Structuring A Novel

I want to grab a pair of scissors and start cutting up my novel. Maybe I should employ a Dada technique and chuck it up in the air and see how it lands. Where it lands is what the structure will be but I am century too late for this kind of idea and there…

Reasons To Be Cheerful

I am going to start with a concern. Covid-19 has been horrific for the UK, there is no way of getting around this or deny it. It has though shown the potential for us to stamp down on pollution and my concern is that many will see this as the answer to #ClimateChange. That it…

Lincoln Review

Great to be included in the first edition of the Lincoln Review with some fabulous poets and writers. You can see the full issue here.

Sound of Silence

I could do the normal British thing which is to apologise profusely but at the same time give off a passive aggressive undertone that makes you want to say, ‘sorry’ every time I punctuate the apology with a puncture. As in, ‘I am so sorry that I have not been blogging. I have been busy…

Knight of the Thimble

New publication day, find my latest short story at Mechanics Institute Review. I hope you enjoy and let me know what you think in the comments below.

Mosaic Novel

I am trying to use the blog today to piece together ideas; no I won’t be sharing any for the novel I am writing – it’s not because I think you will manhandle each one of them against their will into a derivative piece of work that you want to get published (by the way,…

From the Short Story to the Novel

What differs between the short story and the novel for me? I am not talking about the reading of them or even the mechanics of them. There will be no twee creative writing tips that announce that the short story is a moment and the novel, geology. I find all that advice to be rather…

Transhumanism

Finishing the second draft of my story and considering a few things. Memory is like a river and transhumanism comes at a cost. Seem like two very different ideas. If you upgrade or more than likely are upgraded by someone else who has vested interests in what you will become then that river of memory…

The Body Divine

As a disabled writer with spinal damage that has lead to scoliosis, nerve death, missing discs, sciatic pain and arthritis I have begun to explore the idea of the body in my writing. Sometimes you don’t realise that something is underpinning your work until you step back and evaluate it. We have had a body…

I Love Dystopia

It should be written on a t-shirt, made in a sweat shop, shipped from a country were people are subjugated through religion, politics or the colour black. Dystopia is a clarion call in literature, less and less a cracked mirror held up to society and more and more the truth writ large so people will…

Kim Wilde and Genre

Kim Wilde is on Top of the Pops singing You Came in a little black dress and with the most uncomfortable backing band ever, as if they’re more happy to be in bank suits than in denim. It’s the year I really get going as a writer, I am thirteen and in the last few…

Between the Cracks

A common complaint about writing is time. As in, ‘I haven’t enough time’. Yet, I bet if I sat you down and audited your day I could find moments, I could find minutes that add up to a sizeable chunk of time. Let’s start with lunch, so many British people eat their lunch at their…