A Weekly Update
This year has been a bit of a whirlwind (as usual), but I’m gradually getting things together. So, what’s happening? First, I am working on a new literary festival. No, I don’t mean I’m just attending – I’m working on the idea of a festival to help writers and readers. We had a meeting about … Continue reading
The Next Big Thing …
And now: the Next Big Thing – ten questions in ten minutes. Not such an easy concept for an author who spends his time thinking carefully about what he should be writing, revising, editing, and then throwing it away and starting again. Which is actually what happened here, because I carefully wrote what I … Continue reading
Pens, Pencils, Computers – Guess My Favourites
Writing – again. The last few weeks have been really fun. Hard, but fun. I am in the middle of the next book for Simon & Schuster, which is to be an action story based on the Hundred Years War, with the campaign that finally led to Crécy, and I am enjoying it enormously. However, … Continue reading
Displacement Activities
I’ve been trying to type the first paragraph of the next book. For quite some time. It’s there, in my head, but my head is an irrational location in which to story it with any hope of getting it out and down on paper. Dr Wang, who created Wang Laboratories in the 1950s, was an … Continue reading
Ebooks and Stuff!
Good news potentially, from the Frankfurt Book Fair. Apparently agents are warning of a reckoning to come, because of the low royalties paid to authors. If you want to read more, go and look at The Bookseller for the full article here: http://www.thebookseller.com/news/agents-warn-e-book-reckoning.html Many people have asked me in the last few months why so … Continue reading
This really is the death knell for publishers
My apologies. This is a blog from an astonishingly angry author. Why? Today the Bookseller announced that Amazon is having a great new sales campaign. In an October Kindle promotion, they will be aiming to sell vast numbers of books. This is brilliant news, isn’t it? Amazon will do what they do best, push huge … Continue reading
Language
Ach, it’s a tough one, but I got three comments about anachronisms in my language this week, so got to make a comment, I guess. This is a hard one to comment on, because no matter what I say, I will be wrong in the eyes of some. Some years ago, I was contacted by … Continue reading
Ten Deadly Sins of Entering Competitions
This week, the competition run by Simon & Schuster for a Michael Jecks Detection Collection pen from Conway Stewart as been won, by Michael Chidley. Congratulations to Michael, and sorry to all those who didn’t win the pen. You’ll just have to save your pennies! Thinking of competitions, I was reminded of the old CWA … Continue reading
Ruminations on Executions and Referenda
This has been an interesting few days. Guido Fawkes, God bless ‘im, has started a petition on the UK government website. Now the idea of petitions is not new, but our revered leader has decided that he will listen to any petitions, and if more than 100,000 names are added to the petition, it will … Continue reading
Ideas, Ideas, Ideas
Where do the ideas come from? I was once sitting in Crediton Church (which I can heartily recommend) and listening to Exeter Chamber Choir giving a redition of Faure’s Requiem, when I suddenly had a flash of inspiration: a scene sprang into my mind of a number of scruffy, ill-armed, but violent ruffians swooping down … Continue reading
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