Category Archive

At drinks with colleagues a few days back, the topic came up of my lack of ‘work style’. Of course I wear a suit, so I’m smartly presented, but that always becomes shirt and pants as I’m not comfortable in a jacket. Add that to the fact that I don’t wear a tie (nobody does here) and I often wear white shirts (I’ve got 8 of them), and my ‘work style’ is very bland. No cardigan, waistcoat, jacket or vest, jumper or cummerbund or what have you. So, I borrowed a colleague’s bow tie and gave it a go. What …

The sign says it’s not a bin. So, some kind of medieval urinal?  Answers on a postcard.    Actually if you peer closely at the faded sign, you will it is in fact a mop wringer.  Of course. We saw this at the Guildhall in Leicester- which we headed up to for a day trip today. Actually, it’s a little sad- we booked the trip to go see our latest niece, my sister’s second daughter, named Clover. She was born a week ago and we wanted to go welcome her to the world. But I had a cold. It seemed …

For the past few days I’ve been doubting the opening quarter of Zombie Ocean 3- but today I had s breakthrough. What seemed repetitive and dull became (I hope) gripping and taut. Even if we know what happens. It’s no secret to say the opening part of Zombie Ocean 3 has some substantial overlap with books 1 and 2, just as book 2 had overlap with book 1. Done well, I love this technique in the stories I read/watch, eg: – LOST did it all the time, showing us the same events from new perspectives, tied in to different bits …

This morning on the train into work SY and I totally saw Ugne from Great British Bakeoff!! She was squeezing into the Hammersmith and City line, and I felt the urge to yell out “Hey Ugne!” followed by something like, “Great baking!” I didn’t- perhaps I was too star struck? I should be prepared, honestly, after seeing Richard who nearly won Bakeoff last year just off Russell Square.  “Hey Richard yeah it’s me, great baking!” Of course they don’t know me! 😀 It does feel like you know them though.  I knew moving to London we’d start seeing famous people.  …

What with all the forward and backward stepping with the house of late, and no time set aside for doing purely fun stuff, and the next 3 months of term looming ahead monolithically, I think it’s a good time to contemplate the positives. So, a list of things I’m looking forward to: – Seeing The Martian. I loved the book, generally love Matt Damon, and am expecting great things. – Getting my book covers done. This whole process is always very exciting, like the night before Christmas. There are still two covers in the Ruins War and one upcoming Zombie …

Today I spent many many hours working on the typography for the new Mr. Ruins cover. Hours hunting for good free fonts, then hours more tinkering with colors, font combos, spacing and placement, as well as making mini changes to the image itself. It’s amazing how long it can take to do such little things that nobody will really notice. The image is fantastic. It’s so vampiric! But also- I believe- it has the sci-fi tone. It definitely doesn’t look like vampire romance, which I believe is the dominant part of the genre. Nothing wrong with vam-ro, of course, but …

Its a mini pedestal desk with 7 drawers and two writing-ey bits that pop out above drawers at left and right to afford more writing surface. It is where I will do most of my writing hereon in.     Just behind the chair is my weights bench. Did weights tonight.  Corbyn won the Labour leadership election. People say it’s huge, but the next election is not til 2020, so I’m not convinced it means all that much.  Plus I can’t say I’m anti-austerity. Increase tax on rich people, yes, I’m for that, but pure socialism just seems so mushy to …

Today I thought a lot about what Cerulean’s story arc is. I think knowing that will make the writing flow.  With Amo and Anna it was easy- they were both a kind of love story. Boy/girl, parent/daughter. The arc from beginning to end is straightforward- have someone, lose them, get them back again. That’s not Cerulean’s arc though. If anything, his is about heroism, and straining towards an ideal. So in the start- he loses sight of that ideal. Then he dpends the rest of the story trying to get it back. I’ve been tinkering with the blurb, and thinking …

I had some time today for writing, and I set to it with slogging perseverance. It was not especially fun, more like wrestling with a slippery goat in a vat of cold spaghetti bolognese. There were certainly mini-highs, as I stumbled upon a bit that seemed fun or pointing in the right direction, but there were quite a lot of fumbles and potential missteps. Ah, writing beginnings. They have to do so much work- . And recently, I keep on setting myself challenges to ‘set up’ the story with a pre-story, because I want to ‘situate’ the crazy changes to …

We hired two guys who came round today and brute forced the wardrobes up over the banister and into the room. The banister got pretty scratched up, but paint will fix that. The wardrobes are massive, very deep, but they look great. The TV stand we bought though was damaged, crunched on the corner, so it will hopefully go back for a full refund. It’s weirdly stressful, receiving furniture- even stuff you want and are mostly happy with. I’ve never experienced it before, having never really owned anything.  Maybe it’s a bit like that feeling after you take a cast …