(First published on my old blog 2nd October 2013) I’d hate to give anyone the wrong impression, so I’ll state now that while the title was a pleasing oxymoron for me and apt for this topic, I won’t be covering any erotica today – sorry about that 😉 September 2013 saw the University of York…
Tag: #amwriting
Throwback Thursday: Self-Editing and Humble Pie
(First published on my blog 14th August 2013) I can honestly say that I’ve never left a scathing, personal review for a book. (Occasionally I have left a harsher review if I feel the author has cheated the reader or propagated something harmful with their words.) That’s not to say I haven’t thought personal comments, I just…
Throwback Thursday: Candle flames, light bulbs, flash bulbs and flare guns; Editing your novel.
(First published on my old blog 19th August 2013) At the end of April, earlier this year, I finished writing my novel. I spent a day walking around in a hypnogogic state where everything seemed very crisp and bright and yet nothing was quite real. Bit of an odd day – I was torn between…
Five things to Expect when you Admit you’re a Writer
I’ve always been a bit wary of blogging about my writing journey. I mean what could I possibly have to say that hasn’t been said – and far more eloquently – by writers who came before me. Probably better writers to. I mean, if Stephen King was in two minds about adding his experiences…
Throwback Thursday: The Rejection Code
(First published on my old blog 8th July 2013) Nobody like rejection. At least I have never encountered anyone who does. It would have to be a fairly rare fetish if it does exist independently of other factors. Writers, like brave souls returning to or continuing playing the dating game, probably make it fairly high…
Dissecting Dragons – hatching a podcast
Today was an exciting new first as my fellow fantasy author, M. E. Vaughan, and I prepared for the launch of our new podcast. ‘Dissecting Dragons’ is aimed at fans of all forms of speculative fiction – fantasy, sci-fi, horror, dystopian, steam-punk – you name it and we’ll be discussing it. As we are…
Throwback Thursday: A Debut Author’s A B C of Publishing
Whether you want to be published traditionally or not, most of us are interested in what happens when you’ve crossed that fence. There have been some excellent posts on the mechanics of the publishing and I’m certain I can’t do any better. So here for your amusement is a series of observations from my first…
Readers’ Block: How to write a review
Why Write a Review; If you’re a writer, then you may well have no trouble coming up with an insightful, clear, entertaining and thought provoking review of whatever you have just finished reading. Well, maybe anyway. Ok some of the time. Er occasionally…? Because let’s face it, unless you are in good practice, writing a…
Throwback Thursday: First Choose your Victim
(First Published on my old blog 4th July 2013) As an avid reader of …well pretty much anything, I often find myself thinking certain, repeated thoughts about a variety of Main Characters. ‘Why did you make that obviously foolish decision?’; ‘what are you doing that for?’; ‘You realize that you’ve brought all of this…