Authors Electric

Somewhere recently, (the fact that I don’t offer you a link to who and where it was is down to my laziness), I heard or read an interview with an actor who talked about needing to have a ‘dual consciousness’. In crude terms, he meant inhabiting the consciousness of the character he was playing but simultaneously being aware (as himself) of the mechanics of what he was doing – the director’s instructions, the audience’s reactions and so on. And I’ve frequently said the same sort of thing about how writers operate. It applied particularly strongly as I was writing the last few pages of my most recent novel (‘recent’ as in 2016. See above: laziness). Those pages covered the resolution of the relationship between the two lovers in my story. I knew and know them well. They’d already lived through my novel The Figurehead , where they met and their love started to grow, and part of the reason for writing its sequel was that some readers had actually said they wanted to know what happe...

A Sterkarm Kiss by Susan Price '...There had been a lot more dancing, and drinking and eating, and the evening light that came through the door... had flickered into dusk before the fiddlers and the pipers began to play, once more, the tune called 'Come to the Wedding.' As they played, they bore down on Per and Joan, and people cheered and clapped and stamped. It was time that the wedded pair were put to bed...           Mistress Crosar put her mouth so close to Joan’s ear that it tickled, and shouted, “Undo thine garters!”           Joan froze. They were at the back of the dancing hall, near the benches. People were everywhere. How could she pull up her skirts and undo her garters?..           "Oh, come here, lass!” her aunt said, and turned her round, tutting at how slow and clumsy Joan was in moving. Other women gathered round he...

(The following effusion is by Nicholas Fowler, eighteenth century poet, scientist, philosopher, wit and owner of Coswold, a splendid and renowned estate, who was miraculously reincarnated in June 2013 for the sole purpose of writing it.) The summons having woken me, I hied, Caring no whit for time or even tide, Toward the north, where Solway runs its course Through Scotia's windy plains where lies its source, Where Devil's Porridge boils, where fields are bleak And Burns the ploughman makes his rough verse speak. My spirits droop as further still I tread,  When suddenly, like Lazarus from his bed, They rise, as Gretna's   purlieus do me face. For here a miracle I see, a blessed place, A sanctuary, alive with tree and flower, With many a bubbling stream and bosky bower,  Colourful, lush, abundant, leafy, ferny,  Another Hidcote, Sissinghurst, Giverny.  Nature and man together made this scene. What beauty now? What barb'rousness has been? ...

Susan Jane Smith B.Sc           When is a Kindle not a Kindle?   When it’s surpassed by a Kobo I’d say.   I’ve been a electric author for a couple of years now and publishing e-books via Kindle Direct Publishing on Amazon.   I have always loved my Kindle.   I think I could love a Kindle Fire even more!           Yet, I’ve been seduced by a Kobo Mini.   It was a decent price I thought and so small that I felt I could justify having it to keep in my handbag.   When I walked past a W H Smith it was in the window gleaming up at me.   Beckoned, I went in and simply could not resist it.             My h usband was not impressed as he could see no reason for a second e-book reader.   My excuse to him and myself is that I have recently paid Matt Horner at ebookpartnership to turn two of my books into epub...