Authors Electric

  For the past three years I have been an editor for an online magazine for women; for the last six months I have been the Editor in Chief and Publisher. I enjoyed every minute of that experience but increasingly my passion for helping other writers grew and I knew it was time for pastures new. Therefore I retired the previous magazine (the last issue was published today) and a brand new magazine will emerge blazing on to the scene in August this year; that's 2023 in case you are reading this in the future. I am excited about my new venture and thought I would point out a few things I have learned along the way.  Choose a Title Choosing a title is a lot harder than you think. Seriously, every single thing we came up with was already taken in some format - company, instagram handle, twitter handle, Facebook page - you name it, every single name was gone. Four stressful days and hundreds of names later and, rather than turning to the bottle, I turned to AI. Whatever you think of...

As you read this, National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo as it is fondly called, will be just over half way through. Writers all over the world will collectively have written millions of words and will be storming towards their final goal of 50,000. Some writers will already have completed this number of words and may have stopped at that point or may be carrying on to write an entire novel. Some writers may be struggling to move their word count forward and that magical 50,000 seems to be far in the distance. I speak to everyone today but mainly to those who are struggling.  To those of you who are storming ahead, congratulations, I applaud you. This is a fabulous achievement and you should give yourself a pat on the back and some extra chocolate (other treats are available). At the end of November you can download that winners certificate and claim your winner goodies. You might even buy yourself a NaNoWriMo Winner T-Shirt. Why not, you deserve it after all your hard work. To...

My head is still spinning from discovering My book Killer's Craft, was sitting at number 3 on the bestseller shelf in Waterstones. This was alongside some highly respected writers. How did I find myself there is a question I am still asking. The answer is, I am not entirely sure. However, in the interests of helping others I will try and work it out. Join me in my quest.  I think the answer partly lies In the fact that I am quite a social person, and fairly confident. The story starts about 10 months ago when I went into my local Waterstones bookshop. For those outwith the UK, this is a large bookshop chain. I asked if I could hold a book launch for my first book, Killer's Countdown. This was despite the fact that I had nothing to show them other than a photo of the cover on my mobile phone. I must have been persuasive because the manager agreed to take a risk on a debut author and agreed. I then invited people to come along to the launch. Over a hundred people cam...

As a writer I have been thinking about the different ways in which we write. Readers often think that writers fall into two camps, those who use a keyboard and those who write by hand. Indeed many writers would, themselves, say they are one or the other. Is this in fact true, and if true, is it always the best way? I am knee deep in editing at the moment and this entails sitting at a computer and going through the entire novel. I am sure most writers will agree, that it can be long and tiring work. Still, it is one of the most crucial aspects of writing a book. However, editing can, and should, be done in different ways. Once I have finished the edits on my computer, I will print the book out and will then go through it on paper. I will move to a completely different area of the house. Using another medium, and in a new place, can bring a fresh approach to the editing process. I will be wielding my pen and highlighting any areas which need to be changed or culled.  One...

You may be somewhat confused at the moment as the title of my blog suggests I will be talking about characters, and here I am talking about reading. Never fear, you were right in the first place. Just as no two readers ever read the same book, no two writers ever write the same character. It would be interesting to give a group of writers the following exercise: Female, 24 years old, quiet, mousy brown hair and glasses. Write a story about this character.  I can assure you that no two stories would be the same and the character would come over differently in each one.  As writers we often set off thinking we know our characters well. I, following advice in a book on writing, answered 100 questions about the characters in my series. I thought I knew them intimately and could answer any questions about them. Wrong. During the writing of a novel the characters take on a life of their own. You want them to do one thing and they want to do the complete opposite. I...

I have recently taken up the role of Webmaster for the Association of Christian Writers. In my enthusiasm to develop the role I had the bright idea of setting up a collective blog. This would involve 27 ACW members being regular contributors, and the other days of the month being open to guest bloggers. The blog, More Than Writers ,  has now been running for one exhilarating month. So what have I learnt from this process? I started by inviting members to be regular contributors. They were chosen to provide an eclectic selection of bloggers, each of whom would bring their own unique talents, and spin, to the blog. This has worked well and the posts have been varied and interesting. However, I have learned one lesson. As this is the blog of the Association of Christian Writers, many members want to be involved. This can be difficult with only 31 days in the month. I may have to look at changing regular contributors, after 6 months or a year, to give others a chance. At t...

I've started the post today with a photo of Glamis Castle. This is the childhood home of Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother and is situated near Dundee in Scotland. Castles are something that we Scots seem to do extremely well. The other is using a language which sounds very bonnie indeed. There's nothing like the sound of a Scot in full flow, be it with the lilt of the Highlands and Islands or the strong accents of Glasgow or Dundee. However, these melodic sounds are accompanied by words which may mean nothing to a reader outside the area.  For example, I have a bonnie wee burn at the end of my garden. A burn would be called a stream anywhere else in the UK. In the middle of Dundee, we have a hill called the Law. Law is an old Scots word for hill. Therefore, the proper name is The Law. As I write crime books this could be somewhat confusing if I said "there's been a body found on The Law". So I have to say the Law Hill. I am sure you are getting my dri...

          As a writer I spend a lot of time on social media, and I mean a lot of time. It is amazing how this displacement activity can turn into hours rather than minutes. However, as a writer, social media is also a necessity to reach out to readers. So, an important part of a writer's life. I am on all the usual ones such as Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Pinterest and Instagram. However, one thing I have done is sign up with my writer name to as many social media sites as I can. This means that should I ever want to use them, my name is available. They just sit there in cyberspace waiting for me to engage one day. One such site was Wordeo. I had little to do with this but decided to give it a go. It is an app which turns your words into images. Yesterday I decided to do this and within seconds I had a little video which I could share. The images come from Getty Images, but you can also tweak the clips with your own images and others fro...

Wendy Jones talks about her book, Killer's Countdown Things have been very exciting for me recently as my first book, Killer's Countdown, was launched in November last year. If you are about to launch your first book, or are even writing your first book, I can assure you it is a heady feeling. It is also a whirlwind ride. In the midst of all this euphoria I also had to bear in mind that somehow or other I had to let the public know that my book was out and readily available. Now that was a sobering thought. So what have I learned about marketing in the midst of all the fun and excitement. I thought I would write this in order to help others. 1. Gradually build the level of interest. Having been reading about writing and marketing for some time, I was aware that marketing starts long before the book is hot off the press. It is important to build up excitement and anticipation so that people are waiting for it's arrival. The minute I started writing the book it wa...