Tale, it comes at the end of Chapter 19, but in many ways it sums up the book for me. Of the two of them, I think Balik changes the most from who he has been, and I really like this idea of him turning away from his old life and what it made him, and looking for a future with Cassie.

Well, aren’t I a little more cheesy and romantic beneath the surface than I would normally care to admit 🙂 Perhaps the reason for the nostalgia and emotion today is because I have finally, FINALLY finished RMT. Yes, the ARC feedback has been listened to (thank you!), the beta readers edits have been noted (thanks again!) and I have completed my full re-draft and edit from the scrappy printed edition that I have been carrying around with me since July.

Today the book has been delivered to the lovely chaps at Amazon – I’ve missed my little Kindle a lot these last few months as I’ve been living in book-silence whilst I tried to finish the writing, so I thought it would be a nice way to launch the book (with lots of freebie copies going out to people), and gives me an excuse to charge mine up again.

It will go out to other suppliers at the beginning of December, so if you’ve been waiting for it, it’ll be there soon 🙂 And, this will be me – doing a Balik – and turning my back on the Ambrosia Sequence for a while, as I’ve got something else bubbling away for my NaNo project this year. More detail to follow soon…

Tick tock, tick tock

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The cogs in my brain are busily turning as I try to get to the end of the editing / proof-reading process with Balik’s story, before sending it away to the lovely people who’ve offered fresh eyes on the book, before I push out ARCs and then final official release. Unfortunately, my self-imposed deadline of ‘summer 2012’ has slipped a little – mainly due to a very busy period in my non-writing, working-life – the chaotic period has hopefully now drawn to a close, giving me the final concentrated time I need to put the finishing touches to Balik’s tale and move on to Outlanders, which has been hovering in the background for a good while now.

I’ve really enjoyed being in Balik’s head since April time, when I began ‘serious’ work on my old drafts of RMT. Even though the story is somewhat familiar to Cassie’s in Hope’s Daughter, it has been important to fill in the gaps of who he is and how he came to be the person that Cassie meets. When I began writing The Rainbow Maker’s Tale, I didn’t really know everything about Balik and so this has been a learning experience for me too. He’s a tough little cookie – but still a yummy cookie 🙂

I hope you’re looking forward to seeing more of Balik before the story continues in Outlanders, there’s a lot that Cassie didn’t know…she’s not the only one who can keep secrets.

Just Writing…To Stalk or Not to Stalk…?

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Hello. I’m Balik, and I think I might be a stalker.

I know it sounds a bit melodramatic, but I think I must be. Not the crazed, knife-wielding, want-to-kill-her kind. It’s more the can’t-stop-looking-at-her, changing-my-life-to-match-hers, accidentally-quoting-poetry, type. But I don’t think that makes it better: stalking is stalking after all.

To be honest, I was fine until I spoke to Cassie. I lived unhappily enough in my little box; doing as I was told, thinking what I was supposed to, waiting for my chance to get out. I shouldn’t have talked to her after the exams – that was my first mistake. When we’d never spoken I could pretend that Cassie was just like everyone else, perhaps a little prettier, more intelligent, but she was certainly one of them. But now I was stuck.

Going on the early rotation at the Clinic hasn’t helped me at all. I’d promised myself it would be a few days – a week at the most – and then I’d get back to work on my plans to get out of the Family Quarter. I think I knew I was lying to myself even as I was making these arrangements in my head…But once we got here and Cassie began working with Joel I’ve found it impossible to leave. It’s stupid really – although I’m almost certain she doesn’t like him as anything more than a friend, I can’t stay away from her just in case I’m wrong. It’s nearly two weeks on from my initial decision to join Cassie on her placement at The Clinic and I’m still only managing to see her for a short while at lunch and sometimes at either end of the day if I’m lucky enough to get the timings right. Yes, I think I’m definitely a stalker.

So here I am. Sitting in the sixth floor labs trying to ignore the incessant babbling of my placement partner, Olivia, and daydreaming about the beautiful girl with the clever green eyes, who I’m not absolutely sure I can trust. Perhaps there’s only one way to find out the truth about Cassie and maybe myself? If I could get her alone somewhere, away from prying eyes, it might give me the chance I so desperately need.

Oh dear – if that doesn’t make me sound like a stalker I don’t know what would.

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Balik appears in Hope’s Daughter , available now.

(And no – he’s not a stalker – well, not much! But you’ll get to see his side of the story this summer when The Rainbow Maker’s Tale is released.)