Claire Waller

Another fascinating blog Richard. And unlike so many of them, where there were obvious risks being taken or safety features omitted, with this one it’s so unlikely as to surely have been unforseeable. Do you think the signalmen were reassured by all the built-in the safety features that nothing like that could have happened, freeing them to run t…[Read more]

Sounds like my kind of novella, Stevie 😁

Sounds like my kind of writer and you’ve definitely sold him to me.

Thanks Richard. I’d never heard of him but have down loaded a collection of his and will have a look – maybe not at night with the wind howling round the house like it did yesterday evening!

That’s definitely one of the problems Bella – people, self included, really want these things to go well and can easily blind themselves to the problems. There’s that siren voice of ‘yes, but you’ll be published…’ – as if that means anything by itself

Go for it, Stevie. I bet you can knock out more words in 5 months than you think. And worst case scenario, you’ll still have the makings of a story if you don’t hit the deadline.

Thanks @philippaeast – you’re most welcome. I feel very silly having made all these avoidable errors, but I wouldn’t want anyone else to fall into the same trap. Mostly I don’t want people to get stuck with publishers who act in bad faith.

Would you mind retweeting the link the next time you’re on Twitter? Just to get the highest circulation…[Read more]

And you’re doing brilliantly at it John 😉

Congrats and good luck both – John, don’t do yourself down, you have a talent with the short story

I’ve just published Part 2

My Publishing Nightmare – the story of a book deal gone bad (Part 2)

Er, scuse my ignorance. I know LGBT, but what’s QAIP?

I do too. I’m really annoyed with myself for not entering the last one. I had an idea and half the words down but I ran out of time…

Congratulations @Johnalty. Lovely news!

Nice… my kind of prompt.

Oh, wow, Philippa! What a journey! And you are still standing – and your book is going to be in the world. It’s so brilliant to read all of this – the lows and the highs. Thank you so much for posting. And a great big huge Well done! You did it!

Brilliant – thanks John and well done Jonathan, a tour-de-force of purple prose

I think you’re right to be absolutely honest and not gloss over the difficulties and how emotionally taxing success can be. As writers we need to hear it and be under no illusions (and I think it would be nice if readers were a bit more aware of that too – a fellow writer and illustrator tells me his daughter’s friends refuse to accept that’s what…[Read more]