The message is simple: everyone has a story to tell and sharing it can be a source of pleasure and power.
So are you writing today? And if so, what are you writing about?
I'm writing about vampires. ;-)
ACE Gamebooks: The Gamebook Podcast
The Art of ACE Gamebooks Volume One Coming Soon
Wednesday, 26 June 2019
National Writing Day 2019
The message is simple: everyone has a story to tell and sharing it can be a source of pleasure and power.
So are you writing today? And if so, what are you writing about?
I'm writing about vampires. ;-)
Monday, 24 June 2019
Thought for the Day
~ Gareth Powell, author
Friday, 21 June 2019
Summer Solstice: Shakespeare Vs Cthulhu
This Summer Solstice, why not treat yourself to a series of short stories featuring the works of the Bard merged with the horrors of H P Lovecraft's Cthulhu mythos?
Shakespeare Vs Cthulhu is available to buy here.
Shakespeare Vs Cthulhu is available to buy here.
Monday, 17 June 2019
Thought for the Day
~ Jen Williams, author of the Winnowing Flame Trilogy
Wednesday, 12 June 2019
Warhammer Wednesday: How I Write OR Procrastination, Procrastination, Procrastination
Today I finished a short story. My fifty-ninth, in fact. And while I'm still high on the adrenaline rush of having finished, I thought it might be interesting to share my writing process with you.
The first thing you have to understand is that I am an inefficient writer. I have tried to changed this over the years, but in that time I have come to realise (and grudging accept) that this is just how it is for me. By the time I have finished the first draft of a manuscript, whether it's a novel, a gamebook or a story, it will be roughly 150% as long as the final draft will be.
Take, for example, the short story I completed today. It was commissioned to be 8,000 words long. The first draft ran to 12,000, but once I had finished editing it, it was just over 8,000. This is because I am very indecisive and my first draft is full of all the alternative ways of phrasing things that I could use, and which I don't finally decide upon until the final edit. My first drafts are also littered with notes, and prompts, and even ideas for other stories, which don't get taken out until the edit.
It can also take me a long time to finish a short story. For example, I started #59 on Monday 6th May and today is Wednesday 12th June. And here is a list of the days I actually worked on the story:
As you can see, I haven't worked on the story every day since 6th May, but I have been thinking about it a lot during that time. The trouble is, I never have just one project on the go at the same time. While writing #59 I have also been putting the finishing touches to my ACE Gamebook 'TWAS - The Krampus Night Before Christmas, I've prepped and launched a Kickstarter for a role-playing game, I've been organising and promoting Fighting Fantasy Fest 3, I've worked on a proposal for something new, I've tinkered with some other ideas, and I attended the UK Games Expo. On top of all that, I'm also a Dad, with all the commitments that brings, and I have a part-time non-writing-related job.
When I start writing a story, it always takes me a while to get into it, to get to know the characters and feel the flow of the narrative, no matter how detailed a plot synopsis I have prepared before actually putting fingers to keyboard. At this stage of the process, I also find I get easily distracted. The Internet is great for research, but once I open a window to fact-check something for my story before I know it I'm on Facebook, or checking my emails for the umpteenth time, or tweaking my Twitter profile.
Procrastination is also a problem, because getting started is hard. I will sometimes put off writing to do something else, which maybe still needs doing but isn't actually as pressing, such as prepping updates for my blog. However, as you can see from the catalogue of days worked, once I get into the swing of the story I become much more focused, until by the time I'm working on the final edit I will work on nothing else until it is done.
You may be interested to know that I spent 18 hours writing Story #59 and another 11 hours editing (or re-writing, if you like), proofreading, and applying the final corrections before sending the story off. This means that before any royalties the story may earn in the future, I may not have earned big bucks writing it, but at least it's more than the minimum living wage.
Of course, the actual writing is only half the story. Rewriting, as much as I hate it sometimes, is key. As Neil Gaiman says in an advert for his masterclass that keeps popping up on YouTube whenever I try to watch anything*, "The process of doing your second draft is a process of making it look like you knew what you were doing all along."
As well as sorting out all the kinks in the story - discovering a character was carrying one type of weapon at the start, which magically transformed into an entirely different weapon halfway through - it's a chance to put in some foreshadowing, cool character traits, and even some red herrings, just to keep the future reader on their toes.
And I think this is why I feel such elation when I finish the spell-check and save the final draft, before submitting it. Because I don't particularly enjoy the process of rewriting, it feels like an achievement just to have got through it. And maybe it's also because by the end, I feel that I've written something that I think someone else will enjoy reading**.
To give you a better idea of my process, here is a single from Story #59 in all its many and varied forms, from first draft to final draft.
There will doubtless be revisions and re-writes to come, but for the time being I am enjoying the feeling of simply having finished writing something. And so tonight I am going to treat myself by starting work on a new project I've been dying to get my teeth into for ages!
* When I should be writing!
** In this case my fellow scribe Clint Werner in particular!
The first thing you have to understand is that I am an inefficient writer. I have tried to changed this over the years, but in that time I have come to realise (and grudging accept) that this is just how it is for me. By the time I have finished the first draft of a manuscript, whether it's a novel, a gamebook or a story, it will be roughly 150% as long as the final draft will be.
Take, for example, the short story I completed today. It was commissioned to be 8,000 words long. The first draft ran to 12,000, but once I had finished editing it, it was just over 8,000. This is because I am very indecisive and my first draft is full of all the alternative ways of phrasing things that I could use, and which I don't finally decide upon until the final edit. My first drafts are also littered with notes, and prompts, and even ideas for other stories, which don't get taken out until the edit.
It can also take me a long time to finish a short story. For example, I started #59 on Monday 6th May and today is Wednesday 12th June. And here is a list of the days I actually worked on the story:
Monday 6th May
Monday 13th May
Wednesday 22nd May
Thursday 23rd May
Wednesday 5th June
Friday 7th June
Saturday 8th June
Sunday 9th June
Monday 10th June
Tuesday 11th June
Wednesday 12th June
As you can see, I haven't worked on the story every day since 6th May, but I have been thinking about it a lot during that time. The trouble is, I never have just one project on the go at the same time. While writing #59 I have also been putting the finishing touches to my ACE Gamebook 'TWAS - The Krampus Night Before Christmas, I've prepped and launched a Kickstarter for a role-playing game, I've been organising and promoting Fighting Fantasy Fest 3, I've worked on a proposal for something new, I've tinkered with some other ideas, and I attended the UK Games Expo. On top of all that, I'm also a Dad, with all the commitments that brings, and I have a part-time non-writing-related job.
When I start writing a story, it always takes me a while to get into it, to get to know the characters and feel the flow of the narrative, no matter how detailed a plot synopsis I have prepared before actually putting fingers to keyboard. At this stage of the process, I also find I get easily distracted. The Internet is great for research, but once I open a window to fact-check something for my story before I know it I'm on Facebook, or checking my emails for the umpteenth time, or tweaking my Twitter profile.
Procrastination is also a problem, because getting started is hard. I will sometimes put off writing to do something else, which maybe still needs doing but isn't actually as pressing, such as prepping updates for my blog. However, as you can see from the catalogue of days worked, once I get into the swing of the story I become much more focused, until by the time I'm working on the final edit I will work on nothing else until it is done.
You may be interested to know that I spent 18 hours writing Story #59 and another 11 hours editing (or re-writing, if you like), proofreading, and applying the final corrections before sending the story off. This means that before any royalties the story may earn in the future, I may not have earned big bucks writing it, but at least it's more than the minimum living wage.
Of course, the actual writing is only half the story. Rewriting, as much as I hate it sometimes, is key. As Neil Gaiman says in an advert for his masterclass that keeps popping up on YouTube whenever I try to watch anything*, "The process of doing your second draft is a process of making it look like you knew what you were doing all along."
As well as sorting out all the kinks in the story - discovering a character was carrying one type of weapon at the start, which magically transformed into an entirely different weapon halfway through - it's a chance to put in some foreshadowing, cool character traits, and even some red herrings, just to keep the future reader on their toes.
And I think this is why I feel such elation when I finish the spell-check and save the final draft, before submitting it. Because I don't particularly enjoy the process of rewriting, it feels like an achievement just to have got through it. And maybe it's also because by the end, I feel that I've written something that I think someone else will enjoy reading**.
To give you a better idea of my process, here is a single from Story #59 in all its many and varied forms, from first draft to final draft.
Click to enlarge
There will doubtless be revisions and re-writes to come, but for the time being I am enjoying the feeling of simply having finished writing something. And so tonight I am going to treat myself by starting work on a new project I've been dying to get my teeth into for ages!
* When I should be writing!
** In this case my fellow scribe Clint Werner in particular!
Monday, 10 June 2019
Thought for the Day
~ Isaac Asimov, science fiction author
Friday, 7 June 2019
Gamebook Friday: Forthcoming Gamebook Events
I had a great time at the UK Games Expo 2019, last weekend, and it was great to see so many of you there. Although the Expo is usually the biggest event in my calendar I have some more gamebook-related events coming up, one of which is particularly close to my heart.
Four weeks tomorrow on Saturday 6th July I will be in Oxford for Alice's Day, and giving a lecture* at the Weston Library about Alice's Nightmare in Wonderland.
In August, I will be a guest of Manticon, in Germany, from Thursday 15th - Sunday 18th August.
And not long after that, I will be attending* Fighting Fantasy Fest 3 on Saturday 31st August, at the University of West London in Ealing.
* Or should that be 'running'?
Four weeks tomorrow on Saturday 6th July I will be in Oxford for Alice's Day, and giving a lecture* at the Weston Library about Alice's Nightmare in Wonderland.
In August, I will be a guest of Manticon, in Germany, from Thursday 15th - Sunday 18th August.
And not long after that, I will be attending* Fighting Fantasy Fest 3 on Saturday 31st August, at the University of West London in Ealing.
* Or should that be 'running'?
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