The Birmingham SF Group, an esteemed science fiction society which is nearly as old as I am, have kindly invited me along as their guest in September. I’ll be doing an interview and a reading from Guardians of Paradise on Friday the 10th of September, at the Briar Rose Hotel, Bennetts Hill. The doors open […]
Today isn’t really a full book birthday, but it is the day Consorts of Heaven comes out in paperback. The paperback has a new cover, very similar to the old one except with (I think) better colouring and a nicer font for my name. (In contrast to my last imported image this one is tiny […]
Although the climax of Bringer of Light might be exciting for the characters, it’s turning into a bit of a death-march for the author. Between writing it and doing a temporary but full-time day-job I’ve not got a lot of brain left. However, I am one of those writers who is lucky enough to be […]
… I bring you the not-news that my next book title is also the name of a Guild in World of Warcraft. I haven’t checked, but with a name like ‘Guardians of Paradise’ I’m guessing we’re looking at light ‘n’ lawful types. Also from the virtual pages of google alerts, a hit for ‘Principles of […]
Having gone on (at some length) about the writing process, I’m now at the stage of Bringer of Light where I’m abandoning some of those organisational crutches. The questions in the ‘questions’ file have all been answered (or deferred until the next book…). It’s been weeks since I’ve looked at the ‘character’ or ‘reference’ files, […]
I’m proud to unveil (well, insert) the final version of the cover for ‘Guardians of Paradise’: Observant (or particularly sad) readers may notice the addition of certain vowels. I liked the cover before: now I love it.
Writers are, of course, megalomaniacs. We toy with our characters’ fates in a cruel and capricious way. Bwa-ha-ha and all that. Yeah, right. I’ve now reached the point in Bringer of Light where all my plot threads tie up and head for the denouement. It took a while and one of the strands ended too […]
The original plan was to be reaching the end of the first draft of Bringer of Light about now. That would leave me a month or so of ‘fallow time’ during which I’d revisit some short stories (and have a social life), ready to embark on the double cycle of rewrites (aka ‘rinse and repeat’) […]
The release date of the paperback of Consorts of Heaven has been delayed and will now be 29th July. This puts it only 10 weeks before the hardback and trade paperback of Guardians of Paradise hits the shops, on 16th September. To allow for last-minute slippage and to co-ordinate with the local literary festival, the […]
That ideal world I referred to a while back would make the following tax deductible to help out us poor starving writers: 1. Chocolate. Because we need to encourage ourselves. 2. Massages. Because we spend a long time sitting in one (possibly uncomfortable) position while the words (hopefully) pour out. 3. Wine. See chocolate. 4. […]