new writing

An award? Why, thank you!

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Beautiful Blogger Award

Oh my word, my blog has been nominated for a second award! The delightful and hugely talented Kristina Pui has nominated Jumping From Cliffs for the Beautiful Blogger Award. “At last,” I thought, “someone who recognises that Clooney and I were separated at birth.” Then I realised it’s the blog which is regarded as beautiful, but that in no way lessened my joy and gratitude (not too much anyway.) I know many people are skeptical about awards, but I believe they’re a valuable means of showing appreciation to people who add something to your day and I truly appreciate it.

Now I have to nominate 5 other bloggers (easy) and tell you 5 beautiful/interesting things about myself (not so easy). I’ll give you my 5 fave bloggers first and then, down the bottom there, try and scrape together 5 facts that those with far too much time on their hands may find vaguely interesting/entertaining.

If I had to rank these ladies and gents in order of preference, they’d all be at Number One, but blog layout and physics won’t permit that, so here, in no particular order, are the Top 5:

Reader, I Wrote a Novel
This is my ‘must-read’ blog; a new post from the fabulous Holly Robinson always stops me in my tracks. Dry, self-deprecating humour from an extremely talented writer attempting to pen a novel in a year, whilst simultaneously having a life. Constantly entertaining, inspiring and wonderful. Get yourselves over there now for a peek. Thank you.

The Illustrious Peacock
The Illustrious Peacock has the self-styled mission of “bringing a touch of beautiful into everyday life.” And boy oh boy, does she succeed! Outstanding photography and high-concept design from an extraordinarily creative mind. This blog will brighten your day every time.

Catherine, Caffeinated
Living, breathing proof that you can get your work published. Catherine shares her insights, advice and expertise in a non-lecturing, massively readable style. And she knows exactly what she’s talking about. An invaluable stopping-off point (prepare to be stopped there for some time.)

Andrew Toynbee’s Very Own Blog
I’m nominating Andrew because he’s another writer who squeezes writing in during the spare moments inbetween the general madness of a hectic life. I think of these as “moments of beauty” in my day and I admire the way Andrew manages to find so many of them and keep focused.

K. J. Colt
Kylie Colt has a “restlessness in her heart” that drives her to write and I for one understand precisely how that feels. Short posts that crackle with energy and get straight to the point, re-affirming that you’re not the only aspiring scribe who sometimes struggles. More power to your pen K.J.

Now to the bit I’ve been dreading. I don’t write about me because I don’t like writing about me. I write about how I write and what I’ve learned and what inspires me. Anyone who’s interested in what I had for breakfast proooooobably isn’t someone I’d want to be following my blog… Anyhow, in deference to the nomination, here goes.

Thing 1: In previous phases of my life, I have been a juggler, a guitarist, a showjumper, a cross-country rider, an actor and a linguist. I still am some of these things, but haven’t been any of them professionally. The one thing I’ve always been in addition to all of these is a writer – even when I’ve not been practicing the craft. It is what I genuinely feel I was made to do and that I believe one day, somehow, I will do for a living. If not, I will retire to a hillside cottage in Sicily and live off the land whilst writing for fun. Truth.

Thing 2: I am Spiderman. As a kid, I was a humungous Spiderman fan. A couple of years ago, at the age of far-too-mature-to-be-reading-comics, I re-discovered the joy of the webslinger. Now, when faced with a challenge I don’t think I’m up to, or something I really dread doing, I remind myself that I’m Spiderman, knuckle down and get on with it. I’m nowhere near as geeky as that makes me sound.

Thing 3: I love rugby, cats and The Clash. And pirates. You have to love pirates.

Thing 4: Since my Dad developed Alzheimer’s a couple of years ago, I’ve vowed never to put off anything I want to do until ‘one day.’ All-too-often, one day never comes.

Thing 5: My novel (which I’m increasingly considering re-naming Jumping From Cliffs, instead of Dark Energies) is based on the true story of how I met my fiancée. Truth may not be stranger than fiction but it comes in a pretty close second.

So there you have it, 5 things about me. I’m chuffed to bits by the nomination and look forward to posting further writerly musings as soon as life returns to anything mildly approaching normal.

Familiarity breeds… more familiarity?

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I noticed a word last night.

To be precise, I noticed a lot of them and far too many were the same.

Edit Number 4 (I have a far less polite name for it than that in private) of the novel is progressing at the pace of a wounded snail. I’m busily typing up the edits I made long-hand whilst sitting on trains to and from work.

It is tedious in the extreme. Oh boy, oh boy is it tedious. BUT (capitals, ‘cos this is important) it has taught me something fascinating.

I have words and phrases I over-use.

Last night, I discovered 34 instances of the word “familiar”.

34?!

3 of them occurred within 3 consecutive paragraphs.

That’s more than familiar, that’s positively intimate.

This realisation subsequently led on to a Sherlock Holmes-style investigation of exactly how such a heinous bludgeoning of the English language could have occurred. I like to think I have a broad vocabulary and I know lots and lots and lots of words. Some of them quite good ones. So why this insistence on one single variant?

I came up with two answers:

1)    I like things that are familiar. I’m not a big fan of change in general… yep, OK, whoa there! That’s true but this is not the place for psychoanalysis.

There’s a second, more writerly, solution:

2)    The novel has been written and edited in chunks over a long period of time. Like a jigsaw, pieces which have been hiding at the outset have been slotted in over the course of its evolution.

“So what, you slovenly abuser of vocab?” I hear you ask.

I’ve never, until now, read the whole book through from end-to-end with no gaps, omissions or chopping-up of the timeline. So I’ve never had the opportunity to hear the repetition until now.

Which means that this agonising 4th edit is actually one of the most important pieces of work I have ever done since I committed the opening sentence to paper all that time ago.

And that, boys and girls, is a massive relief that stops me heading off in search of a chocolate digestive and a duvet at this very moment. Onwards and upwards, to boldly hunt out other flagrant violations of my Mother tongue.

Do you have words or phrases that you find cropping up time and time again without you realising? And how do you write – are you structured or random?

Do tell…

6 Sentence Sunday

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OK, let me be the first to point out that it’s not Sunday. Not yet anyway. Although if you’re reading this on Sunday it will be…

I only came across 6 Sentence Sunday recently, but the idea is that you share 6 sentences from your work (whether in progress or completed) which will then go live over at http://www.sixsunday.com on – yep, you guessed it – Sunday.

It’s the first time I’ve taken part in this, so here goes. Please find below, for your delight and delectation, the first 6 sentences of my novel-in-draft. It may be called Dark Energies or it may be called Jumping From Cliffs. I’ll let my audience decide once the time comes. I hope you enjoy them. Please feel free to comment if you do; or even if you don’t.

Edward Stretton somehow knew that neither he, nor anyone else, would ever see his wife again.

He replaced the bottle-green handset in its cradle and ran his hand once again over the empty space on the sideboard. A hazy rectangle of dark walnut stood out feather-edged against the sun-lightened surface surrounding it, the only indication of what no longer stood there. A light residue of polish coated his fingertips as they stroked rhythmically back and forth across the absence, as if he were stroking the hair of a child recently woken from a nightmare. He paused and inspected the powdery coating for a second, his mind a thousand miles away, before wiping it on the sleeve of his suit jacket and picking up the receiver once more.

With a slender forefinger, he turned the clear plastic dial until it stopped against the metal fingerpiece, then listened to the clicking as it ratcheted back to its starting position.

Any readers who have previously perused the post Sneak Peek will recognise these as the start of the Prologue. There’s one subtle difference however: this is from the edited, revised, adjective-light version which entered the world following feedback from all the lovely people who reviewed the original for me.

As soon as the final edit of the MS is complete, I shall be posting more. You have been warned.

In the meantime, I shall leave you in suspense…

Should I?

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I have been ‘sort-of’ challenged to take part in NaNoWriMo (you know who you are!)

Anyone who’s read my post It’s About Time will appreciate the combination of excitement and abject fear this causes me.

1200 words a day??

How I’d love to. But there’s also work, cleaning, family, moving house (again), cooking, cleaning, eating, washing, ironing.. aaaaarrrggghhhh!!

I guess I could give up sleeping for 6 hours a night but, hey, everyone’s entitled to one luxury right?

Do I? Or don’t I?

Now You See It…

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…and very soon you won’t.

A book written in disappearing ink? It sounds like the stuff of childhood spy fantasies but now it’s all come true.

Which of us didn’t spend hours writing notes using lemon juice or top-secret kits purchased with our hard-earned pocket money from the ads in the back pages of the comics? I know I certainly did… before I discovered girls obviously.

Now, “The Book That Cannot Wait” (El Libro Que No Puede Esperar) has come along as an extraordinary writing/art concept. From the day the book is opened, you have two months to read it before the words vanish irrevocably.

You can read all about it in this article at Springwise – but be quick ;o)

Oh, and check out that cover too – I love it.

Step Away From the Biscuits!

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The Joy of Writing

Ah, the blank slate.

The freedom. The possibilities.

The abject blinding terror…

Sitting with a blank sheaf of paper (or virginal Word document) before you, you have the boundless liberty to let your mind and words run free. You have the opportunity to conjure up undreamt-of landscapes populated with captivating characters, enthralling events and plots so twisty and turny that Machiavelli himself would weep to read them.

 

At this stage, the temptation to throw it all in and hide under the duvet with a packet of chocolate digestives is virtually overwhelming.

What should I write? Who should I write about? What’s going to happen? Will anyone read it? Why am I doing this? Why did I ever want to be a writer in the first place, oh Lord help me! Time for a biscuit…

The pressure of a blank slate needing to be filled is one that all of us writers encounter at one time or another. But we impose it upon ourselves. And you know what? It’s completely invented. Writer’s block doesn’t exist.

That’s right, you heard me correctly; writer’s block doesn’t exist.

Harking back to my previous post on taming writer’s block, I’d like to re-state the wonderful advice from Maya Angelou:

What I try to do is write… And then it’s as if the muse is convinced that I’m serious and says ‘Okay. Okay. I’ll come.’

Unless someone’s taped your fingers together with duct tape overnight, you can still write. Your imagination may have booked a package tour of Merthyr Tydfil for a few days, but that shouldn’t stop you from writing. So abandon all thoughts of cowering under the duvet and just write.

Write anything.

Slay the dragon of the blank slate with the sword of words (if you’ll excuse a mangled metaphor).

Write about what you had for breakfast, write about the colour of your socks, write about the wall you’re staring at with inspiration-free perspiration dripping from your forehead, or just write the word ‘badger’ 73 times. Then it’s no longer a blank piece of paper. That’s Step One. Huzzah!

Now carry on writing, don’t stop, don’t ever stop. It doesn’t matter if what you’re committing to paper is gibberish, you’ll find the groove as long as you carry on. It doesn’t have to be the next chapter of the novel, the next stanza of the poem, it doesn’t have to be the same characters or genre or even, Heaven forbid, of any great quality.

Start turning your account of breakfast into an account of the final breakfast recalled by an aristocrat huddled in a tumbril, awaiting his turn at the guillotine.

Morph the colour of your socks into the colour of the moon over Ganymede piercing the green-black gloom of night whilst below the surface, hideous beings toil in the depths of labyrinthine drone-mines.

Or the blank wall instantaneously transformed from a cracked and peeling canvas of magnolia by the livid crimson slash as the assassin’s bullet hits home, piercing the diplomat’s temple, taking with it fragments of skull and brain matter…

The instant you start putting words down, there’s no more blank slate and no such thing as writer’s block. The slight tremor of panic I felt 400-odd words ago at the blank slate which has become this post has morphed into a burning desire to carry on adding words to all those story openings. And I don’t even LIKE historical fiction. Or Sci-Fi. OK, so none of those lines are great quality or jaw-droppingly inventive, but they’ve kick-started a process and got me warmed up. Time now to head back to Dark Energies and apply that creativity to wherever it was that Dan and Kate were stranded when I last left off.

The only thing stopping you writing is you. Get over it. Stop worrying if it’s going to be good enough. It never will be if you don’t write it. Sure, you’ll throw a lot of it away, you’ll change a lot of it and only some will make the final cut.

But at least you’ll be doing what you’ve told yourself all along you wanted to do more than anything else in the world.

So just write.

Maybe get yourself a biscuit while you’re at it.

After all, what’s stopping you?

Summoning the Muse when all hope seems lost

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Just a quickie from me today as I beaver away behind the scenes to put together a series of posts on how you can best use digital marketing to publicise your writing.

In the meantime, I came across this splendid infographic which shows that the many-headed beast known as writer’s block attacks the great and good every bit as ferociously as those of us tackling the foothills of ambition. (Sorry for the tortured metaphor, it’s been a busy week!) It also has some great tips on how to conquer the monster.

Advice for writers from writers - keep writing!

Click the image for the full version.

I’m sure everyone has their own techniques. Personally, I love Maya Angelou’s:

What I try to do is write… And then it’s as if the muse is convinced that I’m serious and says ‘Okay. Okay. I’ll come.’

So my friends, how do you summon your muse and convince her that you mean business?

Jumping From Cliffs

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Edit: I wrote this post about a week before the great man died. He will be much missed, but his advice and inspiration will linger forever.
JS

So, why Jumping From Cliffs?

I was out of work and 18 months (on and off) into the putative novel now known as Dark Energies and massively doubting whether there was any point in continuing with it. Who was I to think I could write? Why put myself through the embarrassment and potential humiliation of committing my innermost thoughts and feelings to paper, thinly cloaked in the disguise of characters I’d invented? Then, serendipitously, I stumbled across this extraordinary interview with Ray Bradbury:

Writer Ray Bradbury on jumping from cliffs

I didn’t know his work well and am still unfamiliar with far too much of it, but I had read Fahrenheit 451. His love of books and writing shines through in this interview, as does his enthusiasm, spirit and love of everything to do with the written word.

His exhortation that

You have to jump from cliffs every day and build your wings on the way down

should be tattooed on all our foreheads at birth.

Backwards, of course, so we can read it in the mirror.

Watch and wonder people, the man is pure authorial inspiration wrapped in a casing of skin. Like a wonderful sausage.

In the beginning…

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This is a blog about a book.

No, scratch that.

This is a blog about a journey and the search for inspiration.

Yes, that’s a much grander opening, good.

Around the age of 7 (or thereabouts) I decided I had to write a book. A little over 3 decades later I’ve finally gone and done it. That was the first part of the journey (more of that later). Now the journey to publish it begins.

Along the way I’ve been inspired – as every writer surely should be – by many different people and things. I wanted to share them here to inspire other would-be first-time writers. Then I realised, what the hell, they can inspire anyone, writer or non. Writing brings up many valuable lessons on life (OK, that sounds pretty hippy-dippy self-help, but stick with me, it gets better…)

I also hope to share some of what I’ve learned (and still am learning) about the process of writing, again in the hope that it will be of use to others. It’s one thing to read advice in books or on blogs by accredited authors, but there’s often a niggling feeling of “easy for you to say Mr/Mrs/Ms Published!” Within these posts, I’ll share what actually worked for me. Whether it works for you, only you can find out.

Like the bemused anti-hero protagonist at the outset of Dark Energies (that’s the book folks, much more of that later too) I don’t know precisely where this journey will end. But it’s a decent bet there’ll be excitement, despair, hope, false hopes, elation and a significant amount of utter blind confusion along the way.

If you’re lucky, there may even be some laughs en-route as well. I’m hoping you’ll stick around to find out.