Update 8th March 2022 😊
Return to the Secret Lake launched on 8th March! You can order it in print or for eBook from Amazon here. The print book is also available to order from other online stores and high street bookshops, with a slightly longer lead time in the first few weeks.
Click or tap here to read more about the book and hear early reviews over on its main page.
(The rest of the text below is from the pre-launch blog post back in February.)
Hello from a blustery London!
This is a quick update to say that I signed off the final cover for the sequel to The Secret Lake on Friday, and the book is having final checks. (There are no real surprises in its title! — Return to the Secret Lake.) I shall be sharing the full cover and blurb seen below more widely in the coming week, but wanted my newsletter and blog subscribers to see it first. Please do comment below or email me to let me know what you think? — and feel free to share with friends, family or pupils. You’ll also find a couple of ‘sneak peeks’ inside the book further down. 😊
I hope you’ll agree that my cover designer, Stuart Bache, has done a brilliant job — in the many years I have been mulling over a sequel, I always knew that the story would involve a young child from the past coming to find Stella and Tom at night. This image is exactly as I had hoped it would be, and more…
Return to the Secret Lake comes in at just over twice the length of The Secret Lake, and in terms of plot complexity is suitable for girls and boys aged 8-12, or to read aloud to those aged 7 and up. I think/hope children will find the setting between modern-day and 1900s London intriguing; we spend more time in both eras in this follow-on book. Click or tap the image below to enlarge and read the blurb.
Early feedback so far on the story from a small team of advance readers has been fantastic, so if your child or class has read and enjoyed The Secret Lake this is definitely for them! (If they haven’t, you can download the first three chapters of The Secret Lake here for free to see if they might enjoy it; the sample is available both for eReaders and in PDF format.)
A sneak peek inside…
Launch date
The book is now having its final print copy proofread and I aim to make it available for pre-order in the next week or so, with a likely release date not very long after that in early March once the final files are uploaded to all printing platforms. Look out for another post in the next couple of weeks with links to pre-order pages. In the meantime, below is a quick look at the opening page of Chapter 1. 😊
Lesson plans
Teachers/home schoolers — As previously mentioned, I shall be creating some interesting lesson plans to go with the book. More on this in a later blog post, or sign up to my email list.
That’s it for now. Do let me know what you/your children/pupils think of the cover if you get a moment? And I’ll post again once the book is available to order.
Sign up to my occasional newsletter to be notified…
If you’re not on my mailing list but would like to be notified when Return to the Secret Lake is available to order, please sign up to my occasional newsletter here. I don’t email often, and you can unsubsribe at any time.
Karen 😊
