More Balancing of Guilt

Sounds painful, but is in fact a little update to a previous post, when I was feeling like a child waiting for Xmas Day as I counted down to the publication of The Balance of Guilt.

I've now flipped to feeling more like a new father. The finished book has arrived, and I'm going through the immodest but frankly irresistible "carrying it around with me everywhere" phase.

I'm not sure if other authors suffer this - it's not a question I've yet been sufficiently brave to ask any! - but I just can't help keeping a copy in my bag, or the car, and occasionally taking an admiring look, or perhaps opening a few pages and having a flick through.

I think I'd probably better stop here before I go a little too far!

I suppose such a feeling is inevitable (he says, trying to reassure himself).  Firstly, on an analytical level, the actual appearance of the book is the culmination of a mass of work.  The Balance of Guilt has been more than two years in the making, from the idea stage, to the plotting and outlining, the details of the characters, the structuring, and then the writing and re-writing, and re-re-writing etc.

In fact, on a quick calculation, I'd say the book has had eight re-writes, which is about average for one of the tvdetective series.

Then there's the harder to actually pin down part which is the emotion of the novel being published.  As the great Eric Morecambe might have put it, here, at last is this book what I wrote, held in my hand.  It all feels suddenly real.

The upshot of those Hall musings is that I'm feeling rather chuffed!

I've been kindly invited to some events to mark the publication of The Balance of Guilt.  If you fancy coming along to one (and dare to submit yourself to yet more Hall-waffle), I'll put details on the News and Events page as they come up - www.thetvdetective.com/news.html