Saturday 28 July 2018
Friday 27 July 2018
Whitby
Had a lovely few days in Scarborough and Whitby. An opportunity to take some photos and an excuse to finally read DRACULA!!
Thursday 19 July 2018
Linwood Barclay at Waterstones, Lincoln
What a brilliant night. Linwood is a truly brilliant speaker. He told us all about his background and how he became a writer after being a journalist in Peterborough, Ontario. He would ring the police every morning to source anything interesting that had happened. Of course, he always wanted to be a writer! He discussed his novel 'No Time For Goodbye' which was a Richard and Judy Read in the UK, and is about someone waking up to find everyone has disappeared!!
Me and Linwood:
Of course he described his latest novel - of which I got a signed copy - A Noise Downstairs, and stated he thinks it is his best since No Time for Goodbye.
Octobers Writing Magazine (www.writers-online.co.uk) have an interview with Linwood in which they say of A Noise Downstairs that it is (arguably) his darkest novel to date. I have to say I loved it. A psychological thriller with a little bit of murder and supernatural thrown in!!
Questions from those attending at Waterstones included the obligatory 'How's' of being a writer. Linwood discussed the need for a serious work ethic and the need to treat being an author as you would being a plumber. You get on with it! If you write 10,000 words a week, you will have a first draft in two and a half months. Linwood writes a book a year and has never missed a deadline. He added, 'It beats working in a bank. I can't think of any other job I would rather do'.
He discussed the difficulty of being an author when you are not just competing against other authors, but also with the Internet, TV, Netflix, Boxsets, Phones etc. There is a need therefore to grab the readers attention very quickly. They way he plots is to keep asking 'What If?' He starts with the bare bones and has an idea of the end. He doesn't always know the 'big mushy' middle. He just starts writing.
GET ON WITH IT (I have written here!)
See: www.linwoodbarclay.com
Me and Linwood:
Of course he described his latest novel - of which I got a signed copy - A Noise Downstairs, and stated he thinks it is his best since No Time for Goodbye.
Octobers Writing Magazine (www.writers-online.co.uk) have an interview with Linwood in which they say of A Noise Downstairs that it is (arguably) his darkest novel to date. I have to say I loved it. A psychological thriller with a little bit of murder and supernatural thrown in!!
Questions from those attending at Waterstones included the obligatory 'How's' of being a writer. Linwood discussed the need for a serious work ethic and the need to treat being an author as you would being a plumber. You get on with it! If you write 10,000 words a week, you will have a first draft in two and a half months. Linwood writes a book a year and has never missed a deadline. He added, 'It beats working in a bank. I can't think of any other job I would rather do'.
He discussed the difficulty of being an author when you are not just competing against other authors, but also with the Internet, TV, Netflix, Boxsets, Phones etc. There is a need therefore to grab the readers attention very quickly. They way he plots is to keep asking 'What If?' He starts with the bare bones and has an idea of the end. He doesn't always know the 'big mushy' middle. He just starts writing.
GET ON WITH IT (I have written here!)
See: www.linwoodbarclay.com
Saturday 14 July 2018
Matt Haig at Newark Book Festival: Notes on Nervous Planet
Myself and Michelle had a fantastic afternoon at Newark Book Festival. We visited all of the bookshops and chatted to lots of like minded people. It was very hot though!!
We discovered that we both have a desire to publish a book; me - writing one, and Michelle - illustrating one. We planned our future over scones and lemonade.
In the evening we went along to see Matt Haig at Newark Theatre. This had been an idea of Michelle's as she has a book by him. While speaking to one of the writers in the market square, she was good enough to tell us that Matt would be signing copies before the event, so we got there early and were very lucky indeed. Here I am with my signed copy (Matt wrote 'Calm Reading') of Notes On A Nervous Planet with Matt and Michelle:
Matt was a great speaker - especially when you realised his latest book is about dealing with panic attacks and anxiety. It's a discussion of the links between what he felt and the world around him. I love him just for having been blocked by Piers Morgan on Twitter. He discussed the anxiety inducing effects of social media, and how he dealt with it. One of the later chapters (in Notes on A...) says; 'Be aware of how much time you are spending on your phone, of how much the news is messing with your mind, of how your attitudes to work are changing, of how many pressures you feel, and how many of them stem from problems of modern life, of being connected into the world's nervous system.'
Notes On A Nervous Planet is exactly that. Very short chapters highlighting things we need to focus on / think about. His two page chapter entitled; 'We need the time we already have', finishes; 'we often find ourselves wishing for more hours in the day, but that wouldn't help anything. The problem, clearly, isn't that we have a shortage of time. Its more that we have an overload of everything else'.
See: http://www.matthaig.com/
We discovered that we both have a desire to publish a book; me - writing one, and Michelle - illustrating one. We planned our future over scones and lemonade.
In the evening we went along to see Matt Haig at Newark Theatre. This had been an idea of Michelle's as she has a book by him. While speaking to one of the writers in the market square, she was good enough to tell us that Matt would be signing copies before the event, so we got there early and were very lucky indeed. Here I am with my signed copy (Matt wrote 'Calm Reading') of Notes On A Nervous Planet with Matt and Michelle:
When we got into the venue itself, we were lucky enough to have front row seats and to see Tim Rideout in the interviewers seat. Tim recently interviewed Ann Cleeves when we went to see her at The Collection.
Notes On A Nervous Planet is exactly that. Very short chapters highlighting things we need to focus on / think about. His two page chapter entitled; 'We need the time we already have', finishes; 'we often find ourselves wishing for more hours in the day, but that wouldn't help anything. The problem, clearly, isn't that we have a shortage of time. Its more that we have an overload of everything else'.
He also discussed his love of Emily Dickinson poems and the metaphors and similes' of Graham Greene, and he told us all about his recent partnership - working on an album - with ex-Razorlight drummer Andy Burrows (Matt writing the lyrics) https://andyburrows.co.uk/#html-page The album is entitled 'Reasons To Stay Alive' - the title of another one of Matt's books.
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