Playing around with character art
As part of re-releasing The Rephaim series in Australia and New Zealand, I’ve been playing around with character art to keep my promos interesting.
I don’t use AI for any form of written content generation, but I’ll confess I’m mildly addicted to the image generation function (which can be hit and miss – and some of the misses are hilarious). And even then, I’m only using it for social media. (I’ll blog separately on my thoughts on generative AI.)
What do you think of these? Any requests for scenes/moments/quotes out of any of the books?
Reflecting on a decade since The Rephaim series
This year, it’s 10 years since Burn, the fourth book in The Rephaim series, came out in Australia and New Zealand.
These books changed my life. Not in a throw-in-my-day-job kind of way, but in the way it enriched my life as an author. After many years of writing novels and amassing a daunting rejection pile, I was finally in print and connected to an audience. That meant writers’ festivals, school visits, meeting other authors and – best of all – interacting with readers.
It was awesome.
From 2012 to 2017, I had a blast – the four books of The Rephaim series came out, were on-sold to the US and UK and I followed it up with a stand-alone near-future thriller, The Undercurrent. It was my most critically successful novel , and I found new readers, but the fans who loved The Rephaim mostly didn’t embrace it (perhaps because Rafa wasn’t in it?).
That was seven years ago and I haven’t had a book published since. I haven’t stopped writing: a contemporary thriller a few years ago and, most recently, the first two books of a new fantasy trilogy. Granted, the thriller was not my best work. I wrote it in the final year of my mum’s life and it was a more of a distraction than a passion project. But the fantasy series is the one I was working on before The Rephaim, and I’m deeply invested. It’s in a very different shape to what it was a decade ago and I think it’s some of my best work.
The Rephaim books have always been close to my heart. I started writing Shadows to entertain myself after a near-miss publishing deal and – as naff as this sounds – I still enjoy reading the series. So, when the books were close to being out of print in Australia, my agent and I reached out to Text Publishing to see if I could get the local rights back. Text Publishing, to whom I’ll always be grateful for taking a chance on me, agreed to the request.
That happened in February this year and I’ve been on a very steep learning curve ever since as I’ve embarked on re-releasing them myself. I’ll blog more on that in coming weeks.
In the meantime, the new 10th anniversary editions of each of The Rephaim books are now available on Amazon Kindle. The new edition print versions (via Amazon and bricks-and-mortar stores in Australia/New Zealand) are not far away and ebooks on other platforms will follow later in the year. All other versions internationally are still available through the usual channels.
What’s particularly special about these new local editions is that the new covers feature original artwork by my talented brother-in-law (and watercolourist) Tony Weston and designs by my talented bestie (and graphic designer) Heather Scott.
I’m hoping the books can have a new lease on life and reach new audiences. Being back in this space has reminded how much I love my creative life – with all its ups, downs, frustrations and triumphs. I’m in the infancy of managing every aspect of publishing a book series myself, of course, and I’m leaning on the wisdom of many who have gone before me – not the least being Ellie Marney and Kirsty Eagar.
Meanwhile…
Meanwhile, the new fantasy trilogy is taking shape, I finally have thoughts on how to step back into the world of The Rephaim, and the TV option in Canada for Shadows is still live.
I’m cautiously optimistic about the future.
But whatever happens, I’ll keep writing.
I’m still here…
Although I’d understand if you lost interest in this blog long ago.
It’s been five years since my last post. I’m keen to get blogging again on a semi-regular basis, and thought I’d start with an update on where I’m at in life and writing.
Life
My last post was in 2017, when The Undercurrent launched. At that point, I’d lost my brother Steve a few days before the launch, barely two years after losing my dad, and my mum had been diagnosed with dementia.
The years that followed were full of ups and downs. I spent a lot of time with my mum, grateful for every day she remembered me. When my dad passed, it was quick and sudden. The last weeks of my mum’s life were the opposite. Both experiences were terrible, and each changed me in profound ways I’m still grappling with.
In happier news, a year later, my husband and I bought a 160-year-old cottage on a couple of acres in the Scenic Rim, an hour south-west of Brisbane. It’s been life-changing in all the right ways. Beautiful scenery, welcoming people, a sense of community, and a re-connection with life away from a digital screen. Our cottage is small, but my life is bigger in ways I’d forgotten I needed.
Writing
If you follow my author account on Facebook, you possibly saw I’ve had two pieces of news about The Rephaim series this year.
Screen rights
In March, Sarah Kelley – a lovely and talented Canadian actress and screenwriter – bought the rights to adapt Shadows into a film (update August 2023: Sarah is now well advanced in adapting Shadows into a TV pilot). Sarah is from Algonquins of Pikwakanagan in Golden Lake, Ontario.
It’s an exciting opportunity for Gaby, Rafa and company. It’s a long road from print to screen, and this is an important first step. The process from here is for Sarah to adapt the book into a screenplay and then find a production company to bring it to the screen.
I’m so grateful to Sarah for loving The Rephaim characters enough to want to adapt the first novel in the series, knowing how many of her own projects she has going on. (This year alone, her short film Good Grief has won a stack of Canadian and international awards (she wrote, directed and starred in it), and she’s also been busy acting, and had another of her screenplays optioned.)
The Rephaim are in Poland!
In September, a Polish language edition of Shadows was released in Poland (print, e-book and audio). Interestingly, it’s been released as an adult book (rather than YA), and has so far been well received by Polish book bloggers.
The Instagram posts have been stunning.
Current project
After The Undercurrent came out in 2017, I spent a couple of years working on a stand-alone contemporary adult thriller, for a change of pace. I wrote it during an intense time in my life, so maybe it’s no surprise it didn’t find a publishing home.
And then I did something I should have done a while ago: returned to the fantasy series I’d been working on before The Rephaim. I had the first book drafted, as well as a few chapters of the second book, so I figured it would simply be a case of tightening up the line, giving it a polish, and writing the rest.
Wrong.
After working with editors on five published books, I’m not only a better writer, I’m also a better storyteller and have a stronger sense of the type of story I want to tell with this group of characters and the world I’ve created for them.
So, I’ve spent the last two years completely re-working the first book (the story is essentially the same but the characters are more nuanced and the world-building much richer) and am about a third of the way into the second book. I also have a completely new direction for the third than what I’d originally planned.
For the first time in a long while, I’m excited about writing. I’ve been doing a lot of fun research, in particular learning more about the middle ages, sword play and Greek myths.
The story will take three books to tell. Fingers crossed the trilogy finds a home.
A few photos from the Burn launch
As you’ll see from the photos below, I had an awesome night when Marianne de Pierres and I launched Burn at Riverbend Books in Bulimba with another of our annual chats.
We had a great crowd and the buzz was fantastic. Thank you again to Marianne, the team at Riverbend Books (especially Vicky, Pauline and Lachlan), Text Publishing (especially Steph Speight), and everyone who came along and made it such a great night.
And I got to meet fellow Brisbane writer Christine Bongers 🙂
Some more shots from the night:
First look at Burn (Rephaim #4): a teaser
It’s only a month now until Burn – the fourth and final instalment in The Rephaim series – is released in Australia and New Zealand (24 June 2015 – release dates for other parts of the world are below).
Hard to believe we’ve come to the end already.
I’ve had quite a few requests for a teaser, so…here it is! (Click on link or thumbnail)
Back cover blurb:
Gaby remembers everything.
For a year she believed she was a backpacker chilling out in Pandanus Beach. Working at the library. Getting over the accident that killed her twin brother.
Then Rafa came to find her and Gaby discovered her true identity as Gabe: one of the Rephaim. Over a hundred years old. Half angel, half human, all demon-smiting badass—and hopelessly attracted to the infuriating Rafa.
Now she knows who faked her memories, and how—and why it’s all hurtling towards a massive showdown between the forces of heaven and hell.
More importantly, she remembers why she’s spent the last ten years wanting to seriously hurt Rafa.
Australia/New Zealand: 24 June 2015 (Text Publishing)
United Kingdom: 5 August 2015 (Orion – Indigo Books)
US/Canada: 7 June 2016 (Tundra Books/Random House Canada)
Everywhere else (English language): check your local book stores or try Amazon (for hard copy and kindle editions) (Orion – Indigo Books)
