Summer’s here
And there we have it. Another book finished. Three books are now complete, all at various stages of development. Coming up, we have the third Coco book, the second prequel trilogy and HDI book 12. Each is very different but yet all the same in one way or another. I’ll write more about each of them as their publication draws nearer, but in the meantime, I’ll give you a little sneak peek:
‘Cercueils en Spirale’ sees the return of our fearless and challenging Parisian flic, Charlotte “Coco” Brunhild. Coco is a joy to write, not that Hugo isn’t, but she is refreshing and I’m never quite sure what she is going to say or do next, no matter how much I try to plan it! This is a really interesting little self-contained story, beginning with the rather odd discovery of three ancient coffins discovered in a building that is about to be demolished. In the course of the investigation, Coco finds herself investigating a monastery where a rather fetching young monk catches her eye. It is as inappropriate as you might imagine with a Coco story and a lot of fun. Oh, and of course, there’s a murder or two to solve. All being well, CES will be yours in September 2022. If you’d like to read the first chapter, you can here. Let me know what you think!
Next up is ‘Club Vidéo,’ the second in the Hugo Duchamp prequel trilogy. Set a year after the explosive events of ‘Hugo & Josef’ the story begins with a downtrodden Hugo walking into a brand new mystery involving the disappearance of a young local woman. Still reeling from the loss of Josef, Hugo walks (literally) right into a new young man called Ezra. This one was interesting to write. Anyone who has read the Hugo books will know that as an adult he is clearly damaged by what happened to him in his youth, so of course, that informed in what I could (and couldn’t do) with the prequels. I think CV will go some way to explain why he became the man he did.
‘Chemin de Compostelle,’ the 12th in the HDI series is a book I’ve been trying to write for a long time. I first had the idea of a murder mystery along the famous religious pilgrimage Camino walk to Santiago that winds its way through France and Spain many years ago. However, it just wasn’t easy to get onto paper. How do you have a murder mystery while people are walking? It took me a while to figure out the logistics of it all, but I think I got there in the end. I’ll talk more about this soon.
Oh, BTW, a lot of people have asked about how the books deal with a new COVID world, and the truth is they don’t. At the very beginning I decided the best approach would be to give it a wide birth. There was a myriad of reasons, some practical and the truth was I didn’t want to get bogged down with the logistics of having a murder mystery while having to bring the whole pandemic into it. But mainly the reason was I have known people with COVID and I know people who sadly died from it, so I just didn’t want to bring it into these books. Better to hope it never touched the world of Montgenoux? I think so.
Anyway, I hope all is well with you, talk more soon!
Lots of love as always.
GX