I've delivered a book

 I've submitted the manuscript for my next novel, the title of which is likely to be INHIBITOR PHASE. I've mentioned another title in the context of interviews, but this is the one that seems to be finding most favour with my publishers, and indeed is the one I initially offered as a placeholder name when the last contract was being drawn up. As may be apparent to those familiar with my work, the book takes place in the Revelation Space universe and is largely set in the years after ABSOLUTION GAP, my 2003 novel. 

It's not intended as a sequel to that book, but merely another entry in the mosaic of books and stories which illuminate a larger future history. That said, it does have connective tissue with some of the other novels. although I've scrupled as carefully as I can to make the book function as a standalone title, a single book which tells a complete tale in its own right and can be read as "just" an isolated story.

It's a much shorter novel than some of its predecessors - a mere 170,000 words, against 275,000 for ABSOLUTION GAP - but there is (I hope) a lot in it, including action set in five different solar systems, and an implied narrative taking in about eight hundred years of future history. Along the way we'll visit some locales that we've seen before, but at different timeframes, and we'll also explore some new corners of the RS universe.

What happens in the book? I'm not going to say - just yet. I can state that some of the influences that have fed into the book include a film by Ingmar Bergman, a song by Scott Walker (in fact more than one), and the closing track of a Muse album.

By by way of a teaser, here's a Wordcloud generated from the text, using https://www.wordclouds.com/

Click to embiggen.