Hi everybody,

First things first: I want to thank all of you for your support for Four Chancellors and a Funeral. I am, as always, genuinely astonished that anybody would want to listen to me for free, let alone pay for it. My flabber has never been so gasted.

I’d love for you to see the book as fast as possible, but obviously I need to be careful with my sources, and check my facts diligently. This takes time, considerably longer than the more enjoyably task of thinking up new, macabre ways to describe the Tory Party’s Bez, Jacob Rees-Mogg (although I’m doing that too).

The first book, The Decade In Tory, was written as you read it – chapter 1 first, chapter 1000 last. This time I’ve been doing it slightly differently, focussing on things as they’re fresh in my mind. So the manuscript is currently a bit like Edam cheese – tasty, full of holes, and probably a bit over-priced. I'm filling in those holes right now, and the end is in sight.

I’m biased of course, but I think this book is funnier than the last one – I’m not exactly short of material – but will thankfully be thinner. My apologies to your creaking bookshelves. I’m going as fast as I can without risking mistakes or quality, and I plan to deliver the manuscript before June. And then it’s into editorial, legal, and all that brouhaha, which takes time but is absolutely essential. Thank you for your patience!

Before I sign off, two quick things.

First, as I understand it, The Decade In Tory will be available in paperback in September, and we hope to include an extract from Four Chancellors and a Funeral too. And a deal for an audiobook has been signed, but at the moment I don’t have any news on when it’ll be published.

Second – and this is unrelated to me – please tell friends about Unbound. It’s a wonderful way to support authors, ensuring the books get to market (which is rare) and that the authors are fairly compensated (which is practically extinct). This is how most books were funded once upon a time, and the only time Jane Austen’s name appeared in print during her lifetime was as a subscriber in the back of other authors’ works. If it’s good enough for her…

Once again, thank you all, and I hope you’re coping OK amidst all of <-- this -->

Love

Russ

P.S. Jacob Rees-Mogg is a harrowing impersonator of the Child Catcher who makes your aura recoil on sight.

P.P.S. Jacob Rees-Mogg is a babadook attempting to blend in at a knitting circle.

P.P.P.S. Jacob Rees-Mogg is Skeletor's cousin who works in accounts.

P.P.P.P.S. Jacob Rees-Mogg is Marilyn Manson's mum.

I could go on all day.