All going somewhere wonderful – discussing creative energy with @AndrewVerlaine

I’m really glad Dave and I kept our DVD player. If you watch movies and boxsets on DVD you get something that isn’t usually available on streamed versions – the extras, with interviews about the making of the piece, or the casting, or the design, or the adaptation for the screen. Sometimes they’re a bit throwaway, sometimes they’re deep and insightful, but all have a sense of creative energy, a love of the project, a pride in the artform, and a sense of a lot of talents coming together.

Publishing a book is like that too. Perhaps there are fewer people involved than on a movie or a TV show, but there’s still a sense of great and noble effort. Well, I think it’s noble.

That’s one of the things I’m talking about in this interview, with satirical and speculative fiction author Andrew Verlaine on his show Publishing Talks.

Andrew is at the beginning of his publishing journey, with a novel scheduled for 2025. We talk about the surprises he might face in the production process, the different experts who contribute to the polish of a published book, like the different trades in a filmed work. We talk about the constructive nature of editing, how a good editor will help you discover your superpowers and also your blind spots – and then, with luck, open your eyes. And about the finicky and fine work of making something as complex and wondrous as a book, which a person will one day read and experience, will keep on their shelf, will buy for a friend as a gift, and might never forget.

Come and hear our discussion here.

There’s a lot more about writing in my Nail Your Novel books – find them here. If you’re curious about my own work, find novels here and my travel memoir here. And if you’re curious about what’s going on at my own writing desk, here’s my latest newsletter. You can subscribe to future updates here.

The push-pull in a person’s soul – how to keep readers desperately hooked. Interview with Mary Kole @Kid_Lit

Mary Kole has long been a legend in my online writing life. I’ve followed her since I first ventured onto the internet of writing, when she was a literary agent and wrote one of the smartest blogs about storytelling. Now she has a podcast for writers – as well as a consultancy – and I was massively chuffed when she invited me to guest.

We had a huge, wide-ranging chat about storycraft which boiled down to this – what keeps the reader hooked? Could we identify any qualities that work for any kind of story – no matter what the genre, even in the absence of a clear genre?

Reader, we did. (See the headline to this post.)

We talk about identifying the core of a story – because most ideas start as an intriguing muddle. They lead us and frustrate us, and for a long time we might not know where we’re going – just that this idea is eating our brain, directing us to books we might not usually read, movies we might not usually choose to watch. We also talk about small but vital aspects of craft – pacing, word shapes, learning from other writers, change in a story and when to give the reader a breather.

We talk about coaching writers – the art of wriggling inside an author’s mind to help them create the book they really want, even if they’re not clear what that is. And about ghostwriting – another kind of mind-reading, with the added challenge of absorbing another person’s experience to write the book they’d write if they could. (Did you know I have a course for ghostwriters?)

We’re editors too, so we talk about switching hats from writer brain to editor brain – and the great big interzone where the two overlap.

You can listen to us talk about all this and more, or if you prefer to read, there’s a full transcript. Step this way.

There’s a lot more about writing in my Nail Your Novel books – find them here. If you’re curious about my own work, find novels here and my travel memoir here. And if you’re curious about what’s going on at my own writing desk, here’s my latest newsletter. You can subscribe to future updates here.

Do androids dream of electric horses? Creating the future – interview about Lifeform Three at @AuthorsElectric @AuthorKatherine

In 2013, I designed the future for my novel Lifeform Three. I wrote about robots that were more human than people, people who were slaves of their devices, and creatures who wanted to escape the algorithms and find real connection and meaningful lives.

Today I’m at the Authors Electric blog, talking to fantasy and historical fiction author Katherine Roberts about the making of Lifeform Three. (Katherine guested on my Undercover Soundtrack series a while back – ‘A ballad of fairyland, but not sweet and innocent’. Find it here.)

Katherine and I discuss key fundamentals of writing a futuristic, science fiction, dystopia or speculative novel: creating a viewpoint character who is non-human yet relatable; designing a world with plausible social systems by figuring out the priorities of the rule makers; choosing names that reinforce the story’s themes and resonance; and lacing the text with warnings that are subtle and not preachy.

So, do androids dream of electric horses? We also discuss homage to favourite books – Lifeform Three is, in part, a love letter to the pony stories I devoured as a kid. (Apologies; I’m bringing you horses for the second time this month. The next post won’t be horsey.)

Do come over.

And here’s a bonus! A bit of bookish chat with Tim Lewis on his channel Book Chat Live. He asked me to make an Amazon wishlist with favourite books that have influenced my own writing. That’s quite a wide brief because I’ve written memoirs, contemporary fiction, SF and writing craft books, but there are literary touchstones for each of those, which you might like if you like my kind of book. Tim has a wildcard question at the end – choose anything you like from the Amazon store and say why you’d like someone to buy it for you. Ever since, I’ve been bombarded with adverts for the thing I chose. People, the algorithms are watching.

Find the show here.

There’s a lot more about writing in my Nail Your Novel books – find them here. If you’re curious about my own work, find novels here and my travel memoir here. And if you’re curious about what’s going on at my own writing desk, here’s my latest newsletter. You can subscribe to future updates here.

Two opportunities for shortform writers, a treat for music lovers and a little interview

Do you write shortform? I have two opportunities for you.

If your forte is piercingly, wincingly, blazingly short, the 50 Give or Take series from Vine Leaves Press wants your work. The editor is my friend Elaina Battista-Parsons.

Does Elaina sound familiar? You’re right. She came to my blog to talk about her memoir Italian Bones In The Snow.

If 50 words is too tight and you like to be thoughtful at greater length, Elaina still wants your goodness. She’s also an editor at Cordelia Magazine.

Go here to her blog and follow the trails.

Elaina also invited me for a brief chat about my writing, my favourite music, my favourite decade and advice for new writers. In the same post she featured the work of pop musicologist Quentin Harrison, and that’s an inspired pairing – Quentin has a series of books (Record Redux) on pop icons, explored through their songs, and I mainlined books on bands when I wrote my novel Ever Rest. We were destined to meet.

Do come over.

Device addiction, how we treat ‘others’, and a love of horses – talking to @authorgreene about World Fantasy Award longlisted Lifeform Three

I’m thrilled to share this interview with Randal Eldon Greene, who wanted to discuss my World Fantasy Award longlisted novel Lifeform Three.

We talk about the authors who inspired me, the novel’s issues and questions. Actually, where do we start with that? I love novels that pose questions! Here are some of them – what makes us human, how we are persuaded to conform even though we have free will and rights, how our devices enable us but also program us, how nature and animals are an essential escape, how we treat people who aren’t like us, why Ray Bradbury is a genius, toxic capitalism and corporate bullying, climate change, visions of the future and places I would be sad to lose. Here’s more about Lifeform Three if you want to know about it.

Randal’s also a writer, so we also get into the practical stuff – how I develop a complex set of themes and ideas into a readable story, how I juggle creative writing with other work that uses those same faculties, and why writing is always a long game for me. Do come over.

If you’d like help with your writing, my Nail Your Novel books are here. If you’re curious about my own work, find novels here and my travel memoir here. And if you’re curious about what’s going on at my own writing desk, here’s my latest newsletter. You can subscribe to future updates here.

The accidental way to build a writing career – interview at @AnnalisaCrawf

How did I get where I am? I’ve asked that question of a number of authors (in my series, How I Made My Writing Career). One of my interviewees, Annalisa Crawford, has returned the invitation and today I find myself in her interview chair.

I’m probably a typical writer – introverted, at home in my own head, not the kind of person to thrust myself into the spotlight or to think I had anything significant to say. But somehow I ended up with my name on book covers, and writing novels for others, and even helping other writers to grow up into authors.

We discuss how that happened, the jobs I did that pointed the way, and how I discovered what kind of writing I should be doing.

Do come over.

If you’d like help with your writing, my Nail Your Novel books are here. If you’re curious about my own work, find novels here and my travel memoir here. And if you’re curious about what’s been going on on at my own writing desk, here’s my latest newsletter. You can subscribe to future updates here.

What’s literary fiction and how do you sell it? Interview on the Self-Publishing Show @SelfPubForm

What’s literary fiction? Today I’m on Mark Dawson and James Blatch’s Self-Publishing Show, wrangling this question.

We talk about definitions, of course. Where literary and genre overlap. What literary isn’t. We also talk about marketing strategies for literary, and about my work as an editor, ghostwriter and writing coach.

Find it here.

If you’d like help with your writing, my Nail Your Novel books are here. If you’re curious about my own creative writing, find novels here and my travel memoir here. And if you’re curious about what’s been going on on at my own writing desk, here’s my latest newsletter. You can subscribe to future updates here.

How to become an author (and how to stay one) – interview at Write-Hearted with @MisterWakefield

How do you become an author? I realised, while recording this interview, that for me it had two elements. There was an Outer Me, who didn’t know what I wanted to do in life, and an Inner Me who did. If only they could talk to each other, but they didn’t, and that was the problem.

Outer Me went to school, took advice about careers, wondered how on earth I’d earn a living. Inner Me spoke only in Yes and No, like an oracle. No, you don’t want to do marketing or accountancy or any of those graduate careers.

So what should I do? said Outer Me.

When you find the right thing, said Inner Me, I’ll let you know.

One day, after being fired from a job to which I was very unsuited, I saw an advert for a temporary proofreader at a local publisher. I arrived there, a place devoted to the making of books. Yes, said Inner Me. This will do nicely.

That’s one of the subjects we’re talking about on this podcast, Write-Hearted, hosted by book coach and author Stuart Wakefield. It was fun!

We also talked about –

Ghostwriting versus writing the books of your art and soul (BTW, I have a professional course for ghostwriters)

What I learned from working with the strictest editors in the business

How to solve plot holes and keep writing when the muse is AWOL

How to manage your writing and editing so you can make measurable and consistent progress, even if the book is taking you years (like mine do)

The rewards of mentoring

How to live with another writer (and not kill each other).

You can find Stuart on Twitter @MisterWakefield. Watch our interview on YouTube or listen on Write-Hearted’s Spotify page. Do come over.

If you’re looking for detailed writing advice, my Nail Your Novel books are full of tips. If you’re curious about my own creative writing, find novels here and my travel memoir here. And if you’re curious about what’s been going on on at my own writing desk, here’s my latest newsletter. You can subscribe to future updates here.

How do you like to talk about books? Themes, juxtapositions and the complication of being human – an interview at Late Last Night Books @L8NiteBooks

I have a Bachelor’s degree in English literature, but if I’m honest, I didn’t enjoy the course. However, I loved studying English literature in the final two years of school, at A level. (Note for non-Brits: you probably call this high school, age 16-18.)

My degree disappointed me because it was too wideswept; it seemed chiefly to value an author for the way they represented a historical period, a concern of the age or a step in the evolution of a form. I was disappointed because it gave little priority to the literary work itself – the novel, poem or play as a creation of beauty and power, enduring resonance and relevance.

But A level was mainly about appreciating the work. While context wasn’t ignored, each novel, poem or play was examined in its own right, as an entity worth detailed attention. We learned to notice how the author might be playing with our hearts and minds. We discussed themes and juxtapositions and narrative devices. We might have found patterns the author did not intend; we might have overthought things. That did not matter; decoding this richness was part of the joy, a quest to discover why this work enspelled us so. We were discovering a wondrous thing – the author’s craft.

I still love this. It’s my favourite way to talk about a book.

If you like that too, you might enjoy my interview here at Late Last Night Books,

The subject is Ever Rest and my interrogator is Garry Craig Powell, a former creative writing professor and author of the prizewinning short story collection Stoning The Devil (which you might remember from his appearance on The Undercover Soundtrack).

We talk about juxtapositions. Why I put this with that. The man frozen in the ice, as young as the day he went in, and the people who remember that day and are now 20 years older.

We talk about themes and narrative aims. We talk about places where we can be gods (playing music to a crowd of 10,000) and places where we are too fragile to survive (the top of Everest). We talk about love and death and loss, the massive complication of being human. And things I wasn’t aware of until Garry asked. Do come over.

Do bring your own questions too if you’ve already read the novel – or you can drop them in the comments here.

Would you enjoy Ever Rest? Here are a few reviews to help you decide.

If you’d like more concentrated writing advice, my Nail Your Novel books are full of tips. If you’re curious about my own creative writing, find novels here and my travel memoir here. And if you’re curious about what’s been going on on at my own writing desk, here’s my latest newsletter. You can subscribe to future updates here.

On nailing your novel, finding your blind spots and writing with artistic integrity. And a few horses. Interview with @CarlyKadeAuthor

Today I’m at the online home of Carly Kade, an award-winning author and creativity coach who helps authors start and develop their writing careers.

We talk about writing, writing processes and deepening your craft by learning about your own blind spots – and strengths.

Carly was interested in my career as a ghostwriter. We talk about that and about the challenges of discovering my own voice after writing in the voices (and souls) of others. (I have a professional ghostwriting course if you want to know more.)

Whoa. You’ll have spotted the word ‘equestrian’ in the description. Carly’s own writing revolves around her lifelong love of horses – she writes the In The Reins series of equestrian romances. So we compare notes on being rider-writers, the particular challenges of horse life, how this affects our approach to writing problems… and probably the odd heartwarming anecdote. A mention of my novel Lifeform Three, too.

Our interview is also available on video – follow this link to find us on her YouTube channel. Though I’m afraid we couldn’t bring our horses to our computers for the recording so these pictures will have to do instead. Do trot over.

Meanwhile, I have a new novel out this month –Ever Rest. Find it in all print and ebook formats.

What’s it like? Here are a few reviews to help you decide.

If you’d like more concentrated writing advice, my Nail Your Novel books are full of tips. If you’re curious about my own creative writing, find novels here and my travel memoir here. And if you’re curious about what’s been going on on at my own writing desk, here’s my latest newsletter. You can subscribe to future updates here.