Why I Wrote “Memory of Water”

It’s no secret Body of Water was intended to be a stand-alone story, so why write Memory of Water?

I drafted Body of Water during National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) back in November 2009 and, the morning I was due to take part in an interview with BBC Radio about 2010’s NaNoWriMo, I fully intended to draft a science fiction novel.

I made a conscious decision to leave some threads hanging at the end of Body of Water, not because I’d planned a sequel but I reasoned that, if I didn’t have all the answers in my own life, why should Leven? Are all the mysteries in life investigated and solved? Do you know everyone’s motivations? Do you even understand your own?

I doubt it.

However, one question nagged at me and that was what happened to Shaun? He was there one minute, gone the next, and glimpsed only once from then on. Many readers didn’t like Shaun because he abandoned Leven, but I believe there are always two sides to every story and often found myself thinking about his background and his future.

By the time the BBC Radio interview was in progress, I was asked what I’d be writing next and, without hesitation, I replied I’d be writing the sequel to Body of Water…

…and I did.

I’m now 100 pages into editing 179 printed pages of Memory of Water, and it’s on schedule to be released as an eBook at the end of August, with the print version following soon after.

If you’ve already read Body of Water, you’ll find yourself getting to know the familiar faces much better as well as discovering some surprising new things about those you’ve only glimpsed.

I look forward to sharing it with you very soon.