I found myself overbooked this week. This is because I’m a moron and didn’t use my calender. When you start writing you’re adding an extra part time job to your life (if you’re doing this seriously) and it is very easy to overload yourself with responsibilities.

Set reminders on devices that go ding! when there’s stuff*.

This goes double if you have kids. Your kids will not be understanding if you are late to pick them up from school because you got stuck into writing your protagonist’s seduction of the love interest.

* I sort of half stole this from Dr Who. I hope Matt Smith will forgive me.

If you’re reading my blog, you probably want to make a go of this writing thing. Since I’m titanically unqualified to advise anyone how to make a career of writing, I’ve been observing writers who are qualified to comment, and I’ve noticed a few things. One of the big things among successful writers is their willingness to invest in themselves. This doesn’t necessarily mean paying for a writing/synopsis/query writing course, but it does mean that they are willing to invest time and of often money in becoming better at what they do.

I chose to do CJ Redwine’s Synopsis Course. It didn’t cost much, but it’s money I could feasibly have spent on pie. Instead I chose to invest in my writing career and improve something in my writing life I’m not all that good at.

It doesn’t matter what you invest in yourself (although I recommend both time and money if you can), as long as you do it. It will be worth it.

Tags: Quick Tips

Yes, I’m going to try and do these every day.

Writing is like getting in/staying in shape. If you write today, writing tomorrow will be slightly easier, and it will also be slightly better. The longer you go without writing, the harder it will be to restart.

Conversely, if you force yourself to write twelve hours a day, you’re going to get burned out. Start slow, build yourself up until you’re happy with your daily word count.*

* Please consult your writing guru before starting a new program.

Tags: advice, Quick Tips

I sometimes stumble across quick writing tips that don’t justify a full multi-page ramble, but are worthy on their own. I’m going to start posting these as often as I can, and I’ll expand on the ones I understand well enough to talk about in depth.

So…

Quick Writing Tip # 1 Poetry

I know. Poetry is for people in weird hats who like daffodils.

It’s also for writers.

Want to improve your writing’s rhythm? Your word selection? Want to read some bawdy Welsh tales that will make you blush to the roots of your hair?

Read poetry. Write poetry. Buy a book called the The Ode Less Travelled by Stephen Fry.

You don’t have to tell anyone, your secret is safe with me.

So I will leave you with this, because it’s awesome. It also neatly sums up my views on life:

see more Lolcats and funny pictures

Well…except for the Fancy Feast part.

I’m lazy.

I also do too much.

This is a bad combination.

I don’t know what got into me, but I finally snapped and decided to do something to enforce a deadline on myself.  I need to get this novel done and polished and I’ve been that dreadful; combination of slack and busy that means a low word count for me.

So… I spent some money. I’m going to fly to San Diego in 2011 to attend the World Fantasy Convention. It’s a literary convention geared towards agents, authors and publishers. Several writers I’ve been in touch with have gotten book deals by pitching their books at World Fantasy, and I’m hoping to do the same. At the very least, I’ll get to shake some hands and make some contacts.

But, despite all the money that has been or will be spent, I’m not going if the book isn’t done. And I mean DONE. Edited. Polished. Looked at by other, smarter people.

Everyone is motivated in different ways. Some people are motivated by cheer leading and the positive approach. I’m motivated by consequences. They don’t have to be good or bad per say, but there has to be a consequence to my actions or I’ll just sit on the couch and watch Joss Whedon shows.

So… in the interests of not missing out on an amazing trip, I’m going back to writing now.

What motivates you?

Tags: Motivation, World Fantasy Convention

I have done another book review at long last. You can check it out right here. It’s of Dan Wells excellent follow up to I am NOT A Serial Killer, Mr Monster.

If you’d like to read a review of I am NOT a Serial Killer, I can hook you up with that too.

I’m still trucking along with my book The Downside of Being Dead. It’s undergone another big change, but it’s slowly coming together.

I’m also hoping to sort out a video camera to so I can do some vidcasts. Time shall tell whether or not I can scrape together enough cash to make that happen.

More soon.

So I managed to catch Pneumonia.

For the pople that know me this actually wont come as too much of a shock. To my friends I known by variations on ‘That Guy that Gets Sick All The Time, Sicko, Sicky, Sicky Sicky Mc Sick Sick and Duck and Cover!’

That last one is a reference to something else, but it’s not that important.

I did the MC Work for my Dad’s book launch party just before I fell ill (I mean JUST before. I thanked everyone who came and six hours later I was bedridden). The book launch went great and I hope to get some photo’s up on here once I can leave my house.

Because I’m so ill I wanted to do a quick post on writing whilst ill. As writers who don’t do this full time we tend to squeeze writing around the other events of our days. There’s a real misconception, even amongst writers, that writing doesn’t take a lot out of you.

This is wrong. At least it is in my experience.

Writing is really good fun, but it does take a lot of energy. If you’ve ever noticed how drained you can feel after writing an intense scene then you have some idea of what I;m talking about. If you;re sick putting your body and your mind through something intese, or profound could drain your already low resources.

Instead, I suggest working on outline or story bible stuff. It’s not as taxing, gives you all the nice feel good creation chemicals I;m convinced we’re all addicted too, and if you’re hallucinating due to high fever you might just come up with a really freaky story idea.

Right, that’s my bit for today, I’m going back to watching Dr Who*.

* If you want a great example of horror/thriller/adventure writing for the screen that could have worked almost as well on the page go watch the episode “Blink” of the last season of Dr Who.

My cat Stubbs died a couple of nights ago. She was my writing partner for the last year, always content to sit next to me curled up on her blanket and making feel a bit less like a shut in with a computer and a zombie fixation.

RIP