Hello,

This was a post I considered making back at the end of September when I lost an entire month in my timeline for working on The Ravyn’s Words due to illness and a bereavement, but at the time while busy I still had a clear schedule.

However, the situation has changed – particularly with work which has become untenable at this point. Covid hit our team hard, we had a lot of older volunteers and between concerns about covid and the long months of lockdown many of them decided to retire – which is more than fair and, it means that we’re operating at bare minimum capacity and they just keep removing resources one after the other, while expecting us to do more and more – and in the busiest period as well. I will be leaving as soon as I find another job – which has increased the pressure on doing job applications, and while I am hoping to do this without relocating I haven’t taken it off the table although I love where I live.

This along with some other personal stuff – including another bereavement in October, has meant that while I’ve been working away on getting the book ready for publication, the stress has been building up and this past week it has manifested with exhaustion and being generally unwell. This has the knock on of slowing everything down because I’m so tired, and I’m at the point where it’s also making me struggle with my dyslexia more than normal and I can see myself making more mistakes.

To top of the general chaos and mess that life is at the moment, I’ve also had it confirmed this week that I now also have arthritis in my right hip in addition to both knees. While it’s nice to know why I’ve been in additional pain for the last few months, it still sucks – and is another reason for moving up the timeline for looking for a new job, as my current one is very physically demanding and my pain levels are starting to get unbearable more often. It has also made sitting down to work more difficult.

I could possibly press through to meet the deadline, but it would be incredibly close, it would be compounding current issues and ultimately more mistakes will be made. I love this book with all my heart, and I want to do it justice – but something is going to break, and I would rather it wasn’t me. So, I am going to take the extra time, have a rest for a few days and then finish the last bits with a fresh mind and hopefully a little less stress.

I want to say a massive thank you to everyone who has cheered me on, pre-ordered The Ravyn’s Words and made the stress a bit more bearable, and I wanted to do this post before changing the date. I will be updating on KDP tomorrow to reflect this change. At present I am looking at the 28th December as the new release date, as I do not want to clash with some other books that are coming out at that time that I want to shout about.

Aside from a review later today and one tomorrow which is part of a blog tour, the blog will be quiet this week as I take a break, work on job applications and try and just breathe.

Rowena