Category: Blog Posts

I am in the process of opening a shop on Shopify. I feel I’ll have more control of my books there.

I have also dipped my toe into something I’ve been thinking of for a while, writing a cosy murder mystery. This genre always appealed, but I wasn’t confident with the whodunnit twist and turns, but with the help of Save the Cat, I’ve come up with my first book The Christmas Wreath Workshop. I shall be serialising that on StockonStack’s Substack and then having it available as an ebook in the shop.

I’m completing the third and last novella in The Dark Stranger series, The Silver Heart, and working through the edits for Benedict’s Song.

So, it’s all go!

Find me at stockonstack if you’d like to follow my musings…

So, things are moving on a pace with my local heritage fight, we now need as many people to sign our petition as possible.

If you love local heritage, and you’ve read my post about the background to this fabulous mill, would you consider signing?

Back in 2024 I removed a character from my medieval fiction novel, now called Benedict’s Song (previously The Wait’s Son). Giselle at that time wasn’t needed, or so I thought, even though she was how I’d introduced the idea of going to France to Benedict; she told him he needed to go there if he wanted to become skilled, the troubadours were the ones to watch.

But the plot in the first third of the novel got a bit tangled so I got rid of her. Then she came back…and she’s back… – Janet Stock. But, after a development edit of the book, I’ve now realised that I need her, she just wasn’t in the right place in the book.

The first third of the novel, where we see Benedict growing into a young man in Lincoln, was very word heavy compared the the middle; his life and learning in France, and the final third; his return to living and performing in Lincoln. So… she is staying – but she will be moved. She will be one of the first people Benedict meets and learns from when he gets to France, and she’ll have a pivotal role certainly in the early part of this section of the story.

She just won’t go away, she’s insisting that she stays – have you ever had characters like that! :-)