A spooktacular subscriber offer

to celebrate three months until publication of my new book

It is three months until publication of The Floating Witch Mystery! Wow! It is still a ‘pinch me’ moment to think I will soon be the proud author of six published titles in six years.

And I would like to celebrate with you!

Would you like to be one of the first to read my latest book? How about a signed, dedicated copy? Then read on to find out how you can take advantage of an offer only available to my Substack subscribers.

The Floating Witch Mystery is set in the same magical universe as all my books. It is the story of a girl desperate to save her island home from a dark sorcerer with powerful mind control magic, only she has no magic to fight with. There will be magic, there will be friendship, bravery, a death, a magical detective cat. There may very well be flapjacks - but you may not want to eat these!

Here is my special offer to celebrate

If you would like to pre-order a copy and have it signed and dedicated by me, email me together with your name and dedication - I’ll do the rest!

I am offering a signed, dedicated copy of the book, including postage, for £7.99. And I will only make this offer available to the first 50 people to apply - so get in quick if you want one! They will go even quicker than those flapjacks!

If you are buying a copy for a school and would like an author letter from me sharing my love of reading - let me know when you order and I will send you one of those for free too.

Three months until publication: how does the book look?

Page proofs of The Floating Witch Mystery have arrived and are being read at this moment!

I know lots of you like to know a little about what goes on behind the scenes to get a book from my head into the hands of readers. At the three-months to publication stage I can tell you the book should be pretty much finished, but it’s not quite there!

At this stage the book is not yet ready to be printed, go to readers or even to go to warehouses and bookshops - but it very nearly is. At this stage it is just for me to read.

This is my last chance for changes! So a small amount of panic sets in.

Seeing the typescript version

So this week page proofs arrived for The Floating Witch Mystery. And that means a week of close reading and editing. This is an important stage as this is my last chance to do any polishing. I always have to really concentrate.

I will have worked with at least one editor to get the book into the best shape it can possibly be. The big decisions get made early on in the editing process. But once my editor is pretty happy with it, then the manuscript is typeset and I get sent a copy - this means I get to see what it will look like when it is printed as a finished book.

I hope you’ll agree it is going to look fantastic. I am so lucky with my talented publisher Chicken House, who make the books so beautiful. The amazingly talented Héloïse Mab has designed the book jacket and inside there will be black and white illustrations that take details from the jacket design.

I love the atmosphere of these illustrations. This book is set in a tiny island in the middle of a river, between a weir and a lock, the sort of place where years ago there was superstition that it was the sort of place water sprites or even witches might live.

Last chance for changes!

It is strange but seeing the book set out like this, when I read it, I see all sorts of things like spelling mistakes, repetition, things that are not very clear. It is supposed to be more or less finished, but nothing is ever perfect I guess.

However this is my last chance to make changes because soon it will go to print.

First the book will also go to a proof-reader who will pick up far more mistakes than me - mostly my grammar!

After all that hard work I think it’s an absolute bargain at £7.99!

If you’d like this wonderful river-set spooky mystery story to drop through your letterbox in January, and you’d like a signed copy, you know what to do.

Of course, you might prefer just to pre-order it from your favourite place to buy books. It’s up to you!

The Floating Witch Mystery is published on January 4, 2024 . Pre-ordering copies can make a huge difference to how a book does at launch (thank you!). You can pre-order a copy at your local independent bookshop, from Bookshop.org (which supports indie bookshops), Waterstones, Blackwells, Amazon or anywhere you get your books :-)

Or order using this link and I will make sure I will sign and dedicate one for you.

Thank you so much for your support 😊

Nicki