Updates & News

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Here’s a Saturday update on what’s going on in my world right now.

The Next Novel

I am now up to 65,000 words of the first draft of ‘Untitled. A Something Mysteries Series, Book One.’  Obviously, I’ve yet to find a title and have not yet decided on the series title either. Will it be a series? We shall see, but I hope so, as long as I can produce the same kind of ongoing themes, characters, excitement and the varied mysteries of the past three series. Let me get to the end of this first book first, and I’ll decide then.
It’s fun bringing back some previous characters and setting them ten years after the last Delamere book, but it’s also hard work. I have to come at the characters anew, yet they need to bring some of their previous traits and characteristics, behaviour and language with them, but changed, somehow, by the time in between. Inventing new ones is easy for me, they invent themselves as I write, and then I mould them during the first rewrite. The next issue for them is deciding whether they should reappear in the next book.

Here’s a minor character who may become a larger player in the future. A crossing sweeper who works around Bloomsbury Square, but also runs a sideline which could become useful to my detectives working out of Bedford Place. (Both the Square and the Place are still there, and you can find them on online maps if you want to look.)

Tommy Peake.

This image (and others I am using for my blog and socials, for fun only, and not for printing) was generated online by one of these fancy and free services, and it’s okay, but there is a tendency for the faces to look very similar.

So, the new first draft is coming along slowly at around 2,000 to 3,000 words per day, with the rest of my writing time given over to reading back, checking, altering, making notes and thinking.

Journeyman Joe and an Odd Review

Joe has been doing me proud and has been selling well. It’s received some great feedback and some praise, but it has also attracted a variety of star ratings from five to one. There’s someone who always gives my new release a one-star rating by default, so I don’t pay any attention to that, but someone gave the book a three-star rating because the book had not been printed very well. There’s not a lot I can do about that, as I don’t actually print them, and I’ve never heard of this problem before. At least the reader was kind enough to leave a written review and not just a star rating.

Journeyman Joe

Navigating a double life under the watchful eyes of the village is a dangerous game. In the shadow of Oscar Wilde’s ruin, a single slip could cost them everything.

At Home
I am home alone for a couple of weeks while Neil visits his children and grandchildren in the warm and sunny climes of Scotland (he says it’s freezing). We’re still enjoying temperatures of 25° here at the moment, and I’ve not had to put the heating on much… Yet. So, that’s good news for the bank account. I’ve been getting up at three or four to start work straight away, working through until ten or eleven and then finding myself confronted with all the things Neil usually sees to while I am working. Shopping, cooking, housework, doing things… I also do them when he’s here, but not every day. Then, I have the afternoons to fill, and I have been pottering around with some projects in a half-hearted way. I’m waiting for a delivery which should be here next week. In it is a book about teaching yourself to draw, so I might have a go at that. Wouldn’t it be fun if I could draw my own characters as Mervyn Peake did for his? It would, but it’s not likely, as all I’ve ever been able to draw are rocks and tree trunks; still, it’s a winter project.

Winter view from the front of the house

Newsletter & Promos

I’ve had some new readers join the newsletter mailing list, thanks to the free giveaway of one of my books. If you have not claimed it, here’s the link: https://dl.bookfunnel.com/wulr9atxyx  

Sign up for the newsletter and download the book. Simple.

And here’s another one for you. Help support other indie authors trying to wrestle sales away from hideous AI-generated trash about hockey players and Christmas romances by browsing this list and checking out anything that catches your eye.

November 2026 LGBT New Releases
Genres: General Fiction / LGBT and Romance / LGBT

This collection holds 22 + titles; there are a few Christmas ones, and plenty of hot hunks on the covers.

https://books.bookfunnel.com/newlgbt1126/tc3yt5ga6c

And Onwards
And now, I am off into chapter 18 of the new mystery where I must start bringing threads together, and where I have another ‘old favourite’ character ready to make an appearance. Who and why…? Time will tell.

Keep reading!

Author Thoughts: Doubts

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I’m still working through my first draft of an unnamed story, and I’m starting to second-guess myself as to whether it’s the right story to be telling. Is it just another mystery but with no emotional point to it? Does there have to be? Does every story have to have a terrible dilemma for one main character? Does he have to have flaws which are explored throughout? Must there be a resolution at the end after him/her going through trials and overcoming them? Is there really a need for a big emotional draw if you’re writing a mystery where the job of the reader is to work out the solution before the detectives? I don’t know. But I am starting to feel that what I am writing is ‘nothing new.’

Ah, but that is what readers want. They come back to the stories because they like the characters and want to know what happens to them next, particularly in ongoing series, such as I write. Yes, but it sometimes feels like I’m just adding in words to fill the word count, and I am not sure where things are heading. That’s because it’s a first draft. Your mind is working through ideas and developments, and you’re doing its bidding and putting them down, and when that’s done, you can assess where you are, where it is, and where to go from there.
But there haven’t been any difficult choices, laughs, weeping, parting, murders, abandonments yet – in other words, where’s the drama, the tension? It’s in there, and it will be more ‘in there’ when the second drafting comes along.

The setting for the detective’s search. A run-down Tudor manor house, the study, where a missing man hides many secrets…

Meanwhile, the internal conversation switches, and the mentor taks over:
So, where are you in the story now? Well, I am over my usual halfway length and am approaching 60,000 words. Has there been a twist? Yes, we’ve gone from the ‘ordinary world’ of the setup and have begun on the complications. Good, then we’re now heading for the crisis and a climax. Yes, but there’s no great countdown or consequence as yet. Yes, there is; you’re holding back a reveal so you can create that when the time comes. And the smoking gun moment? You don’t always need one, but it’s there, plotted on your scrap of paper with the rest of the main points; you’ll get there.

And so the internal mind goes on.
Apart from all that, I am aware that I have introduced X as the main character and story leader, and now, around halfway, I am passing that baton to another character, so I am interested to see how that works. If it works. No! It will work; I just have to keep plugging away, which is what I am currently doing.

In Other News

At home, Neil is off on a trip, leaving in 30 minutes, and I’ll be left home alone for two weeks. Just me and this new story idea. Oh, and me and publicity work for the books, which I’m never very good at. I’ve sent out the monthly newsletter with some updates and promos to check, and soon need to start on next month’s news and lists.

Meanwhile, I’m ignoring at least 10 spam emails per day. Get this: this morning I received one from a nonsense idiot via his Gmail address, presenting himself as a story editor for the story I am currently working on. I’ve only mentioned it here on my own blog, so they’re having their AI machines trawl everything now, and not just limiting themselves to Amazon and published books. All they’re doing, of course, is regurgitating what I’ve already written and throwing it back at me as if I don’t know what I am doing.

All the above is part of being an indie author. No matter if/when you get stuck and have self-doubts, which I rarely have, and when you get fed up with these suckerfish spammers, you only have to remember: you are in charge, and you are driving. Just keep going – which is what I am doing, and if you keep following the blog, I’ll take you along with me.

And with that off my chest and worked through (thank you for listening), it’s back to writing chapter 17…

Promo: It’s Raining MM

Genres: General Fiction / LGBT, Romance / LGBT, and Sci-Fi & Fantasy / Urban Fantasy

There are 63 + books to explore in this collection of MM Romance titles, with all kinds of genres covered. Is there something here for you?

https://books.bookfunnel.com/israiningmm/k6wfkyedtb

It’s Raining MM

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An Experiment

It’s Raining MM
Genres: General Fiction / LGBT, Romance / LGBT, and Sci-Fi & Fantasy / Urban Fantasy

There are 63 + books to explore in this collection of MM Romance titles, with all kinds of genres covered. Is there something here for you?

https://books.bookfunnel.com/israiningmm/k6wfkyedtb

Please excuse the experimental nature of this post, but I just want to see if I can set up a blog post in advance and have it automatically share to Facebook, there to act as a kind of advert (hence the header), because I can no longer put this advert straight onto my FB page as a link. Long story.

I’m testing whether this process, which works fine manually, will happen if I schedule a post for later release, which is what I am doing here. More usual blog updates will resume shortly…

Letting a Little Cat Out of the Bag

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Last week I was telling you a little more about my current work in progress, but not the story and not the overall plan. Well, here’s a little more.

I am now up to 45,000 words of a first draft, which, in my usual terms, is approaching a halfway twist. I am aiming for 100,000 words as a benchmark length, and I set that length as a control mechanism; without it, I’d ramble on forever. I have introduced several new characters, some who will appear in this novel only, and some who will stay, because I intend this to be the first book in a new series. As the name of this series will be ‘The Merrit Brothers Mysteries’, there are no prizes for guessing who it’s about or what line of work they are in. I’m sticking with mysteries and a central cast of (mostly) gay characters. I intend to include some MM romance, bromance, bonding, and relationships as my core emotional throughlines, and mysteries based on real events, people or situations from the past, and the headquarters for all of this is still in London.

However, it is a London of 1904, and much has happened in the ten years since Jack and Wil’s fate was sealed at the end of The Delamere Dilemma.

You want to know which characters are returning, and I hope you will want to know what has happened to the others. As there were nine or ten central characters at Delamere House (including one woman and a horse), I have a pool to choose from, but sadly, and realistically, not all of them made it through into the 20th century. More about them will be revealed as the series progresses.

Already, the Merrit world has expanded. In June 1904, they are working out of two buildings they own outright in Bedford Place, just off Bloomsbury Square, and these buildings are inspired by real properties such as these:

The building on the right is actually the back of one in Bloomsbury Square, and the lower part between the two is, in my world, larger, but you get the idea…

Of course, the motorcars by then appearing on the streets looked nothing like these I found on Google Maps, so ignore them. One of these buildings (right) contains a basement for some domestic staff who will end up doing a little more than running the house; then the ground floor houses Jack Merrit’s study, the offices of his assistant and secretarial team etc., while the first floor is where the detectives and their support staff work, including a new legal genius, a woman based on Cornelia Sorabji, the first woman to pass the Bachelor of Civil Law (BCL) exam at Oxford University in 1892. My character, Cornelia Davar, is the second woman to pass such a degree, but she’s working for Jack because women could not practice law in England until after the Sex Disqualification (Removal) Act of 1919. The upper floors are where Jack now lives, but he doesn’t live alone; he shares a large apartment with Simeon Felman.

Next door in building number two, we have Will Merrit living on the top floor (currently alone and quite happy with that, thank you), while below him lives a character informally voted one of my readers’ favourites, Ben Baxter. The ground and middle floors are entirely given over to Will’s library and study, and the quarters of his librarian, and the basement floor is, again, a mix of domestic staff and an overflow for the archives.

Between the two buildings is another, although it was originally part of one of the houses. It mainly contains what they are calling the forensics department; the science labs and so on. We’ve not needed them yet, so I can’t tell you who is in there. I don’t want to overload the first book with too much background and explanation; that will all come as we go along.

But we also have new characters, and here’s a made-up image of one of them, which is based on an actual photo of an 18-year-old Londoner.

He’s the youngest detective in the new crew, has a background similar to Baxter’s, and he’s Baxter’s protégé. His name is Alfie Styles; he’s from the East End, he’s come from the Cheap Street Mission, and he brings a nicely chequered and useful past.

That’s all I want to tell you right now, but as the weeks go on and the new world takes shape, I’ll let you know more. I will add, though, as we’re talking about characters previously met, that a few others have already been mentioned, one has made a ‘guest appearance ’, and another I have plans for in Act Three of the book. For now, I must get on with the midway twist and the ending of Act Two.

Newsletter

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The next newsletter is out on Saturday

WIP Update: 1904

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1904 is the year in which the next book is set, and not a new title to go along with the short-story collections 1892 and 1893, which are two volumes of the Clearwater Tales.

Having spent much of the last eight or nine years in the late Victorian period, and having stacked my shelves with books about that time, I am now in the Edwardian era, and that’s new to me. But it’s only ten years since Delamere, you might say; and yes, it is. But a lot happened in the world in between times. Cars, telephones, the march of technology, industry and medicine, to name a few, and me being me, I like to make sure I am as accurate as I can be.

This means much starting a chapter and then stopping to check things, such as the legal process of a pre-nuptial marriage settlement between a wealthy American family with a daughter to ‘sell off’ and an impoverished nobleman. How much would be a reasonable jointure back then? Would a new wife have to move from the home if the husband died?

Then, again me being me, the research reaches wider: How much would a road sweeper have earnt? What was Bloomsbury like in that year? What was the weather like on June 14th? What ships left New York for Liverpool on March 12th 1902, and did it have a telegram service? I even stop writing to see if I can find what was on the menu in first Vs third class on that ship…

All that slows me down, but so does filling in the gap of 10 years, figuring out how a character from then might be ten years on, deciding who, if anyone, has died, where they are now, and so on ad infinitum.

All of which is a way of telling my loyal, faithful and generous readers: I’m working on it! Once this first in what I hope is a new series is up and running, other stories should follow and flow more freely, so bear with me as I battle away at only 1,500 or 2,000 words a day rather than my usual three or four thousand.  

In the meantime, if you want more to read while you wait, you have a couple of options:
My back catalogue can be found on my Amazon page.
You can sign up to my monthly newsletter for lists of novels by indie authors that fit with my genre(s).
And if you want to join in with my social media stuff, you can find the list of links at the top of this page, right-hand side, beneath the newsletter signup.

I must get back to my crumbling Tudor manor house in the Essex countryside, and a sequence in the new book which is in danger of becoming Great Expectations meets Bleak House.

In case you were wondering who it is in the image above, he’s an imagining of Lady Harlow’s butler, except, perhaps he is not a butler? Perhaps the missing Lord Harlow has a secret that his new wife and his gradually going mad mother don’t know about… Time will tell, but it might be a longer time than usual.

Keep reading (books by humans).

Moving on to 1904

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New Century, New Ideas.

It’s been two weeks now since I published Journeyman Joe, and you might think I’ve been idle, but I haven’t. The need to write remains as strong as ever, and I have been writing every day as usual. Except it’s not been at my usual pace because I am writing something in a different era. Where Deviant Desire started in the Autumn of Terror in 1888, and the Delamere Dilemma ended in June 1894, what I am writing takes place ten years later, in 1904.

However, for those who wrote and commented and didn’t want to say farewell to the Delamere boys, I can tell you that, if this new project works, you will meet some of them again before long. Here, without giving away too much, is what I have started with.

The year: 1904
The place: Bedford Place, Bloomsbury, London
The name of the business: Merrit Brothers. Confidential Investigations.
Semper Veritas

This may sound like a continuation, but much has changed. Not only in London and the wider world, but also in the lives of the protagonists, Jack and Will Merrit.

I don’t want to give too much away, mainly because I have only written the first quarter of the first draft of a new and uncertain idea, but a new century brings new technology, new cases and new characters. While some of the original characters remain, some are elsewhere. I hope the underlying themes of male friendship, bromance and romance remain, but on top of them will be mysteries that the reader can consider and perhaps solve along with the detectives as each story progresses.

We are in the Edwardian period. There are the first motorcars on the road, some people have telephones, the Unionist (Conservative) Party are in power, the Suffragette movement is rising, and cinema is in the early days of popularity, though still young, and progress progresses at a fast pace.

These changes, and writing outside of the period I have been in for the last ten years, require me to research much that is new to me, and when writing, to stop, think and check the authenticity of everything from transport to costume. I must also consider what has happened to characters in the ten years since we left them celebrating at Delamere House, and this has given me hours of fun. Who is still with whom? What’s happened to X? Where is Y? Who might have died, moved abroad, moved on, and who remains of the cast from 10 years ago? This is why it is taking me a long time to get started. I don’t mean plotting a mystery; I have one set out already, but the characters I developed up to a certain point now have a missing 10-year gap for me to understand, so I am often pausing to consider not just physical appearance, but also their history, and that takes time.
Actually, the physical appearance is often the easiest thing to invent, and I have been using some of today’s technology to help me picture them.

This, for example, is Jack Merrit in 1904. Now aged 37, starting to go grey, but otherwise still fit and handsome and not (as is popular with so many writers of detective fiction) a hard-bitten, bitter and burdened drunkard, but one with more experience, a few more scars and a lot more stories. But still the same heart underneath.

You will have questions: Is this character still in the stories? What has happened to this person? Are this couple still together? Has this one found love yet? How did the Oscar Wilde case affect them as gay men unable to exist as themselves? And, I hope, many more. I shan’t tell you, because I don’t know all the answers yet, but I can tell you that at the core of this first story in what I hope will be another successful series are four of the Delamere Files main characters, with others waiting in the wings to make guest appearances as we go along. Who these four are, though, is a question to be answered later. (Jack and Will Merrit, obviously, but as for the other two…?) So, folks, that’s where I am right now, and I’ll update you as I go. The chances are, this new book won’t be out until after Christmas, which gives you plenty of time to catch up.

Journeyman Joe: Published.

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If you’ve not picked up on the news, I released Journeyman Joe last week. This is a standalone romance that’s more about the people of the story than the mystery, which comes second to the characters and location. Rather than an action/adventure style mystery based in London, it’s a slower and more descriptive journey through a season in a Kent village. There are, of course, quirky characters, a handsome lead, some class distinctions, and some humour, but I hope it has some literary merit in its writing. Having said that, I’m not the sort to explore and understand the ‘human condition’ (whatever that is), or to raise great moral themes intended for discussion at book groups. Just a simple storyteller telling a simple story. You’ll have to make up your own mind.

Here’s the blurb and a universal link to Journeyman Joe:

Spring 1895. As London is gripped by the scandalous trials of Oscar Wilde, a blacksmith’s apprentice in a parochial Kent village is fighting a much quieter, lonelier battle.Joe Webster is desperate to escape the suffocating expectations of his family and his village. The only way out is to free himself of his indenture, which he can only do by becoming a journeyman. To do that, he must forge a new casket for the church, include a secret compartment, and swear an oath of absolute silence.

Joe is lost for inspiration until the archdeacon’s office sends the handsome and erudite historian, Harvey Cade, to inspect the parish records. As Harvey investigates a historical mystery, Joe realises what he needs to succeed: The forbidden love Harvey offers.

But navigating a double life under the watchful eyes of the village is a dangerous game. In the shadow of Oscar Wilde’s ruin, a single slip could cost them everything. When the casket’s secret threatens to publicly expose them both, Joe must choose: Protect the truth he was sworn to hide, or protect the man he loves.
Kindle, KU & paperback

What’s Next?
As usual with me, I am already onto what to write next, and I have two ideas, both returning us to the Clearwater world.

The first would be another set of Clearwater Tales, as requested in my Facebook group the other day. I’ve asked members of the group to suggest who they might like to see appear telling short stories, and I am building a list. No promises! The other idea, and this has only just started bubbling, is to start another series with the series title of the Merrit Brothers Mysteries, or similar. This would be set 10 years ahead of the last Jack Merrit story, starting in 1904, but it’s very early days yet, and I am still waiting for that surge of barely controllable inspiration to land on the desk, so we will see.

Meanwhile…
I have a few promos this month, and two starting later in the month, which I will announce and also put into next month’s newsletter when there will be more talk about my next project. There may even be a free giveaway; I am still working on that. You can subscribe to the newsletter here.

If you’re currently looking for detective stories, though, you can check out the 34 titles in this collection of varied detective stories.

Detective Fiction
Genres: Mystery & Suspense, British Detectives, Crime, Suspense, Thriller

https://books.bookfunnel.com/detectivefictionoct26/nyvziw62qv

Journeyman Joe – Coming Soon

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Good morning.

The news this week is that I am on my last read-through of ‘Journeyman Joe.’ I hope to have this book published for you within the next two weeks. To whet your appetite, here is the blurb and a moving cover I had a machine make for me. (Click play.) This isn’t based on the actual cover (we are still tweaking that), but it reflects a scene from the book.

Spring 1895.

As London is gripped by the scandalous trials of Oscar Wilde, a blacksmith’s apprentice in a parochial Kent village is fighting a much quieter, lonelier battle.

Joe Webster is desperate to escape the suffocating expectations of his family and his village. The only way out is to free himself of his indenture, which he can only do by becoming a journeyman. To do that, he must forge a new casket for the church, include a secret compartment, and swear an oath of absolute silence.

Joe is lost for inspiration until the archdeacon’s office sends the handsome and erudite historian, Harvey Cade, to inspect the parish records. As Harvey investigates a historical mystery, Joe realises what he needs to succeed: The forbidden love Harvey offers.

But navigating a double life under the watchful eyes of the village is a dangerous game. In the shadow of Oscar Wilde’s ruin, a single slip could cost them everything.

When the casket’s secret threatens to publicly expose them both, Joe must choose: Protect the truth he was sworn to hide, or protect the man he loves.

The monthly newsletter is out today with a featured book, some more news, and a couple of promo lists of detective and mystery novels on offer.

If you want to keep up to date with what’s going on in the world of Jackson Marsh, keep an eye on this site, subscribe to the newsletter, and keep watch on my Facebook page:
https://www.facebook.com/jacksonmarshauthor

Jackson’s Amazon Author Page
You can also see the full catalogue of novels on my author page.
https://www.amazon.com/stores/Jackson-Marsh/author/B077LDT5ZL/

Lonely House: a Re-release of a James Collins Horror

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A Cabin in the Woods Horror Story

Something different today. I have been working on a rerelease of a novel I wrote when I was starting out (2015). Actually, I wrote my first ‘novel’ when I was 16 or 17, spending evenings at the desk in my bedroom inventing a story that I wanted to happen to me, writing longhand, and producing absolute drivel. I hope I’ve improved since then, and I certainly didn’t write ‘Lonely House’ wanting the events depicted to happen to me.

This story came about when I was writing for a small film company that wanted to produce a low-budget film. Low budget, in this case, was around £20,000 for the entire budget. They wanted one location, a small cast, and lots of horror. The cast of this novel numbers six, and there is, apart from flashbacks, only one location. It’s a classic ‘cabin in the woods’ scenario: a single house surrounded by a forest, and miles from anywhere. Yup. A classic cliché on which such horror films are built. However, there had to be something different about it, and so I came up with my two main characters.

Two young drifters, bound by a strange friendship and a terrible secret, with one being a criminal and the other an easily led younger chap who everyone thinks is ‘special’ or ‘slow.’ An accident in the lonely house leads to the unravelling of the horror, which only gets worse when the twists start and the past is revealed. Today, I wanted to point you towards Lonely House, which you can get on Amazon (KU, paperback, Kindle). Follow this link if you dare: https://mybook.to/LonelyHouse

How much horror can one friendship take?

Drover and Pete are two hopeful drifters looking for a better life. Desperate for food, they break into an isolated house deep in a forest. There, they accidentally shoot an old man just as the rest of his family arrive for a birthday gathering.

Under intense suspicion from the family, the boys attempt to cover up the accident. But they are not the only ones keeping a murderous secret. Mistrust and deception unearth a primaeval ritual as the lies give way to a terrifying truth.

With time running out and a deadly force closing in, Drover and Pete’s survival rests on the strength of their friendship, but they must face some horrific choices in order to stay alive.

I should warn you, though, that I am not one for peppering my blurbs and info with trigger warnings. The fact that you are in the horror section, reading a blurb about a horror novel, should be enough to tell you you’re in for some disturbing descriptions.
You’re also in for a book that is written in the style of a film treatment, though much fleshed out and, after a recent edit, I hope, better than the original. It is not my usual Jackson Marsh style, because I wrote it before Jackson was born; it’s set in the present day, and… Well, you will see. It is still me, though. As for the original film idea… In the end, the production company went for another of my stories, The Judas Inheritance, which is set on the island where I live. The production went ahead, and they spent their 20k on getting everyone here, filming, falling out, and putting together something that resembled my story in no way whatsoever – but that’s another story for another day.

Monthly Newsletter

The monthly newsletter with other news and book promotions will be out next Saturday, so make sure you have signed up for it. You can do that at the top of this page.