Blog posts that reflect aspects of life as an author.
If you’re of an old enough vintage, you may recall a song by the band Orange Juice where they suggest you might like to rip it up and start again. Well, metaphorically speaking, that is what happened to some of my writing this week. It’s a sad tale but not one without its upside.
Romney Marsh is a large, flat expanse of land on the southern coast of England overlooking the English Channel. Criss-crossed by a seemingly endless maze of dykes and water-filled ditches, and dotted here and there with Medieval churches and old farm buildings, it can feel isolated and cut off from the rest of the world in both time and place.
Seeing how it’s almost the end of the year, I thought it would be a good time to share with you some of my favourite reads of the last twelve months, on both the fiction and non-fiction front.
In truth, I’ve been very disappointed with a number of the fiction books I’ve picked up this year and I stopped reading several of them after thirty or forty pages. Once upon a time, I would have pressed on regardless, but these days I am far less tolerant and more willing to move on to something else. Although this much reduced the pool for consideration here, there were still some good enough ones to be included.
So, let’s crack on, starting with the fiction books.
Realistically, I’ve got about just a week and a half of full-time work remaining before we tumble merrily into the Christmas holiday period and I can’t wait for that. I mean, it’s time for presents, and who doesn’t like that? So, now seems like as good a time as any to take a quick peek back at 2023, especially as it was a big year for me.
As well as being an author, I am, naturally, a reader. I’m also a collector of books. I have a particular soft spot for old books, especially those with beautiful artwork on the boards and spine, with the late C19th and early C20th being especially fertile ground for such books.
Character names. They are a pretty important part of the average novel, but they can be a bit of a challenge in their own right. Just how much of a challenge, I’ve been reminded of these last few weeks as I’ve worked on building out my new project.
Ugh, getting my writing done these last couple of weeks has become more and more difficult, though it’s been entirely of my own doing. The problem is that old chestnut plotting.
At a time when we authors are being encouraged to overcome the challenge from AI by highlighting our humanity, it is interesting to look back to another time when authors were busy getting themselves physically in front of their readers.
So, I’ve recently completed the initial version of The Meyer-Hoffman Affair (Alexander Templeman book two) and despatched it to the editor. That’s very definitely a good thing. However, the act of hitting the send button on that email does always plant a tricky question in my mind, namely what comes next.
I love the whole concept around the creator economy, which is essentially about the outstanding opportunities that exist right now for creators to make a living from the things they produce. It’s easier said than done, the making money part, but the opportunities are there in a way they haven’t been before, certainly during my life-time.