I'll be making a rare public appearance in Budapest, Hungary on Saturday August 24th. I'll be giving a talk and answering questions from those in attendance, then signing books and posing for photos. It's been a long time since my last event in Hungary, and I haven't been doing many events anywhere over the last several years, so if you live in Hungary and miss this one, it might be a long time before you get a chance to catch me again!!

I won't be the only author at the event -- there will be Hungarian authors giving talks and signing as well, with the focus very strongly on fantasy books. The organisers were forced to change the venue, but have come up with somewhere that looks like it might work even better than their original choice. To confirm where it will be, and to book your tickets if you haven't already done so, CLICK HERE. You can find some extra info on the organiser's Facebook EVENT page, including times (although these might change slightly, so make sure you double-check on the day when you get the venue!), by CLICKING HERE.

TERRIFIED TROLL UPDATE

When I announced last year that I was going to be releasing my first ever children's picture book, The Terrified Troll, with artist Eva Byrne, I said that we were hoping to release it before the end of summer 2024, but "our time scale MIGHT prove to be overly optimistic." That, alas, has turned out to be the case. We haven't actually run into any external bumps, such as sickness or accidents (touch wood!!), but it has been a much steeper learning curve than we'd anticipated. For instance, we started out without a storyboard (basically a map of the entire book, featuring a detailed sketch for every page), not knowing that we would need one. When we realised that a storyboard would be essential, it took a few months to work it up from scratch, and as we did that, our aims grew more ambitious and the book grew longer by several pages -- which is good news for all of you who pre-ordered a copy, as you'll be getting far more bang for your buck, but it does also mean a longer wait, as each of those pages had to be planned, and now have to be drawn.

We're almost at the the halfway point, as far as the internal art is concerned. Eva is in the final stages of her MA this coming month, and her children are on holiday, but come September, with the MA in the bag and the kids back at the school, she'll be able to devlote much more time to the book. We don't have a precise estimate for you guys at the moment, but we think spring 2025 -- say, March or April -- is a realistic target. We're hopeful of being in a position to deliver it even earlier than then, but of course the obverse could happen too, and it could end up being even later than that (although we genuinely don't anticipate that much of a delay).

We're sorry for the delay, but we hope you'll all think it was well worth the extra effort and time when you see the finished book -- it's already far exceeded MY expectations of it!! So, your patience is greatly appreicated, and I'll be back in touch with more news and a more concret ETA at some point over the coming months, as work progresses even further and the end starts to trundle into sight. In the meantime, here's one of the pages from the book for you to enjoy -- a little taste of the Trolltastic treats to come!!!

ARCHIE VOL 1 SALE

OK folks, this is a mixed news post -- potentially good long-term news, but mixed in with some short-term bum notes!!

So, I was planning to surprise you all in October with a new Darren Shan book. It's a short horror novel that I wrote several years ago. My agent at the time presented it to my publishers, but they weren't interested in it, so I put it aside for a while, before returning to it this year to polish it up and get it ready for self-publication -- I felt there'd been a long enough wait since the end of my Archibald Lox series, and decided this would be a good one to follow it up with, as I still have a soft spot for the book, regardless of what the publishers thought. My plan was to get it ready, then drop the news on you guys at the last minute, shortly before I went ahead and released it.

As I worked on pushing ahead with the book, I sent the latest draft to my new agent. I always run my self-published work by her ahead of releasing it, to keep her in the loop, and also to give her the chance to step in and take it to traditional publishers if she feels there might be a market for it. I fully expected her to knock this one straight back, since it had been rejected previously, but to my surprise and delight she came back with some very thoughtful comments and suggestions for a rewrite. (For the first time in my long career, I've had someone ask me to make a story darker instead of tone it down!!!)

There's absolutely no guarantee that the rewrite will go well, or that we'll be able to land a publishing deal for it. I may very well end up pushing ahead with my original plan, and self-publish the book next year. But I'm going to give it a go, as there's no doubt that it stand a much better chance of finding a wider audience if it goes through a traditional publisher -- I'm not very good at the publishing side of things and taking my self-published work to a larger readership.

The rewrite will take time (I'll probably have to go through it a few times before I'm happy with it), and then it will have to go to my agent, and then -- if she likes it and thinks it has a shot -- it will have to be sent to a few publishers. So there's absolutely no way it's going to see print this year.

I'd like to put out a Darren Dash book instead, to plug the gap, but unfortunately I don't have one ready to go, as I was concentrating on the YA book. I'm going to start working on one as soon as I can, and might even work on it at the same time as I'm rewriting the Darren Shan book, but I think it's VERY unlikely that I'll be able to get it all lined up before the end of the year. I'm not ruling the possibility out completely, but it's an extreme long shot, and I imagine it will be spring 2025, or even later, before it will be ready for release.

So, this look like being a VERY rare year, with no new book from me on either the YA or adult front. But hopefully I'll make up for it in 2025, with a new Darren Dash book, plus a new Darren Shan YA book, PLUS of course my first ever picture book, The Terrified Troll. Keep those fingers crossed!! And while you're doing that, I'll keep working hard on things at my end, to bring the books to you as swiftly as I can. 2024 might prove to be a bust, but 2025 could end up being one of my most productive years ever!!!!

BEC'S SETTING

BAD REVIEWS

A budding writer called BEX emailed me, having been hurt by a review of her work in progress:

"I hope this is OK to send but I would like to pick your brains about something. Next year, I’ll be self-publishing my debut novel. I’ve chucked the plot about in a private author group only for it to get torn to shreds and it triggered something inside me, spiralling me down a stressful pit of despair and asked myself ‘am I good enough?’

"It then brought on the concern of how do I take criticism? If all it takes is one person (who called my writing poor judging by how I used exclamation points in the synopsis!) to set me off, how will I fair when it comes to negative reviews? So, my questions are – how do you do it? Were you just as nervous before your books were published? Should I not waste energy on [the negative reviewer]?"

I felt Bex's pain, and here's what I told her, which I hope might come in useful for other budding writers too:

"You just have to remember the old adage -- opinions are like a**holes... everyone has one!!! :-) :-) :-)

"My advice is to either ignore reviews completely, or else try to take them with a grain of salt when you read them. Positive reviews put a small smile on my face... bad reviews make me scowl slightly... but I try not to pay too much attention to either. Once you publish a work, it's done, and no review can have any real impact on it from that point on. You should be thinking about the next book, not worrying about what people are saying about one that is now in your past.

"Easier said than done, I know, and some reviews DO rankle with me, even after all my years, especially when they're an ill-formed review. But you really are better off not responding to them, or saying anything to the reviewer. When you put a work out there, people are free to say whatever they want about it, and if you argue with them -- however politely you might argue, even if only to correct them on a big mistake on their part -- they won't appreciate it and it probably won't go well for you. Let them say what they like... take it in, mull it over for a few seconds if you wish... then move on."

A BLOODY HIGH PRICE!

UNLIKELY SEQUELS

A fan of my books, called Andrew, posted on Facebook recently, recommending my Saga Of Larten Crepsley series to other Shansters. After explaining why they should go read the prequel series, Andrew added: "I think this is where Darren the writer is at his best. I think the true power in his creativity is in these sort of books, mainly spin offs from the Cirque Du Freak series... There are loads of avenues he could go down if he chose to, like the origin of the Cirque Du Freak or how the vampire and the vampanese separated or a smaller book of what it is like for some one from the Cirque to live life in normal human society... The ideas are endless. It's up to you, Darren, it's your call..."

I love the Mr Crepsley books just as much as Andrew does… but limiting myself to more and more spin-offs and sequels and prequels? Nah. Not my idea of a life well lived. There are plenty of writers who create a universe and are happy (and maybe are only able) to continue working within that universe for the rest of their careers. But I’ve always been most strongly drawn to the NEXT story, in the NEXT universe. I never rule out tie-ins to my earlier works, but there has to be a damn good reason for me to dip my toes back into waters of my previous creations. It happened with the Crepsley quartet — I couldn’t stop thinking about him and his story before he met Darren — but so far I’ve never been drawn in a similar way by any other story, and I don’t write with an eye on the market and what my readers might most want from me. I write from the heart, always, and pour everything I have into every story that I tell, every single time. Whether it ends up being a traditionally published bestseller or a self published niche item, to me is utterly irrelevant. I go where the stories lead.

IT'S A WRAP!

And that's it for August. Myself and Dante climbed over the O2 dome in London when we were in the area in holiday last month -- that's a photo of us abover, with Canary Wharf in the background. The Shans will be on holiday again in August, this time to Malta, where I'm expecting less of those clouds that you can see behind us in the photos!! I won't be doing much actual work over the coming month, but rest assured my brain will be ticking over in the background, and I'll also be dealing with some interesting bits and pieces of business if they come my way while I'm relaxing by the pool -- by September, I might have announced that a THIRD of my series is potentially going down the TV optioning route, and trust me, this will be one that nobody saw coming!!! Make sure you keep an eye on my Facebook and Twitter pages for any updates on that front, and I'll hopefully see you back here at the start of September for the next issue of my monthly newsletter. Until then, all my bloody best, Darren Shan. x x x

Follow Darren Shan on Facebook and Twitter. He also has a (very rarely updated!) YouTube page.

GDPR

If you received an email with a link to this issue of the Shanville Monthly it's because at some point in the past you subscribed to get updates from me. I don't share your details with any third parties, and do not hold them on any independent device -- everything on the subscription front is done through Sendfox, and you can read about their privacy policy by CLICKING HERE. If you're happy to continue receiving emails from me, you don't need to do anything, and you will continue to be sent updates whenever a new issue of the Shanville Monthly goes live. If, at any point, you wish to unsubscribe, there will always be an Unsubscribe link in any email notification that you receive from me, and you can simply click on that to have yourself removed from my mailing list.