Monthly Archives: June 2015

Sometimes it’s good to know you aren’t alone.

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If you’re a writer, you know it isn’t all play and sunshine, you know that following your dream is not always easy and that your efforts are rarely recognized for what they are.

Those nearest and dearest to you know that you are aiming high, but fail to grasp the sheer size of the journey. Sometimes it seems they are not with you at all.

A massive amount goes into writing a book. It’s not enough just to come up with a plot and characters enough to fill it. There’s an huge amount of understanding necessary for each character and research to do on every angle and profession. Your plot, your characters and their actions must be based in truth for them to come across as realistic and believable.

You have to understand the human animal too, and not just from your own perspective. You have to be in the heads of everybody you write about, villain and hero alike. You have to understand psychology and (depending on the nature of your villain) criminal psychology as well. You have to “be” the police officer, the psychopath, the thief and the victim. You have to understand immense fear or immense loss. Gain too – joy, excitement and love so grand your heart wants to burst. You have to understand adventure and the thrill of danger.

But that’s only part of it. You not only must put that all together and make a story out of it but put it together in such a way that it sings and shines and sweeps your readers up into a world that makes them forget all else, even if just for a time.

So, a very important part of being a writer is learning to be artistic with your words, with pacing and the weave of your story. You want to build pictures in the minds of your readers so that they easily and effortlessly fall under your spell and see what you see and live where you live in the finished result. You not only want to lure them into the world your have crafted, you want them to want to stay there. That’s important! Anyone can put a book down, you want them not to want to put your book down!

Understandably, that mastery over the translation of your mind’s landscape and adventures into words and images your readers can enjoy is the biggest and most important part of your craft.

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First Day of Winter for a Writer (and when the heck am I going to publish Book Three?)

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1st day of Winter

1st day of Winter. Photo taken from my back yard 2015.

 

We had snow on the ground here in our new home in the mountains – a lovely sight to see and a promise of things to come – a good feeling, despite the water pipes frozen solid twice (and not defrosting until mid afternoon).

The house is frequently cold, but that’s to be expected in the early days as we sort out new curtains and carpets, clothing and fuel. A kero heater in my office makes a big difference and so do socks, a scarf and a hat. I have fingerless gloves for typing in, although they feel cumbersome so I rarely use them.

Yes, I’m still typing away and my latest manuscript in the Khekarian series (The Bastard Line) is growing and taking good form. At last the various issues I’ve had with it and the multitude of delays seem to be behind me.

I expect to publish towards the end of the year. This latest book has coincided with an assortment of events that have held me up. The break I took after writing two books back-to-back and an unexpected illness cost me the first six months, which was half my allotted time right there with not a word written. On top of that there have been minor emergencies, delays and the most important move interstate. It’s been a very busy time.

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