Keepers of the Past

The Larkspur Mysteries book two has its title, ‘Keepers of the Past.’ I am now nearing the end of the first draft and have one and a half chapters left to go. I am getting back to them as soon as I finish this brief update. We were invited to a wedding which took up a few days at the end of the week, hence this post coming on Sunday, not Saturday, but now there is little in my diary to interrupt a return to full steam ahead.

I may have said before, but one reason ‘Keepers’ feels like it’s taken me a long time to first draft is because of the research, which has included reading about standing stones, ancient history, and finding genuine accounts of missing people from the newspaper archives. Another reason is because this is the first book since ‘Deviant Desire’ that doesn’t include a familiar cast of characters.

‘Guardians of the Poor’, book one in the new series, is a handover novel. It acted as a way of joining the Clearwater cast to the new Larkspur world. With ‘Guardians’, I had Clearwater, James, Silas and others to fall back on, and as they arrived already created, they were easy to manoeuvre into the story. With ‘Keepers’, I’ve had to do a lot more work on Joe Tanner and Dalston. Fleet has more to do in this story, Clem and Frank, too, because most of the story is set at Academy House. Lord Clearwater is away, and although Thomas, Fecker and Barnett make appearances (as does Jasper, briefly), most of the characters in the story are new to us. Clearwater is about to make his appearance in the final chapter, so I should be back on familiar ground by the end of today’s writing session.

I’ve opened a dialogue with Andjela about the cover, and I have had ‘Dazzling’ my illustrator draw a couple of illustrations to insert at the front of the book. She has produced two drawings, one of which I’ll show you here. The other, you will have to wait for, but it’s not a portrait as we had in book one. The illustration is below.

There are two mysteries in ‘Keepers’, but they collide. In brief, Joe Tanner is tasked by Lord Clearwater to research the history and meaning of symbols carved into two standing stones on his estate. As Joe, who is deaf and uses sign language, sets about doing this, a relative of Joe’s new friend, David, the younger groom, is due to arrive from America but has gone missing. While working on the stones, Joe uncovers news of similar disappearances, and wonders if they might have something to do with the carvings. Thus, one mystery is connected to the other, and, being me, an action climax is guaranteed.

I shan’t say more today, because I am keen to return to chapter 28, which I have left unfinished, and then on to chapter 29, the final chapter, and then… Then I start all over again with draft two. I’ll leave you with Dazzling’s drawing of two sides of one of the standing stones. This made an appearance in ‘Guardians’ you may remember, and yes, the ’rounded arrow’ is meant to look like a…