Out of the blue: a new Halloween tale

I’m working on a new and unexpected story. I’m sure there are authors who schedule what they’re going to write when and actually stick to it, but I don’t seem to be one of them.

You see, I went on a Heritage Open Day earlier this month. Well, I went on a few, but this one’s significant. It was a tour of a former police station which is reputed to be haunted. How could I turn that down when it came knocking at my door?

Let’s just say that the cogs were whirring in my little brain as we walked around. I made notes on my phone and took some pictures. The next day, I did a bit of research and jotted down some plot points for a 10-15K story. So far, so good.

The day after, I put my trainers on and made a start on the actual writing (for anyone new here, I dictate first drafts into my phone while I’m out on a walk).

I came back and was slightly disappointed to discover that I had 1100ish words, which was less than I’d hoped. Then I realised that I hadn’t got to the first plot point yet.

To cut a long(ish) story short, a week later I’m approaching the halfway point of the story. The novelette I had in mind is now going to be a novella. I’m estimating 25-30,000 words in total. And I have a feeling it could be the first of a series.

I didn’t expect to come back from a heritage open day with a whole new concept. But here we are. 

There were several favourable circumstances:

• I’m currently between books and for a couple of reasons, I have a little wait before I can start the next one. So a medium-length project is just the thing to keep me busy.
• I often write a new story for Halloween (e.g. my Halloween Sherlock series), so I’m used to gathering myself together and leaping into a short story at this time of year.
• A couple of years ago I sidestepped out of my comfort zone into a slightly different sub-genre – and while I was completely unsure what readers would think, they liked it. So I was willing to take another sidestep and see what happened.
• How often do a setting and a starter idea fall into your lap? I was worried that if I didn’t grab them, someone else would!

I’m aiming to get the story out in time for Halloween (yes, really) – wish me luck!

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The featured image, “The Illusionist!!!” by Fountain_Head, is licensed under CC BY 2.0.

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