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Hi all, I’m not yet fully versed in the ways of the craft and have wavered between perfectionism and writing tens of thousands of words without any edits. I certainly prefer the latter, but the former seems to bring something to the table.

I started a novel back in 2013 as I managed a hotel in the Peruvian Andes, and all these years later I’m…[Read more]

Midsummer madness

The queue was going nowhere. He gave up wiping the sweat; it poured in carefree torrents down his forehead, around his nose and dripped from his lips and chin onto the white, cotton shirt his wife had bought him for his birthday back in November.
‘It will look great on you in the summer when we’re in Greece!’ she had said.…[Read more]

Am I allowed to agree with all of you? When a writer like Stephen King just says something and it works, it’s because he is utterly confident with his voice. I’m not his biggest fan, but I have read a lot of his work and I do appreciate the extraordinary flow of his prose. I’m willing to bet he’s not on the heavy side when he edits.

I’m terrible.…[Read more]

Mad has touched on what I posted (and lost!) yesterday.

Sometimes, I think we confuse perfectionism with finding our own, unique writer’s voice. We try so hard to make it sound ‘right’ that we forget we’re trying to express something of who we are, who our characters are, within the world we’ve created. Of course we want to make our stories the…[Read more]

Great news Kate – well done!!

Perfectionism is a curse. But the desire for perfection is necessary, if we’re ever to get to be as good as we can be.
Every time I re-read anything I’ve ever written, I find myself changing a word here, a phrase there. A sentence can be cut completely and rewritten, and in the next rewrite, it comes back again.
I found comfort in the quote from…[Read more]

Aaaargh! Just wrote a reply and it’s thrown me off and lost it all! Will post again tomorrow…

I’m not sure you can, or should, avoid perfectionism. Yes, by all means, when you are scribbling down your first draft, avoid it certainly. But not when doing your major edit. (You said ‘revising’ so maybe you’re not editing yet.) But when you are, it’s the perfect word or phrase that you’re searching for and nothing less should satisfy.
Those…[Read more]

Excellent news! I will look out for it!

Oh Fabulous!! Can you let me know when the paperbacks are out?

Thank you x

Ath, I should have some paperbacks soon, after a leetle glitch with the cover (take a decko in RASSA for what happened!)

Midsummer Madness

The ambush had been crueller for the glory of a wiped-clean sky, slowly coloured-in by a northeast Scotland, half-four sunrise, just three days past the solstice. It side-swiped the pleasures of his journey down, dulling the pearly greyness of the North Sea which had sheened pink then gold as it prepared itself for day. The…[Read more]

Huzzah, Kate! I shall keep my eyes open for it.

I’m SOOOOO late in saying a huge “WELL DONE”. I’ve bought the Kindle edition and hopefully I can get a signed paperback in future – even if I have to wait until York next year.

Happy (belated) publication day!

Congratulations Kate!

Yay! Well done!