Authors Electric

I enjoy reading Brian Bilston’s poems on Facebook. One of my favourites is his Mnemonic , where the last line implies January goes on for ever and ever, amen. He has a point! January does drag. How is the New Year going so far ?   It took me a while to resume my usual writing routine after a lovely Christmas break but equally that gave me a “soft start”. January is when I book my place at The Writers’ Summer School, Swanwick , which is a major highlight of my year. It is held in August at The Hayes, Swanwick, Derbyshire. I enjoy a wide range of workshops and courses (with full board accommodation). Naturally I meet old friends, make new ones, and hear wonderful evening speakers. I’ve led courses here too. Booking Swanwick cheers me during the dark days of January. It matters to have something to look forward to writing wise, whether it is booking a conference, or knowing you will finish the first draft of a project by X date. (Seeing the finishing line is always a good enco...

  I’m just coming to the end of a week off work – got to use my annual leave up somehow, and my parents were up from England. As usual, they booked a small cottage near us, in the grounds of Cockenzie House, and despite the weather being chilly at best, we had a great time catching up and just generally relaxing (and drinking copious amounts of gin, but that’s another story). They’re away back to Yorkshire now, and it’s back to work for me by the time this post goes live, but it got me thinking about writing in a couple of ways: is it imperative to write every day, and if so, what, exactly, is the definition of writing? Big questions, but I thought it might be interesting to explore them in this blog post (albeit in a very small way). Writing every day is something you will hear again and again from many sources. I’ve heard it from other writers; I’ve read it in magazine articles and how-to books; I’ve listened to interviews where it invariably comes up. For years, I ...