Dito Abbott

New Stamp Day! With every new book in the series, I design new rubber stamps specific to the story for book packaging. Stoked with how these guys came out.

As always, the stamps make more sense when you’ve read the novel. The lady at the stamp shop had a lot of questions for me.

Thanks very much!

Halloween is a US-thing, but a few houses in Christchurch gave out candy. Grateful for a rad night with my ladies.

Z was Dr. Who. J was Mira from KPDH. I was Temu Spider-Man.

I don’t have firm release date because my beta readers are still working, but I’m aiming for somewhere around the second week of November. Thanks for asking!

Cover reveal for “Thugwallop; Volume Two of the Terravenum Chronicles”!

It's late and I'm going to bed, but I just want to say that today I saw the first draft of Thugwallop's cover and y'all aren't ready. Stoked.

I love following along on maps as I read. For Debunked, I drew a full Terravenum world map. For my follow up novel, Thugwallop, I wanted to zoom in for a close-up view of places in the story, including Easter eggs.

There's going to be a lot of coffee-staining in the near future!

Formatting an interior map for Thugwallop. I'm always surprised at how much I need to pump the contrast up to look good in print.

The Terravenum world map took me a year to illustrate, but it's proved one of the most important creative efforts I've ever done.

Illustrating more potential cover art for Thugwallop. When I originally conceived of the Spires of Dubious Wisdom, the hermits lived in outhouse-sized shacks. When I wrote the scenes, I discovered they have a lot more room (and possibly hot tubs?).

Editors have given me the green light to announce Book Two is titled: “Thugwallop”.

If that changes, this conversation never happened.

Finishing up artwork assets for Thugwallop’s cover. This is “Delver’, a submersible who plays a role in the story. Designed with a puffer fish in mind.

Alpha readers are editing Book Two. I've already made a bunch of touch-ups, per my wife's suggestions. She has this strange need for stories to "make sense" and "be coherent".
Pshh. Whatever.

Meanwhile, I'm working on back matter for the book. Specifically, a character and terms glossary.

The title of this book alone earns a re-post.

It turns out I accidentally wrote two books instead of one. Book Two is out to alpha readers now (I need to add a few chapters to Book Three)!

My daughter is reading it and her gentle encouragements soothe my bruised ego.

Confession: When I spell the word "queue", I just close my eyes and hope for the best.

Another word I hit with momentum so I don't end up questioning my sanity:
"occasionally"

Word that used to trip me up, but now I'm freaking amazing at spelling: "Annihilator".

We’re celebrating our 200th (!!!) episode by talking about one of @lillyscribe.bsky.social’s favorite books: THE GREAT GATSBY by F. Scott Fitzgerald, featuring special guest @krystlematar.bsky.social !

Listen to our (very long) conversation here: linktr.ee/fictionfanspod

#booksky 💙📚

Thanks for the offer! I've got a long way to go before I'm in that phase, and I'm trying a new editing process with this book. I appreciate the interest, though:)

First draft of Book 2 is DONE at 149,113 words!

Book 1 started at 134,000 and ended at 104,500.

My goal is to have this book ready when I fly to the USA for a mini-tour in November. There's a lot of work in front of me. Revisions, beta readers, cover art, ARCs, and formatting. Time to level up.

Stumbled across the greatest Free Little (it's bigger on the inside) Library ever today in Hamner Springs.

Checked my author dashboard and was delighted that a 10 year old and 44 year old both enjoyed Debunked.

Crossed 140,000 words on Book 2 today. Rounding third base and ready to slide into the basket for a touchdown. Did I sports right? Flying V! Knuckle Puck!

Ten years ago, I wrote:

100% of chimichangas are ordered because people want to say the word "chimichanga".

This has never been more true than it is today.

Woohoo! Thanks for the shout out, Tam:) You'll always occupy a special place in my Live Event heart. My first show and I lucked out with a wonderful neighbor:)

Me, at the start of every writing session: "Ugh, this is getting too complicated. No more POVs."

Me, five minutes later: "This washer woman's story MUST be told!"

Raptor in the Australia Museum. If I were in charge of posing an exhibit, I would make the raptor look as inept a hunter as possible, too.

Referencing clutz raptors is my secret Writing Side Quest. Did Garrillus the Unread lose money investing in a clutz raptor racing league? Why, yes he did.

Reader art!

I love seeing how my characters look in other people’s minds. I try to leave room in my descriptions for readers to fill in the blanks. Nikos did an incredible job with Pascal and Layla.

He is writing and illustrating his own book, too, when he isn’t busy making my day. Cheers!

ACX invitation to create AI audiobook

Making audiobooks is hard work and expensive. I recorded my entire first book and haven't edited a second of it because the process burnt me out.

But holy smokes, I'm sick of AI. No thanks, ACX. Maybe someday as a cheap version AFTER I release a human one.

Terry didn't just astound me with his voice. He challenged me with his mind.
Granny Weatherwax and Mightily Oats arguing about faith.
Death, temporarily mortal, lamenting the passage of time.
Vimes' theory of socioeconomic unfairness.
Every story a life lesson.
Legend.

Cheers!

Stoked with how these posters came out! Poster Ninja did a fantastic job.

As an experiment, compared heavy card stock and a fascinating synthetic metallic paper. Ended up liking them both for different reasons (metallic paper has smoooooooth color gradient, card stock feels lovely in fingers).

In USA for the first time in a year. Here for 2 weeks before heading back to NZ, so hitting important stuff.

1. Carnitas tortas.

2. Barro’s Italian sausage pizza This was number one flavor I imagined on ocean passages

3. My sister’s neighbor built a Mad Max-style hotrod. Yeah.

In middle school, I filled entire binders with spaceship armadas. I loved making up stats and purposes for each vessel, imagining how they would fit into their fleet.

Little Dito would be stoked out of his zero-gravity-loving mind about projects I’m currently working on.