It’s 2061 when a young scientist invents a time machine to fix a tragedy in his past, and the Extracted trilogy begins. But his good intentions turn catastrophic when an early test reveals something unexpected: the end of the world. A desperate plan is formed to recruit three heroes – Ben, Safa and Harry - ordinary humans capable of extraordinary things, but from dramatically different eras. Can they really change the future and save the world? (Does the world even believe it’s in danger?) With governments pursuing them relentlessly, attempting to steal the time-travel device to use for their own ends, and a new leader Miri - who has motives of her own - the heroes are on the run, fighting for survival in a world they’re supposed to save. Now in Extinct, the epic conclusion to the trilogy, it seems the end of the world has been avoided, for the moment…
With Miri and her team of heroes still on the run, Mother - the disgraced former head of the British Secret Service - has other ideas… While Mother retreats to her bunker to plot her next move, Miri, Ben, Safa and Harry travel far into the future to ensure that they have prevented the apocalypse. But what they find just doesn’t make sense. London in 2111 is on the brink of annihilation. What’s more, the timelines have been twisted. Folded in on each other. It’s hard to keep track of who is where. Or, more accurately, who is when. The clock is ticking for them all. With nothing left to lose but life itself, our heroes must stop Mother—or die trying….
I'm delighted to be hosting the blog tour for Extinct by RR Haywood today. Extinct is the third book in the Extracted trilogy following Extracted and Executed. Many thanks for inviting me to take part in the tour and for sending me all three books, I'm really looking forward to reading them soon. In the meantime, I'm so pleased to welcome RR Haywood to Hair Past A Freckle today with a guest post about his writing journey.
My journey into writing began in early 2012 when I read a fantastic book called Three Feet of Sky by Stephen Ayres and later discovered it was self-published. I had no clue what self-publishing was but the concept of writers being able to deliver their books direct to the reader blew my mind. I was fascinated by it. I had always assumed you needed a degree in English and connections to the publishing world to release a book but suddenly writers were bypassing that whole process and having great fun at the same time.
I was a police officer and although I was very happy in my career, I had always wanted to be a writer. Now there was a way, and as time went on, so that idea grew roots and eventually coupled with my fascination of the zombie genre until I just decided to give it a go and sat down at my dining room table and wrote The Undead Day One.
I had no clue what I was doing. I didn’t know about syntax or cadence, about form or structure, about characterisation or scene-setting and the initial end result was awful. I mean wow, it was shockingly bad. A five-year-old with a crayon could have done a better job, but the bug was there, and I was in love with putting words on a page.
My original plan was to write Day One to Day Seven, and with each book I would teach myself how to write and develop characters and transition them from scene to scene. How to describe and when to suggest and leave space for the reader to imagine. The different types of narrative and converging storylines. First person. Third person. Dialogue scared me, so I really focused on that.
In amongst all that, and first and foremost, is that I had a story to tell, and I wanted it to be a stonking, rip-roaring adventure with a moral heart. The best advice I ever heard was to write the book you want to read.
I’d been releasing each “Day” as it was written but nobody read them. They floundered at the bottom of every genre chart list imaginable. Eventually, I completed the seven days and put them together as a compilation edition called The Undead The First Seven Days, and it was that book that took off. The series started gaining traction and is now the UK’s best-selling zombie horror series.
I’m now published and have experienced working with agents, editorial processes and publishers and I honestly think the onset of self-publishing has made the world of literature a better place.
Self-publishing allows writers that have a different voice, and who might not get through the selection processes, to reach readers and in turn, it gives readers access to raw imaginations that have not been filtered and polished. Sure, there is a lot of awful, poorly written stuff online, but there are some golden gems too and when they do shine, they shine the brightest of all for the fact they did it alone.
Thank you so much for this fascinating post and congratulations on the success of your novels. I've been very fortunate to read some wonderful self-published books in the past few years and one of the things I love about blogging is the opportunity to read books I may have missed otherwise.
Extinct will be published by 47North on 24th May 2018 and can be purchased here.
Don't miss the other stops on the blog tour, details are below.
About the Author
Richard Raymond Haywood has three dogs and lots of tattoos. Born in Birmingham, he now lives by the beach on the Isle of Wight with his German Shepherds.
RR Haywood: ‘First and foremost, I want to be a storyteller and write immersive, exciting, character-led stories that make readers laugh out loud and move to the edge of their seats as they cheer for the goodies and boo-hiss the baddies, but within everything I write I try and reflect the reality of life and what being human is. The flaws we all have and how situations can escalate and pull people along on a path they never intended to take.
My policing career influences a lot within my work. I joined the force when I was 23 and served most of my career in uniform and working on pro-active crime teams. In high-tense, volatile public order situations. I also spent a lot of time disrupting drug supply and all of those things have given me years of raw material to draw from.
I never expected The Undead series to do so well, or become an international best-selling author. I started off using The Undead as a way of learning to write. Now, 5 or 6 years later, I’ve reached a point where I can take a career break from the police and write full-time.
Life can be very harsh sometimes, and I’d love it if my writing can give readers some cracking adventures to enjoy while all the time showing that goodness shines through.’
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