Author and Renaissance wannabe
In my earlier attempts at books, I tried to create covers myself. Now this may come as a shock to you, but I’m not a graphic designer, typesetter, photographer or artist. I know, it surprised me too, but the process of learning book cover composition, …
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So this is a part of my series about the process of writing and publishing. For those who aren’t aware, Beta Readers come from a community of readers and writers, and give feedback on pre-publication versions of novels, varying from grammar and spell checks to …
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So, rookie mistake one, I’d left the guidelines on the cover template resulting in a dotted line around the different sections. Doofus. Easily fixed, though nothing is ever straightforward. To match the colours on the image I’d needed to flood fill with the colour code …
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Well, it’s an exciting day for me. My first paperback proofs arrived just after I’d finished my scrambled eggs on toast (I wasn’t constantly checking the tracking information all morning, honestly). It’s always scary to reach the next new stage of the publication journey, and …
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You may know this title best from Disney’s ‘Sword in the Stone’, or the classic musical ‘Camelot’, both of which are based on these books, but this five (four originally) part novel was a huge leap forward in retelling the King Arthur story in the …
Read MoreYou know what it’s like, you get something in your brain and it won’t go away. After I posted yesterday, I started thinking about common treads between the first two novels. Thankfully the plots are totally different but I realised there is a similar deconstruction …
Read MoreJust perusing a couple of lovely reviews that got posted on Amazon for Man in the Bath, and realised a pretty naive scheduling mistake I’ve made. The first comments (and no, as far as I’m aware I don’t know the reviewers) notes how the main …
Read MoreOne of my major flaws is that I’m over eager, and that when I get a good idea I just want to get on and do it. In some ways this is a good thing, and keeps me motivated and moving, in others it can …
Read MoreThis revelation and discovery I can’t claim for myself, it was suggested to me by a reviewer but has made a massive difference to my writing, and is possible the biggest (free) help I’ve found. It may sound blindingly obvious, but it’s an option I’d …
Read MoreSo, after the overwhelming (ahem) response to my offer of a series of blogposts on the writing process, I came to two conclusions. First, on reflection, there’s hundreds of those buggers out there, and while my insights and truthful and thrilling journey might be unique, …
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