EmmaD

I once tried out a character questionnaire from Emma Darwin’s blog on a principal character of mine, and my answer to seven out of twenty-one questions was ‘Dunno’ and/or ‘Does it really matter?’ Some of the other answers were pretty vague. But while writing the story I never had any difficulty in imagining what she’d say or do.

Everybody has their own way of working; mine is very like Tony’s above. The important thing, I believe, is to find out which way suits you best, and not put yourself in a creative strait-jacket by blindly following some ‘rule.’ What works for some people may not work for you.

For example, we keep hearing ‘cut, cut, cut’ when it comes to editing,…[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]

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]

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.

Well done Jill – you came so close to winning on YWP that it is only justice you come first here.

And thank you Libby for setting a theme which sent me back to all of these small stones and properly gather them in one place (now up to #94

Not entirely incidentally, there’s a certain resonance for me in all this. Caerleon was where my mother lived for nearly four decades, and so I have a passing, though not intimate, familiarity with the area Arthur Machen loved so much – though I have no doubt that he would be appalled if he could see it today, with the M4 passing within a couple o…[Read more]

Excellent blog, Richard. I fear my “to be read” list has acquired some new items.