Jethro Weyman

Really good, Daeds – and IMO we could all go out and respond publicly to your and Kaz’s FB posts with words to recognise how good this story is. Fantastic.

Great story.

Blimey – and I think my son’s nuts for setting his sights on a bass that’s selling for £5K!

Mind you, he’s got one custom built bass, courtesy of Mr Squidge, and apparently he plans to build another custom ‘normal’ guitar this summer, so who knows what they’ll be worth in years to come…?

Great story telling, Daeds, congratulations.

Coming to this late…but hugs to both Hil and Janette… Agents can be beetles at times, can’t they? Fill us full of hope and then dash us down. We are stronger than they think though – we get back up and live to fight another day, and keep writing, whatever they say.
Hil, your writing is gorgeous, and you have deservedly got agent interest.…[Read more]

Fab news, Daeds, x

Another interesting blog, Richard, thank you.

Oh Hil, I’m so sorry. You know my thoughts on this through the messages we’ve exchanged, and I just send my commiserations again xxx

Thank you Raine. Yes it turned out to be a pretty cunning ploy.

Wow, thanks Libby! Well done to the other participants. I’ll think up some devilishly difficult competition for March and post later tomorrow.

New Day

The smoke from cooking fires lay like a grey blanket over Alexandra township and a tangerine sun rose behind it, then burst clear and threw its warming mantle over the land. The windows of the high-rise buildings on the distant Johannesburg skyline glinted like slabs of molten gold. A typical autumn dawn on the highveld but this was not a…[Read more]

I agree with what you say, Raine. I should have clarified what I meant by problematic. For instance there are readers who boycott writers just on someone else’s sayso – I think you should always do your due dillifence and try to find out the whole story in as far as you can. Three independant sources of verification and I won’t boycott a book…[Read more]

This is something that I end up discussing a lot with my co-dragon on Dissecting Dragons. Ultimately, I think it’s fine to read and enjoy problematic art by problematic artists. The important thing is that you are questioning both within your own mind. I’ve boycotted certain YA authors because they’ve been involved in horrific online bullyimg…[Read more]

There are also examples in art – Paul Gauguin, Picasso and Freud, for example, were not particularly nice folk, it seems.
If a writer’s work doesn’t reflect his obnoxious views, does that make it OK? Or if his views are expressed in a work of fiction and not an educational piece?
Some very good people write fiction that contains extreme views, but…[Read more]

No problem @Libby, it was a flippant remark on my part, not intended to be taken seriously.

I have two pieces nearly done but I don’t now which of them to enter. Maybe I’ll enter both, one under a pseudonym. Would that be cheating?

It’s still possible to get in close, even using third person. It’s a bit of a knack, to get into your character’s head in this way – I often find myself rewriting complete paras when editing, because by the end of the book I’m so familiar with my character I can tell how they’re going to react, what they’re feeling or thinking. It’s a weird place…[Read more]

Hi Kate, it’s pitched about right, I think.

I wondered about the amount of description initially – and where it just touches on backstory/info dump when your MC says she’s never been there before. Can you rework something along the lines of ‘In all my sneaking around, I’d never managed to see inside, and I wasn’t disappointed on this, my first…[Read more]