Authors Electric

It’s that time of year when one usually makes their New Year’s resolutions. I’ve done so in the past (and usually, to be fair, have managed to keep to them; however, I put this down to them being reasonably small steps to take). This year, however, my resolution was not to make any resolutions. Instead of planning for the year, I’m going to try and ‘pants’ it. Pretty much like I do with most of my writing, although I have been dabbling with plotting for a while with reasonable success. That’s not to say I don’t have some ideas in mind for goals I’d like to reach – There’s a couple of pieces of Bach’s music for which I have guitar transcriptions and I’d like to learn them; there’s also a couple of pieces I’d like to master on the piano as well, for example – but I don’t want to set dates on them. I’d rather enjoy the journey of discovery as I come to learn the pieces. It’s a similar story with writing. I have a few projects that I aim to finish this year. I have a new YA...

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 first picture book - first published 2007 At the beginning of the year I decided to set myself some goals. A few of these goals are linked to my writing. The first one was to get at least one picture book traditionally published or at least a contract signed. So, in order to set the ball rolling I decided to go through my computer files and put all my half written stories and story ideas in one place. A few hours later I'd rediscovered: 10 picture books - written to first or second draft stage 25 picture book ideas - some sketched out whilst others are just a few bullet points 4 fantasy stories for young confident readers - two have chapters sketched out whilst the other two are just a jumble of ideas. 1 young adult story - jumbled ideas only 3 steam punk stories for confident readers - one has each chapter sketched out 1 kids TV show - ideas for the first five episodes are sketched out 3 short stories for adults - the type you get in magazines 4 novel ideas for ...