I must admit that I spend a lot of my travel time (home -> work -> home) listening to interviews, podcasts and panel discussions on the topic of writing and writers. Often the same ones over and over in case I can learn something new. The Coronavirus has put a short halt to this as it only takes me about three seconds to travel from my bedroom to my new
This post is about editing a first draft. Anyway, about the way I do it. You can compare the product of the first edit (this post) with the unedited first draft (last post). Note: as with any of my other posts in this section of my blog, it may contain spoilers to my writing. So proceed at your own risk. In my last post I discussed my routine of reading
I now tend to write scene by scene rather than chapter by chapter. I imagine each scene as something from a television show or film. What is cohesive? What sticks? What camera angles? Who do I focus upon? When do I shift focus? These thoughts tumble into a rough plan in my head. I play with this plan, not yet having started to type. When I do eventually type I
#writers #writing It was one of those twitter discussions. I was asking about using characters in short stories as a means for discovering their viability for a novel. (Don’t ask me what that means; it made more sense at the time). Author L K Weir responded along with Katheryn Bigelow,
NOTE: David Lee Summers, author of this book, is a blogging and Facebook friend of mine. This said, the following review is an objective one, warts and all. David has, as always, packed an awful lot of ideas, information and tropes in his horror novel The Astronomer’s Crypt. Love it! The basic premise revolves around the trope of stolen Native American artifact with supernatural qualities and the havoc that ensues.
Hi all, just a quick one. I was interviewed in Midnight Echo along with a bunch of other #horror authors and artists. It’s really only just one question about my inspiration, but I tried to make the most of it. The interview can be found here: Midnight Echo 14 inspiration interviews – part 2 It’s nice to have a little bit of success. I’ve had a few rejections for some of
From 2013 to 2015 I wrote a science fiction / fantasy novel called Tempting in Shade. I sent it to Beta Readers who were very kind. Then I sat back and reread it. In doing so I came to several conclusions, the dominant one being that the novel was unpublishable. This post examines my decision from the perspective of four years later. It focuses upon how I mangled the plot.
As a struggling author one of my common Google searches is “Call for submissions fiction.” Now my my future novel has turned into an epic series (when will I ever finish just one of these books?!), I find myself writing little pieces just so I know that I can actually finish something. The good news is that I am getting nibbles in respect to these short stories and that is
Disclaimer: David Lee Summers is an online friend. This said, I have endeavoured to be completely objective in my review of this novel. Key take-aways It reads like a combined Mary Renault and (adult) Rosemary Sutcliffe novel crossed with Anne Rice novel It covers about 2000 years from Classical Greece to the Renaissance and so tends to jump centuries at a time I enjoyed reading it Overall This novel is
Many years ago I was identified as a possible Public Service leader of the future. Well, it didn’t pan out, but for a year the government did pay for me to have a personal mentor. This man taught me a lot about leadership and motivating people. One of the big lessons revolved around “why?”. Why should your staff care? Why should your bosses care? Why should your customers give a
