Journal

Or, homogeneity and Flanderisation. We're back with ranticles baby! This is not a new idea, it's not an original idea, it's just a series of opinions (which as a white dude approaching his early middle years, I am sure the world wants...). Cast your mind back, it's the years following the release of Lord of the Rings. The world is feeling it. One ring has bound them all, and in the wake of this fantasy behemoth "everyone" is writing Tolkien pastiches, ripoffs, or whatever oth

One of the most frequent questions which crops up anywhere discussions of writing occur, is "how did you go about ______________?" In this post I am going to try to lay out the entire process of creating and launching my debut novel: Mettle and Ice. I'll talk about the initial concept, what drafting looked like, free and paid beta-readers, my first dealings with a developmental editor, working with a copy editor and proof-reader, and then finally all of the fun of making a bo

Image from literary hub's article about Meta's data theft. AI are trained on stolen material, it's a tale as old as... itself. Recently, Meta have been found to have stolen millions of books to train its late to the party AI. Chances are, your favourite author had their book stolen (I guess to balance things out, your least favourite author did too). Why is theft on this scale not causing more outrage? We’ve been trained not to care… we’ve spent years, decades even, telling s

The R**e of Proserpina , by Gianlorenzo Bernini, c. 1618–25 This piece includes references to SV. Readers who may find the below content triggering are advised not to read further. The depiction of SV is a discussion which comes up from time to time in the realm of media and specifically SFF books, which is the realm in which I exist creatively. Advocates for depictions of SV say that it grounds stories, it adds historical realism, or that it is part of character development

I'm one of those people who needs a deadline. I know that doesn't make me special and as a teacher I am constantly reminded that a lot of us are like gasses. We will expand to fit the container we are in. When a container doesn't have boundaries or a task doesn't have deadlines, I find myself expanding and making no progress toward anything being finished. A few months ago I found the post Travis Baldree made about the process he underwent in publishing Legends and Lattes. I