kdavies

Feb 25 2025

RELEASE DAY!

Where There’s A Blade is here! Go buy it, and if you’ve already bought it, why are you reading this? Go read it!

Can you tell I’m excited? Well, perhaps excited isn’t the right word. Extrepidatious? Nervecited? Something like that.

Anywho. Here it is, the sixth installment of The Chronicles of Breed is now LIVE! Go and feast your eyes on what they are saying is the most bookish book since the last book you read.

Get a copy of ‘Where There’s A Blade’!

When you’ve read it lemme know what you think. Drop me a line, write your comments below, or scrawl it on the walls of your cell, whichever you fancy.

Adios,

Feb 14 2025

“The Time Has Come,” The Warspawn Said…

How’s your February going? As you may have noticed, January felt like it was made entirely of Sundays and the colour grey. So far, a few Mondays have been sprinkled through February, and the great ball of fire in the sky has made an occasional appearance.

Some of you might be getting ready to slap on the Dapper Dan pomade and buy your beloved other halfsies a bunch of flowers. Some of you might also be breaking out the blankies and headphones in preparation for Hallmark Day. To each their own—I do not judge. Because I will take almost any excuse to drink wine and eat good food I will be celebrating.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot. Breed Six, AKA Where There’s a Blade, will be released on the 25th of this month.

It’s a big beast—the longest Breed novel evah at 130,000 words, and most of them aren’t ‘fuck.’ Not gonna lie, though—a fair few of them are.

Anyway, there you go. You can beat the rush and any impending ink shortages by pre-ordering my magnum hopeless here…

Click Here, Right Here

(Kindle Version Only, Paperback releases on 25th)

If any of you have any questions about anything to do with Breed, or writin’ stuff, feel free to get in touch.

Muchas gracias, amigos*

*Why Spanish? Why not?

Dec 09 2024

130 Thousand Reasons I Am Happy, Sad, and Knackered

The novel is finished*, It is now with my lovely editor, who will sort out my crappy grammar. It is 130 thousand words of Breedful shenanigans, give or take a few hundred words of malarky. I hope you’ve lubed up your eyeballs and given your wrists a good workout because this is one hefty tome.

It will be out in February. “February!?!” I hear you cry. “Why February?”

Welp, mes amis, December and January are some of the worst months to release a book. Everyone is either liquored up and full of pie or crying because they got liquored up and ate too much pie—but that might just be me.

As well as release dates being a factor, there’s also all the technical ‘stuff’ to sign off on but that’s not my department.

What is my department is the dreaded ‘back matter’ or ‘back blurb’ or ‘back cover copy’ or ‘the demented hellscrawl of a mad person.’

Now, I have a slightly unorthodox theory with regard the issue of ‘back blurbs.’ Go with me on this. If you’ve read up to book five, you’re likely to read book six. You’re invested, interested, even morbidly curious—whatever, you’re in. Am I right?

But oh no. Apparently, that isn’t how it works. I am told that no matter where it comes in a series, a book needs ‘back matter,’ and apparently, I have to write it.

Ask any writer, and when they’ve finished begging you for beer money, they will tell you that the absolute worst part of writing a book is coming up with the back cover copy. You have to reduce the wonder of your creation—the ins and outs, the cuts and thrusts, the convoluted and downright curious twists and turns—to a paragraph and make it snappy. It’s harder than trying to explain blockchain to a chicken.

Also, by this point, all the words have been used up. After typing ‘The End,’ the poor writer emerges from their pit and wanders around, blinking in the harsh light of day, grunting and scrubbing ineffectually at the food stains on their filthy jimjams while plucking lice from their unkempt hair.**

You are in this weird ‘just finished a novel’ headspace. You’re full of feelings, mostly hunger and exhaustion, when some editorial assistant*** demands you find more words for the back matter and that they are brilliant enough to make everyone who sees them want to read the dang book or go on a holy pilgrimage. “Either or will be fine.”

I hates it, I does. Did that come across?

So, anyway, there you have it, my manifesto on why back matter should be banned and news that the story is finished. It will come out in February, there will be a preorder, there may even be a quiz. I will let you know when dates are finalized.

All that remains is to wish each and every one of you lovely peeps a fantastic Christmas and/or an awesome Midwinter Feast.

*The novel is never finished; it is relinquished, but it can always, always be improved or entirely rewritten.
**Okay, my hair—I mean me.
***The jumped-up eville minion of dark and eville gods.

Jul 31 2024

Surviving the Heatwave: KT’s Sweaty Summer Chronicles

Evening folks,

Hot innit? Too dang hot for me, anyway. Not that I love the cold, but the thing about the cold is you can put layers on. Summer is different. Apparently working nekkid is ‘frowned upon’ and ‘a bit much’ according to my nan who dropped in unexpectedly the other week.

Aaanyway, now I have an ankle tag.

Only joking. I do have a state of the art… for 1990, Colde Ayre Blewer or ‘electric fan’ as the kids are calling them these days. It’s almost entirely useless, akin to having someone who smokes fifty a day blow raspberries at me while they’re running a marathon.

As in previous weeks, my life is editing in my dark office, now with extra sweat. I’ve had to banish the dogs because it is too hot to be confined in a smol room with a panting, farting critter or so they said via their speak ‘n’ spell buttons. What can I say? Everyone’s a critic.

When evening falls, I emerge from my den like a bog eyed Morlock and take the hounds for a walk before hitting the sack and watching rubbish tv. I think you’ll agree, life doesn’t get wilder than this.

I am however closing in on completing the second draft of Breed 6.

I find the second draft to be the hardest. (I would say that wouldn’t I?) This is the version where I attempt to dig out the story I’ve buried under a mountain of possible subplots and extraneous words.

Like a diamond ring that I’ve dropped in a cess pit, I know it’s in there, I just have to hold my nose and wade into the muck. It’s quite technical, especially for someone whose brain is literally boiling in its own cerebrospinal juice.

What I wrote in the heat of the moment I have to take apart and rebuild. I won’t bore you with the details, suffice it to say the manuscript has grown despite redundant storylines being removed. It’s like magic without the rabbits.

I’m currently working on Chapter Thirty, which is about seven from ‘The End’ but that might change.

While we’re all waiting for the next exciting instalment of ‘KT’s Die in Hot Offices’, here’s a survey– a chance to get to know a little more about you like your bank details, mother’s maiden name, first pet that kind of thing*. Feel free to ignore, but don’t, but if you want to you can, obviously…

TTFN

*Not really. I know if you read my stuff you’re bright enough to know that, but just in case a rando got in here by accident, let me assure you, I am too thick and too scared of them prison daddies to commit fraud.

There are some free book and sales promotions below. You may find something you like in them.

Free Books and Stories Here

Find your next dragon-centric story here.

Fantasy and Sci-Fi Wrath Month – Free Reads

Jun 30 2024

Working Around the Clock

Hi there,

Hope you are all well.

Life has been pretty hectic this month. I am spending every waking hour editing Breed 6 from the joyful chaos of first draft into a far more polished, coherent tale.

Hours pass as I pour over the manuscript, improving prose, tweaking dialogue, and sometimes removing scenes, characters, and story arcs altogether. Its really quite exhausting.

And then there’s the real world, with its usual chores and a party that I agreed to hold for someone, which took DAYS to prepare.

Oh, yes. Occasionally I sleep as well.

All this is a long winded way of saying that I don’t have much to share with you this month.

My work is in a couple of promotions though. I hope you find something you like amongst the other books there. If you do please let me know. At some point soon I hope to have some free time in which to read, and I am always on the lookout for a good book.

Now, back to the editing.

Until next time,