Authors Electric

  It’s been a funny month. I’ve been a bit of a party animal (by my standards, anyway) which on the surface should mean less time to write. I’ve also been spending more time on the garden this year, as since moving last year I now have a huge amount of space for flowers and vegetables, as well as a large expanse of lawn to keep tidy. Yet it hasn’t worked out like that. The physical time to write has shrunk, that’s for sure. But I’ve found I’ve been using what time I do have much more productively. All those hours in the garden weeding and mowing and watering and nurturing the plants (and the rhubarb, started from seed last year, is now almost four feet tall and there’s some ready to harvest already) gives one time to think, and sub-consciously, that’s what I’ve been doing. It’s the only way I can explain it – every night when I sit down to write, the words have flowed, minimum of 500 but often edging close to (or even over) the 1k mark. In a maximum of two hours. And ...

One of the most frequently asked, and for me at least, one of the most frustrating, questions for a writer is: 'Where do you find your inspiration?' One of the answers I am always tempted to give with my horror audience, but not yet used, is ‘imagining what I shall do with the next person to ask that question.’ I dread having to field this particular one because for me at least there is no straight answer. It may seem a logical query to the non-writer, but I strongly suspect that most authors on being asked it seldom have a ready answer beyond watching the world around them and taking it all in by osmosis. The answer I have heard given most often is along the lines of 'it just arrives,' and in my experience is as close to the truth as can be.  We steal a piece here and a hint there, and the hard work comes in drawing all of those tiny things into a mosaic that makes sense to our readers. As a breed writers should be acknowledged as the nosiest people on earth, ...