Authors Electric

  I started out as as author of adult mysteries and branched into adult humorous mysteries and young adult mysteries. I am sure you are sensing a theme here. Then, I was asked to write a children's book. This came completely out of the blue and my initial thoughts were , no way on God's earth could I or am I writing a children's picture book. However, the reason was intriguing and my more rational and sensible self talked me into it. I went from no way to why not. The original Bertie book, Bertie the Buffalo , was based on the true story of a baby water buffalo who went missing from a farm in Fife in Scotland, where he proceeded to roam the countryside evading capture for 14 days. This brings me to my top ten tips. About time I hear you say. Bear with me, I was pinning my credentials to the literary mast if you may allow me to mangle a metaphor. So my tips are: 1. Find a good story, one which hasn't already been done to death and which will excite young readers. 2. Try ...

Writing books is one of the most enjoyable and rewarding ways to earn a living and I can’t imagine ever doing anything else. That does not mean, however, that every part of the operation is a joy. As with any large scale endeavour, from creating a garden to running a marathon, from being a rock star to being a prince of the realm, there are times where the effort and the monotony of the job feel crushing. The blues usually strike me about half way through the writing process. All too often, I believe, the books which the market has traditionally demanded are longer than their subject matter merits. If you write tightly and edit well as you go along you can often tell a story very effectively in thirty to fifty thousand words. (“The Turn of the Screw”, “Animal Farm”, “Of Mice and Men”, “The Great Gatsby”, “Death in Venice”, “Heart of Darkness”, “The Picture of Dorian Gray” … I could go on). Publishers and readers, however, have been accustomed for many years to books that are eig...