I’ve been trying to get out of my habit of moving on to another work as soon as something else is occupying my mind … and for the most part, I have! But there’s been some interesting developments when it comes to me teen passion project Dual Wielding: Blade’s Gauntlet.

Firstly: I failed to get Writvember completed for it. But that’s okay. It’s one thing to hammer out a rough draft and another thing to force yourself to write.

Secondly: some incredibly plot changes suddenly sparked from a single song and I want to take time to digest it.

Thirdly: I really want to take my time to get this one right, just like with Rini & Butler. I might have had Dual Wielding for 15 years now (omg it’s been 15yrs since I was in year 10), but I’ve been mostly musing about it for the last three. The last draft/re-write was in 2023, but the one before that was 2014 😱 . It’s changed significantly from the 2023 re-write and the 2026 re-plot, but that’s only led to more work on the novel, really.

There has also been interest in the Rini & Butler sequel and the excitement of the release has started my fingers moving on that. Though there’s obviously plans for a sequel, I actually never thought Rini & Butler would be my first book published and so hadn’t taken the sequel too seriously. I also realise that Rini & Butler and DW: BG are wildly different and so am thinking that I should focus on the work that I have in one area first before leapfrogging my way around 😅

I’ve had some serious conversations with myself, and I’m pretty confident this is the right decision to make 😤