Tag: featured
Representing Refugees
One of the things I’ve noticed on returning from any big trip is that most people aren’t that interested in hearing about what’s happened. They don’t want a half-hour diatribe on all the stuff I’ve done and seen nor even hear stories that moved me. There’s no time for all that. When I said I […]
Write Your Query FIRST for a Better Novel
Ah, the dreaded query letter. Writers bemoan, obsess about and labor over them—not realizing that this one-page document may be one of the greatest tools at their disposal. In fact, I’d argue that you shouldn’t wait until you’re finished drafting your novel to craft your query letter. Whether you’ve just started a new book or […]
Method Writing: When Imagining Just Isn’t Enough
I sat at my computer, poking myself in the throat. Not the throat exactly, but the soft pucker just above the sternum, a place called the jugular notch. As I tapped, the muscle below my ribcage tingled queasily and bile fizzled up my throat. I wrote: He doubled over, feeling as if he’d swallowed a […]
Stargazing Into Your Mind
An appreciation of stars shining across the cosmos is not just for astronomy or science fiction fans, sometimes a centerfold across Cosmopolitan magazine will do. On a dreary, disappointing day, many of us are tempted to wonder what it would be like to live the life of someone else, especially someone rich, powerful, physically fit, […]
The Hunger Within
Another winter approaches, another book of mine has been published. If you had have asked me this time last year I never would have imagined that in the space of twelve months I would have two crime fiction novels under my belt along with a short story published in a number one bestselling anthology! The […]
How a Casual Stroll in the City of Ramallah Inspired a Novel About Graffiti
“Graffiti is ugly” I used to think. I would walk by it and shake my head in dismay. Anti-social. Shows disregard for community. All those scrawled spray-painted and incoherent messages on public walls made me feel an inkling of anger. “What makes anybody think they can scribble just anywhere?” We all have heard of the […]
A Literary Novelist’s Blog: Six Tips
Eimear McBride doesn’t have one. Nor do Deborah Levy, Rachel Cusk and Sarah Ladipo Manyika. Anakana Schofield does, but it has only been updated three times this year. What don’t these women have? A blog. Hell, Cusk doesn’t even have a website. Conventional wisdom says these women can’t possibly have got published. But they have. […]
A Day in the Life of a Publisher, with SilverWood Books
SilverWood Books (silverwoodbooks.co.uk) provides self-funding authors with professional book production services, wholesale and retail book distribution, and a high level of support. Publishing Assistant Rowena Ball takes us through a typical day in the life of a dynamic publishing team… Morning Continuous communication is vital, and the day begins with running through our production schedule […]
Women Writers I Admire
It’s a dangerous subject to draw a writer into, the question of books and writers they admire. I don’t think I’m generalising when I say that writers love books. We surround ourselves with them, we eagerly devour our favourite author’s latest offerings. We write about them, we tweet and blog about them, we spend every […]
My Bossy, Imaginary Readers
With the publication of my memoir Not Exactly Love, I’m eager to meet my flesh-and-blood readers, the ones who might nod their heads as I speak, who ask me questions, who might hand me a book to sign. It’s a bit unnerving though; in the book, I break decades of silence to tell the story […]
Recent Comments