Yesterday was both a good and a bad day. Bad because I didn’t write a single word. did some thinking about the WIP, didn’t quite reach a decision about where it’s going, so not productive in that sense. Plus I had a non-productive think about the question for the next writer’s group. ‘Tell an existing […]
A short story I wrote has now been accepted for inclusion on the Reedsy site, so feel free to go and have a read. Click here to see it and feel free to comment, either there or below, remember that comments really matter. It refers to a tragedy that happened in the Ribble estuary in […]
I’ve just started to use BSky as a way of engaging a bit more with other writers and the publishing industry in general. And it does seem to have had an effect, at least on me. One of the earlier books I published and then withdrew seems to me to be almost ready to hit […]
In an effort to get myself moving along I’ve made a decision to try entering a few competitions, and the first one is… ReedsyPrompts, a competition where you have to follow one of several given themes and produce a work that is between 1,000 and 3,000 words long. I sent in the entry this morning […]
It’s been a while (God, has it been THAT long), but I’m back. Got a lot of new short stories, some of which I’m going to post on this website, and some that have been submitted elsewhere. So, a new year has just begun and a new resolution has been made. I’ll try and update […]
The second of my books to hit the shelves inside three weeks ‘The Book Without a Story’ grew out of the NaNoWriMo movement in 2019. I put the results of that rush to one side for a while as I worked on ‘Dark Roads’. Now both are completed and available on Amazon. You can get […]
While the pacing of the story is one concern, there is also the pacing of the writing. It isn’t the same sort of issue. In the story, we need to keep the reader’s attention, so the ebb and flow of action and the changes of perspective all add to the mix. In the writing, it’s […]
It seems strange that the characters in story sometimes take over and shape where the story is going and what is likely to be happening. In the current story the male main character, de Quincey was always going to be the strongest. The one with the most action and in theatrical terms, the most lines. […]
I suppose, there is a sweet-spot somewhere between complex and simple that allows the story to unfurl easily while still keeping the reader’s attention captivated. I’ve read enough books recently to know that too simple is boring, books full of pointless description because the author can’t think of what he or she wants the character […]
In the current climate of terror, we ventured out into the open this morning, Mrs D and myself, armed only with a small warning bell and a long pole to keep the ‘others’ away. We ventured onto the beach at St. Annes. Fortunately the tide was out so we had all of seven or maybe […]