I’ve been scratching my head for some time now as to what to do about Ingleby, the fictitious town where 3 of my novels are based. Those novels, of course, being:

The Ghost of Lenton Wattingham

Mutch Wants Moor

Vole

If you haven’t read them yet then I would urge you to do so at the earliest possible convenience. They’re all full of dark humour and are thumping good reads that take an introspective look at the seedier side of life.

So why have I been scratching my head?

In short, I think the Ingleby novels have run out of steam. Or is it me that’s run out of steam for the Ingleby novels? May I beg a few moments of your time whilst I elaborate? Thank you.

When I independently published my first novel – Ah Boy! – in 2019 I had already got the plan for a full series of books starring the central character, Joe Wilkie. But at the time, I didn’t want to pigeonhole myself and just write in one particular style and felt it best to branch out into other literary worlds. That’s when the idea for Ingleby came about.

I saw my writing career going as thus – A Blessham/Joe Wilkie novel followed by an Ingleby novel and repeat the cycle.

The thing is, as time has progressed and with my development as a writer, I’m just not “feeling” the Ingleby thing anymore. Don’t get me wrong, I’m as proud as a peacock with those three books and many people have told me how they think Mutch Wants Moor is the best book I’ve written to date and I’m somewhat inclined to agree.

However, I had begun work on another Ingleby novel over two years ago. It was the follow up to Mutch Wants Moor featuring the adorable Archie and Aggie Stone and their canal boat Orca. I had actually got 15 chapters into it and for some reason, which I can’t fully explain, I just stalled. Came to an abrupt halt. I didn’t know where to go with it. I’d driven it down a literary cul-de-sac and couldn’t turn around.

Here’s what I think happened.

Over the last 6 years of being an independent author, I’ve come to realise that Joe Wilkie and the village of Blessham is where I’m happiest writing about. I think Joe has really developed into such a well-rounded character and those stories are so much fun to write. To be honest with you, I wasn’t having very much fun with that abandoned Ingleby novel.

I’m firmly entrenched in that particular camp that says if you don’t enjoy writing then you shouldn’t really be doing it in the first place. And I wasn’t enjoying writing that one. It just didn’t have the same flair, pace and joie de vivre that its predecessor had and I was finding it hard to recapture all that.

Henceforth, I shelved it and turned my focus back onto Blessham. Note the word “shelved” in that sentence; I’m a firm believer in the phrase “Never say never.” It may come to fruition at some point in the future. But for now, it remains unfinished.

I’m now a mere 4 chapters from finishing the first draft of the new Blessham novel and I am having a mountain of fun in doing so. I swear I haven’t enjoyed writing this much since The Pheasants Revolt, back in 2020/21. My imagination is running more riotous than a large group of poll tax protesters and ideas are just tumbling out of me like last nights kebab. I’m having a blast.

Also, and I’m sorry if this sounds like bragging, but I’ve been gifted a new computer by my amazing and generous in-laws the Morgan Family. It’s an absolute beast of a machine which was formerly used for gaming so you can probably guess how powerful and fast it is. I love my old laptop and it served me well for 11 years but it’s starting to show it’s age a little (like all of us) and running rather slow and I think it’s time to retire the old girl.

This new machine though is so fast and efficient that I can write around 1300 words an hour or more. Something I couldn’t do on Propane Elaine (my laptop’s name, don’t ask).

So, here’s where I’m now at. The Ingleby novels will henceforth become the Ingleby Trilogy until such times as I return to them in the dim and distant future. I’m going to focus the bulk of my attention on getting some more Wilkie books written so that there is a lengthy series for readers to immerse themselves in and I desperately need to be so much more proactive and creative with the marketing of my books as well. I don’t invest anywhere near enough time in doing that.

And I think my books are well worth promoting.

I also have a couple of other irons in the fire, one of which is an anthology of my non-novel scribblings from this blog and Substack etc and there’s a new character I’ve been playing about with in my head which I’m slowly developing for when I eventually do need to take a break from Blessham, which is bound to happen at some point.

So sincere apologies if you prefer my Ingleby books. Like I said, I most likely will return to that townful of reprobates at some point in the future, but for my own career’s sake I need to focus on Mr Wilkie and Co for now.