A sense of place in fantasy
Every book is set somewhere, whether that’s a quasi-medieval world or a space station or a modern city – or even in someone’s mind. An interesting question, though, is how… Read more »
Category: Writing
Productivity
I’m uneasily conscious that I haven’t blogged in far too long. I’d say it’s been the month from hell, but it’s more like the year from hell. However, there’s only so long… Read more »
Why are male UF protagonists badass and female protagonists… not?
I have been noticing this for a while. Although we have all these ‘strong female protagonists’ in urban fantasy – to the level that an author friend of mine said… Read more »
What makes a good story?
I spend more time reading than I probably should. There are many other things I ought to be doing: laundry, ironing, writing… I console myself with the thought that somebody-or-other… Read more »
Writing Women in Traditionally Male Roles
Thankfully, we’ve got beyond the idea that a woman’s place in literature is to be the hero’s (prospective) love interest, and to scream and break her ankle a lot. However,… Read more »
Writing a short story
I’m a member of the New Street Authors writers’ group, and at the last meeting, someone had the bright idea of producing a group anthology. One short story from each… Read more »
Strange Names
Terry Pratchett’s novels include a variety of characters with strange names. Many of them live in the mountain kingdom of Lancre, where people do things their own way. And where… Read more »
A week off… right?
The Easter holidays means at least a few days off, and this year I got the big prize of 10 days off for only 4 days’ annual leave booked. Of… Read more »
Copyediting: the agony and the… whatever.
This month, I have got no writing done whatsoever. This is because I’ve been copyediting someone else’s book. Well, copyediting sounds a bit posh; what I was actually doing was… Read more »
Setting up the kill
Sometimes, it has to be admitted, a character’s only reason to be in the book at all is to die; their death is the event that pushes the protagonist into… Read more »