Two sequels in one?

Not quite but

My new book, Sweet Melissa, is going to be let loose in the rainforest on the 28th.

It is a continuation of the story started in Melissa, More or Less. The main characters, Mark and Melissa, are slowly building their relationship, despite both having deep scars from their past lives.

Yes, same cast, same situation, so it is a sequel.

Midway through the book, I needed to inject new characters. At the same time, I received several messages from readers asking to hear more about the main characters in an earlier book. (A dual earlier, I wrote and published it a while back, and it is set at a fixed point of time, about six years earlier than the Melissa stories.)

The same protagonists, built on the original story, is it a sequel?

I don’t know.

Melissa, More or Less will be free for Kindle next week (23 to 27 March) as an introduction

And here is an extract, in which Mark encounters Melissa for the first time …

“I met Melissa on my first day in my new post. I say it was new but it was really the same job that I had done for many years but the hospital had been reorganised. I’d got a new title and job description. My name still occupied the box near the top righthand corner of the organogram. The heading on the PowerPoint slide and the name and title in the box above me had changed.

As a result of the reorganisation, everybody named on the slide, that is the whole management structure, was on a ‘getting to know each other day’. I almost arrived late for the start. I had taken a call from one of my technicians, he was very upset. He had just been roundly abused by one of the consultants. I won’t mention the doctor’s name here; the disciplinary hearing is still ongoing. Such is the joy of being in charge of what had once been the Computer Department.

The whole hospital now runs on one big computer system, not on the whim of a vocal, egocentric, consultant. The operating theatres are booked, with timed slots, weeks in advance. It is not the fault of the computer that an extra patient cannot be added to his list for Tuesday. It has more to do with the porters’ holiday roster. The cost and availability of medical gases. The capacity of the physiotherapy department and a hundred and one other little details that have to come together to prevent … Sorry I’m on my high horse again.

I had missed the coffee and biscuits and dashed into the Board Room as the Chief Exec. started his ‘Welcome to the Brave New World of Divisions” speech. One spare seat, mine: I sat down. The welcome was very similar to the ‘Introducing the Brave New World of One Organisation Working’ that I’d heard him give, was it three years earlier.

“Blah, blah, drone, reflexive interactions, blah …”

I nudged the person next to me and whispered. “Reflexive interactions, that must be this month’s new management-speak phrase.”

The woman, I had glanced to see which of my colleagues I was sharing my wit and wisdom with, was not anyone I recognised. I shut up and looked straight ahead. It is all well and good playing buzzword bingo with your friends, strangers though that is different. This newcomer, she could be anybody. She was certainly a somebody, the nobodies were outside, getting on with the job of turning poorly people into functioning members of society.”

You can order Sweet Melissa here