Category: writing Page 1 of 3

Feathers and Boarding School

Greetings from lockdown Melbourne.

Today I’m sharing a little poetry and a guest blog post I wrote for Debbie Young on my love for Enid Blyton boarding school stories.

I’m a recent poetry convert. In the last weeks and months, I’ve been drawn to reading and writing poetry (Kathleen Raine, Yeats, Robin Robertson, Marissa Davis). Poetry writing has been a welcome and liberating change from my usual novella/novel writing. I’m also pairing my words with images and here is my latest dabbling ‘Shelter Feather’, inspired by Robert Macfarlane‘s Word of the Day tweets.

On to school stories…I was a bookish child – yes I know, hard to believe – and I especially loved boarding school stories. Debbie Young asked me to review (as an adult) one of my favourite boarding school books and consider how these stories have influenced my writing. My Favourite School Stories.

Enjoy.

Finding Creativity Through Folklore

Over the past few weeks, I’ve been taking a course run by the fabulous Sandra Ireland – Finding Creativity Through Folklore.

Ordinarily, Sandra’s courses are run face-to-face out of Dundee but due to the COVID-19 crisis, the course has moved online. Which is brilliant for me on the other side of the world, because now I can participate.

Each week, Sandra circulates materials on a folklore theme with prompts for creative projects. The themes to date have included water, trees and family stories.

Rather than writing novels or novellas (which is my usual comfy place), I’ve been playing with visuals and poetry.

In addition to the prompts, we have a weekly Zoom where the group discusses folklore and creativity. I’ve been blown away by the stories and creativity of my course-mates and look forward to the call each week.

End of Write Through The Roof podcast

It’s with an element of sadness that I announce the end of Write Through The Roof podcast.

After almost three years and 76 episodes, it’s time to do something new. But I’m really going to miss great conversations with interesting writers and having the opportunity to selfishly ask my writing heroes the questions I want to be answered.

So what I have learned about writing over the 76 interviews?

  • There is no right way to write

From meticulous spreadsheets of Oscar de Muriel to the pantsing of Rebecca Tope and everything in between, there is no right way to plot your novel.

Some write every day but many more wish they could. However, others see the definite need for rests to replenish their creative well. But discipline is the key and to finish what you start.

Take all writing advice with a pinch of salt.

AMANDA BRIDGMAN

Trusting yourself. You don’t have to write like other people.

KAARON WARREN

Cherrypick techniques but develop your own style and process.

DEAN MAYES

Do you write every day? I wish!

ROSALIE MORALES KEARNS

Don’t bore the reader. Don’t annoy the reader. Don’t confuse the reader.

PATTY JANSEN
  • Writers are generous and lovely people
  • Coffee runs in our veins
  • Writers like to read ‘like a fat kid at the dessert table’

Thanks for the quote, Angela Slatter but all the writers I spoke to love to read. The most popular inspiring authors were Stephen King, Jane Austen, Neil Gaiman, Daphne du Maurier, Shirley Jackson, Angela Carter and Margaret Atwood.

  • Most writers are life-long learners

Aside from the amazing Karen Rose Smith with 100 romance novels under her belt and a comfortable writing process, most of the writers I spoke with were trying something new with each book and continually trying to perfect their process.

So all things come to an end but I’d like to thank all the writers I spoke with!

#76 – Tim Ewins – Write Through The Roof

Interview with writer and stand-up comic, Tim Ewins

“It’s a good thing to write every day, I just don’t do it.”

Episode 76 – Show Notes – Tim Ewins

  • Prefer to write and read novels
  • Writes during lunch breaks at work – with a monthly word target
  • Four years to write his first book
  • Coffee and Bon Iver
  • Themes of enduring and long-lasting love. How love changes over time.
  • Having a child changed ‘We Are Animals’ and added depth to the writing.
  • Influence of stand-up but not getting the pay-off
  • Editing chapters as he goes.
  • Embarrassing pick-ups by editors
  • Loose and lose
  • The luxury of writing at home with a glass of wine
  • Jonas Johannsen, Roald Dahl, Andrew Kaufman
  • ‘We Are Animals’ started as a travel blog

“I researched all kinds of thing but not how to spell loose and lose.”

“I do quite often think about the book Matilda”

Links

#75 – Alison Littlewood – Write Through The Roof

Interview with ‘dark and weird’ writer, Alison Littlewood

‘History, folklore, ghosts and spooky things.’

Episode 75 – Alison Littlewood – Show Notes

  • Plot beginnings and endings and pants it all the rest of the way
  • Word count spreadsheet – 1000 words per day
  • Obsessive about edits
  • Satisfies the canine overlords before she begins a writing session
  • Dark and weird genre – on the edges of horror
  • Themes – loss and death and love – various aspects of being human- twisted fairytales and folklore
  • Perceptions of horror writers
  • ‘Reading a lot. Writing a lot.’
  • The benefits of working with a good editor
  • Writing in the middle of the night – inspired by HP Lovecraft
  • Michelle Paver, Jason Arnop, Paul Tremblay, Joe Hill, Katrina Ward, Andrew Michael Hurley, Nathan Ballingrud, Priya Sharma, Angela Slatter, Graham Joyce
  • Mistletoe – ghost stories at Christmas – MR James, Victorian times – folklore and history of the plant and the season
  • Historical research
  • Cottingley faeries and changelings

‘Plot beginnings and endings and pants it all the rest of the way.’

‘People back away when I say I’m a horror writer.’

Links

#74 – Jon Black – Write Through The Roof

Interview with author and music journalist, Jon Black

“You can’t do a one-to-one transition of role-playing to fiction.”

Episode 74 – Jon Black

  • No preference for medium but a natural geography and cluster in terms of word counts
  • Mix of a plotter and pantser. Influenced by role-playing games
  • Environment is important – quirky 24-hour coffee house and writes throughout the night
  • A music journalist but does not actively listen to music while writing
  • Supernatural, historical fiction with a twist
  • Themes of power of human curiosity, music, exploring the interplay between folklore, mythology and history
  • Cultivating a sensate writing style: all five senses to bring the reader into the scene
  • Benefits of role playing in writing fiction and pitfalls
  • Experimenting with less exposition and background for characters
  • Caleb Carr, Harry Turtledove, Stephen King, Garrison Keilor, Daniel Pinkwater
  • Gabriel’s Trumpet – second wave of spiritualism and Jazz Age
  • Expanding short stories into novel-length
  • Currently editing an anthology about searches for lost books

“I’m not sure whether I have a genuine love for it or whether it’s a Stockholm syndrome thing.”

Links

#73 – Kristy Childs – Write Through The Roof podcast

Interview with debut steampunk author, Kristy Childs

“How to make Sleeping Beauty an active protagonist.”

Episode 73 – Kristy Childs – Show Notes

  • Writes seasonally – starts in November with Nanowrimo until April
  • Light plot outline but generally pantsing
  • Fuelled by green tea
  • Themes are usually concepts to be included in the work – e.g. airship heist
  • Start with character or concept first?
  • Steampunk or gas lamp – genre definition
  • Editing
  • Changing British English into American English and difference in grammar rules
  • Passive voice cut-out and strengthening word use
  • Microsoft Word extra grammar features
  • “I before e except after c” – exceptions
  • Favourite genres to read – urban fantasy and YA – N.K. Jemisin, Tamora Pierce, Ben Aaronovitch, Warlock Holmes
  • The Nightmare Detective inspired by The Maltese Falcon but set between the Wars and Sleeping Beauty retelling.
  • Sleep disorders
  • Current project is a Chinese fantasy for Nanowrimo. Inspired by ‘cultivation novels’ – Dragonball Z

“I want dinosaurs and I want explosions”

Links

#72 – Violeta M. Bagia – Write Through The Roof

Interview with paranormal author, Violeta M. Bagia

“Whatever you do, you’re only going to get better by repeating it.”

Episode 72 – Violeta M. Bagia – Show Notes

  • Writes every day without fail
  • Early morning writing time is the best
  • Nice pair of shoes are required to write
  • Poetic and “prose-y” style. PTSD, new identity, personal transformation
  • The problems with defining a genre – paranormal or urban fantasy or war fiction
  • Routine is all-important to build a writing habit
  • Learning to plot to meet the publisher’s expectations
  • Whiteboard wall
  • Stephen King, Jennifer L Armentrout
  • Jack of Hart – the book came after “finishing” the series. Quick to write but then expanded to double the size.
  • Taking back the rights of the Hart of Darkness series from the original publisher and republished

Links

#71 – Debbie Young – Write Through The Roof

Interview with cosy mystery writer Debbie Young

“Cosy mysteries are an antidote to the strains of modern life”

Episode 71 – Debbie Young – Show Notes

  • Short novels are her favourite form
  • Journalistic background but mainly a pantser
  • Writes a chapter a day in the writing phase
  • Doesn’t always write every day. Needs to recharge the batteries and think
  • Themes of celebrating community and nurturing understanding between people
  • The mystery provides the framework to flesh out with characters and comedy
  • Based on her real village life and her community
  • Closed communities in a mystery; village and classic English boarding school
  • Cosy mystery popularity – an antidote to modern life, resolution and happy ever after
  • Writing without stopping – experiment with the next novel with a little light editing to begin each writing session
  • Different technologies for writing – Word, using Scrivener for plotting, writing by hand with a fountain pen
  • Touch typing
  • Agatha Christie, Dorothy L Sayers
  • Sophie Sayers mysteries are not always murder stories and veer more to romantic and situational comedy.
  • Experimenting with crossing over between the Sayers and St.Brides series and writing more novellas

I’m an organised pantser.”

“Sometimes I feel I’m writing situation comedy sketches.”

Links

#70 – R.R. Campbell – Write Through The Roof

Episode 70 – interview with sci-fi author, podcaster and writing coach, RR Campbell.

“There’s no Twitter, no email. The coffee is here. The time has come.”

Episode 70 – Show Notes

  • Meticulous planner rather than pantser – with scene by scene outlines. This means every morning he wakes up and knows exactly what he’s going to write
  • Analytical approach to writing – informed by linguistics background
  • Daily writing ritual – coffee pot on a timer and ready to go
  • Re-reading a favourite author as writing fuel
  • Empathy between characters. Epistolary novel form.
  • Five core components to any scene: setting, goal, conflict, resolution, cliffhanger/pivot/change
  • Margaret Atwood. David Mitchell
  • Empathy series – internet access brain implants inspired by smartphones
  • Taking time away from a manuscript to get perspective before retooling
  • Multiple points of view, dimensions and shout-outs

“Finding the best way to create empathy between the character and the reader.”

“There are five core components to any scene.”

Links

#69 – Alan Baxter – Write Through The Roof

Interview with Alan Baxter, writer of dark weird shit

‘Write caffeinated and edit drunk’

Episode 69 – Alan Baxter – Show Notes

  • Baxter believes plotting and pantsing is a sliding scale.
  • Vomit drafter but often edits a little before starting each day’s writing session
  • Has a target of 5000 words per week when writing first drafts but doesn’t try to write every day
  • Coffee in the day, whiskey in the evening
  • Genre is ‘dark weird shit’ – soup of urban fantasy, horror and the weird plus crime and noir
  • Themes of justice and consequences
  • Time is the most important thing
  • Martial arts mindset – time and commitment – developing a practice and striving for improvement
  • Stepping away from the manuscript to let the brain to work out the problems
  • Short stories can shake up the process, like cross-training
  • Clive Barker, Stephen King, Lovecraft, Poe, Kaaron Warren, Margo Lanegan and comics
  • Short story collection Served Cold leans more into horror and explores Australian identity

Links

#68 – Lee Kofman – Write Through The Roof

Interview with Lee Kofman – author and writing teacher

‘In each draft I try to get one or two things right rather than everything.’

Episode 68 – Lee Kofman – Show Notes

  • Creative non-fiction is her current favourite medium. Closer to poetry than non-fiction. It is a fresher and younger experimental genre.
  • Multi-tasking with children
  • Prepare for writing session by thinking about the current project before sitting down at the desk.
  • Gerald Murnane – three types of writers: curious, preachy and possessed/obsessed.
  • Themes – doomed loves.
  • Memoir-writing and Russian poets
  • All writing is rewriting.
  • Working on plotting skills but not plotting too much. Needs a sense of tension to keep the writing process interesting
  • Tolstoy, Chekhov, Gogol, Helen Garner, Robert Dessaix, Zadie Smith, Geoff Dyer, Joan Didion, Karl Ove Knausgaard
  • Imperfect – scars and haunted by shame. Inspired by her child’s diagnosis of albinism

‘Writing is layering.’

‘What it’s like to have a body which deviates from the so-called norm.’

Links

#67 – Agnes Gomillion – Write Through The Roof

Interview with Afro-futurist writer Agnes Gomillion

“I wanted people to reflect on their relative state of freedom.”

Episode 67 – Agnes Gomillion – Show Notes

  • Writes something every day – maybe poetry or notes but not necessarily her ‘work-in-progress’
  • Poetry, songs and lyrical writing
  • Sleep is writing fuel of choice
  • Afrofuturism – lift the audience from reality for the purpose of looking back and better understanding African-American culture.
  • Humanity with an African-American lens.
  • Writing about the underlying person brings different people together.
  • Perseverance
  • ‘Story’ by Robert McKee – how to create a character and how to use structure to ‘show, don’t tell’.
  • Having to incorporate more structure in the writing day with children
  • Jesmyn Ward – Salvage the Bones, Stephen King
  • Frederick Douglass inspired The Record Keeper with his spirit of freedom. The story of how someone overcomes their fear set in a dystopia after World War 3.
  • Octavia Butler comparisons
  • Working on the sequel – The Seed of Cain.

“Humanity with an afro-futurist bent.”

“Slavery is more than physical chains.”

Links

#66 – Alison Morton – Write Through The Roof

Interview with alternative history novelist Alison Morton

‘Exercise your writing muscle in different ways on different days.’

Episode 66 – Alison Morton – Show Notes

  • 30% plotter and 70% pantser
  • Black moments: when it all falls apart for the main character
  • Writing versus marketing
  • Tea imported in from England – sergeant major’s tea
  • Wanted to explore female-led action stories with a Roman flavour. But needed to create an alternative history world to feature strong female leaders. Values, betrayal, rebellion, resilience
  • Alternative history research: taking history and twisting it but anchoring back to the facts.
  • Using historical logic – what would have happened if?
  • Collaborating with other writers, exchanging ideas, being accepting and giving
  • A team effort to produce a book
  • Robert Harris’ Fatherland, William Boyd’s Restless, Sebastian Faulks, Lindsay Davis, Georgette Heyer
  • Aurelia: going back to write the backstory of the grandmother of the main character of the Carina Mitela series
  • Writing short stories and novellas

‘30% plotter and 70% pantser.’

‘You do need other people to get a successful book out.’

Links

#65 – Clare Flynn – Write Through The Roof

Podcast interview with historical novelist, Clare Flynn

‘Read everything I could get my little hands on.’

Episode 65 – Clare Flynn – Show Notes

  • Instinctive pantser who occasionally tries to plot
  • The first book took 15 years to write but now tries to be more disciplined
  • Writes most days
  • Two solutions if the words are hard – walk away or force herself to write
  • ‘Edit as you go’ person
  • Once a week writing group to share work-in-progress
  • Nanowrimo – to kick start a book or finish a book off
  • Tea, coffee and water and wine o’clock
  • Displacement: theme comes from childhood experiences, relationship problems, PTSD and impact of war, self discovery, religious bigotry
  • Reading: taught to read by her father
  • Learnt from editor; tough but also positive
  • Read aloud
  • Writing two books at once; keeps the writing fresh
  • Classics: Hardy, Brontes, Anya Seton, Jean Plaidy, Agatha Christie, Mary Stewart, Tolstoy, Zola, Kate Atkinson, Amor Towles, historical research
  • Hybrid publishing
  • Storms Gather Between Us

‘A competitive person, even if the competition is myself.’

‘It’s got to have highs & lows and lights & darks.’

Links

#64 – Christopher Ruz – Write Through The Roof

Interview with horror and fantasy writer Christopher Ruz

‘Look for people who are one or two stages ahead of where you’re at.’

Episode 64 – Christopher Ruz – Show Notes

  • Doesn’t know how to write short stories any more.
  • Tries to write every day – most productive when writing every day
  • Rituals – encasing in a bubble, getting rid of visual distraction and white noise.
  • Pomodoro method – 100 words every 5 minutes.
  • Themes – horror-based but fantasy and sci-fi. But also spy fiction
  • A narrow focus on character – even with epic fantasy using a single narrator.
  • Using a single narrator to create tension with a timeline
  • Finding a group of writers who were better than him
  • Penny Arcade, Discord, Reddit, Twitter
  • Dictation in the car with a lapel mic
  • Cormac McCarthy, Emma Osborne, NK Jemesin, James SA Corey
  • China Mieville and Joe Hill – horror short stories
  • The Ragged Blade – epic fantasy – inspired by a vivid dream – started as a short story
  • All These Shiny Worlds
  • Working on The Ragged Blade 2 (yet unnamed)
  • Originally self-published the first two parts of The Ragged Blade
  • The journey from self-published to traditionally published

‘The novel is the lazy form’


‘Every change they recommended made it a better story’

Links

#63 – Toby Neal – Write Through The Roof

Interview with best-selling romance & mystery writer Toby Neal

‘People are preoccupied by crime because we want to recognise the wolves in our midst’

Episode 63 – Toby Neal – Show Notes

  • Writing is like a muscle – needs regular workouts
  • 2000 words a day target
  • Both a plotter and a pantser. More pantser for romance and plotter for mysteries
  • Recording affirmations and listening prior to writing session
  • Themes of good versus evil and the shades of grey in everyone and how love can overcome a multitude of problems
  • Dark themes but with hope – fascinated with the duality between dark and light
  • Mastering your craft – Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell – the 10,000 hour rule
  • Take off your pants – Libbie Hawker – the hero needs to find a cure for their flaw
  • Unconventional childhood – Memoir – Freckles
  • Putting off writing goals for security – started with an anonymous blog – using real life experience as a school counsellor
  • Speeding up the writing process
  • Dictation, health and accessing creative brain by writing longhand
  • Where the Crawdads Sing – Delia Owens, The Outlander series – Diana Gabaldon
  • Wired Truth: multi-cultural kick-ass female main character. Pushing the envelope for what’s acceptable with female behaviour. Experimenting with different kinds of love.

‘Nothing but writing is going to make you a better writer’

‘I tried to do literary fiction and I bored myself by page 40’

Links

Music for writing – atmospheric synths

Today’s music recommendations are all about the synths. Instrumental of course, because this is music for writing.

These artists aren’t necessarily soundtrack composers (although sometimes they are) but their electronic music creates a special dark atmospheric mood.

S U R V I V E

S U R V I V E is a dark synth group from Texas and two of the members are well known for creating the ‘Stranger Things’ TV series soundtrack. Their music reminds me of 80s horror films with a touch of early Depeche Mode.

Pentagram Home Video

I know very little about this band but their music and soundtracks create a sombre yet eerie backdrop for my writing.

Cryo Chamber

Now Cryo Chamber is not an artist but a record label focusing on dark ambient music. Their YouTube channel features a whole bunch of curated playlists, releases and mixes for atmospheric writing or sleep.

If you’d like to listen to all my recommendations in one place, head to the Spotify playlist.

Happy writing.

#62 – Suzanne J Willis – Write Through The Roof

Episode 62 with Suzanne J Willis – fantasy short story & flash-fiction writer

‘The best kind of fairies, you know, the nasty ones’

Episode 62 – Suzanne J Willis – Show Notes

  • A natural pantser but learning to plot and outline. A structure helps to hit the right beats
  • Making notes every day but not writing every day
  • Tea and chocolate – freckles
  • Connection between music and writing: lyrical and poetic.
  • Themes of lack of belonging, search for self or a home, life and music
  • Learning that the language is secondary to the story and the interaction between characters gives rise to the plot
  • Writing novellas: taking up an opportunity
  • Jeanette Winterson, Patricia McKillip, Margaret Atwood, Neil Gaiman, Angela Slater
  • Importance of word of mouth for recommendations
  • Portals and evil fairies in ‘Silver String in between worlds’
  • Novella for Broken Cities shared world for Falstaff Books.
  • Upcoming stories in Syntax & Salt Magazine

‘The language is inseparable from the story itself’

‘It’s a good thing to learn your bad habits.

Links

Music for Writing – dark & spooky moods

Most of the time I need music for writing. And the right kind of music. Like books and stories, I’ve always had a passion for music.

This is a new series where I’ll be sharing what I’m listening to.

Today is dark and spooky music for dark and spooky moods.

Here are three artists to inspire your dark and spooky writing.

Lebanon Hanover

Lebanon Hanover is a German-British goth electric duo. Think New Order with Nico. Great music for taphophiles and recovering goths.

Bohren and der Club of Gore

Bohren and der Club of Gore are slow, languid, dark and jazzy. Known as ‘doom jazz’, this is reminiscent of smoky clubs, noir with a touch of Twin Peaks.

John Carpenter

‘Horror-synth’ is another musical genre I gravitate towards when writing horror or general dark stuff. And John Carpenter is the grand-daddy of them all. His synth soundtracks create the perfect sense of dread.

I hope you enjoy these atmosphere-creating tunes.

If you’re writing something dark and spooky, what music do you listen to?

Edit: I’ve created a Spotify playlist featuring the artists above.

Spotify – Music for Writing playlist

#61 – Pauline Wiles – Write Through The Roof

Episode 61 with Pauline Wiles – women’s fiction author & writing productivity coach

‘We need to figure out our own path and plod along steadily.’

Episode 61 – Pauline Wiles – Show Notes

  • Benefit from writing both fiction and non-fiction: entertainment v exploring own worries
  • Take a day off once a week
  • Tea – English breakfast with milk
  • Bacon controversy
  • Fiction – light-hearted escapist women’s fiction but dealing with finding yourself as a person before getting in a relationship.
  • Quirky cultural differences between the UK and the US.
  • Non-fiction – productivity for writers – purposeful productivity.
  • Comparisonitis. Humans learn by comparing.
  • Listening to her own advice.
  • Mindfulness – catch own thinking before it spirals out of control. Ten-minute daily meditation – listen to own breath.
  • Dividing week into blocks of time. Writing, business, promotion and marketing.
  • Creating a parking lot for ideas
  • Jane Austen, Marian Keyes, Emily Giffin, Laura Vanderkam, Gretchen Rubin
  • Indie With Ease
  • Ten Things my Husband Hated

‘Try to compare when you’re having a positive day.’

‘I’m definitely not sitting there on a fluffy cloud of zen.’

Links

#60 – David Baboulene – Write Through The Roof

Episode 60 – interview with David Baboulene – author, academic & story consultant

‘I find inspiration but analyse the inspiration to speed up the process’

Episode 60 – David Baboulene – Show Notes

  • Type of writing depending on mood and deadline
  • Both a plotter and a pantser – wearing two hats
  • Successful writers are very productive
  • Writers being hermits
  • Winning a competition but having an unsatisfying experience with a Hollywood guru
  • Explaining the story craft without telling the writer what to do
  • Storification – what jumps off the page and lives in the reader’s mind e.g a moral message in a fairy tale
  • The author doesn’t need to know the ending half as much as they need to know how the story storifies. Then you can work backwards.
  • Encoding knowledge gaps which are decoded by the receiver (the reader) as meaning
  • Leaving gaps makes the reader create meaning in their own mind – puzzles for the reader to do the work
  • PG Wodehouse – books released after his death
  • The Primary Colours of Story coming out in 2019

‘He’d been rubbish but he became a genius because he worked’

Links

#59 – Rebecca Tope – Write Through The Roof

Episode #59 – Interview with cosy-mystery writer Rebecca Tope.

‘I didn’t get published until I was 50.’

  • Written 35+ murder mystery novels as a pantser
  • Coffee or gin
  • Themes of natural burials & anti-technology.
  • British cosy mysteries featuring a village pub.
  • Mobile phones affecting crime stories & the inclusion of drones
  • Practice – millions & millions of words
  • Writing groups didn’t help
  • Mentoring others helps own writing – seeing the good & bad in aspiring writers
  • Brutal feedback
  • Long apprenticeships & writing competitions
  • Biography of Sabine Baring-Gould – writer of ‘Onward Christian Soldiers’
  • Research – a lot of research done for the biography & historical fiction but little research for murder mysteries
  • Celia Fremlin (domestic suspense), Agatha Christie, Lee Child, Kate Atkinson, William de Morgan
  • Settings – real & fictitious
  • The Grasmere Grudge, Secrets in the Cotswolds, the Patterdale Plot
  • One draft

‘Readers don’t mind if they think their house is the scene of a murder.”

‘I only really do one draft.’

Links

Women of Wasps and War – cover reveal

I’m delighted to reveal the cover for my next novel – Women of Wasps and War – the Sting of Injustice.

Women of Wasps and War is a grim feminist historical fantasy inspired by a true story.

Women of Wasps and War will be released by mid-June 2019. If you’d like to keep up with the latest news, including pre-order links and a chance for a free Advance Reading Copy (ARC), make sure you join my mailing list.

Women of Wasps and War

Agata, the Duchess of Ambrovna, was never meant to take the throne. 

In a land where men rule, her sole purpose was to smile and curtsey.

However, when war left her land leaderless, the Fatherhood religion begrudgingly allowed a first; a woman to rule. 

Now the war is over and the men have returned more arrogant and cruel than ever, and the Duchess is shoved back into a life of needlework and silence.

But with her new thirst for justice, Agata is reluctant to allow her country to return to its old ways.

Without her position of power, Agata and her circle of women look to the taboo wisdom of the Wasp Women for answers. But this ancient knowledge comes with consequences, and with death and treachery on the horizon, Agata must decide whether it is worth the risk. 

Women of Wasps and War is a grim, gripping tale of power and politics, and the heart-breaking struggle between love and honour.

#58 – Patty Jansen – Write Through The Roof

Welcome to Write Through The Roof, the podcast for writers who want to improve their craft.

Episode 58 – Patty Jansen– award-winning science-fiction & fantasy writer

‘Don’t bore the reader. Don’t annoy the reader. Don’t confuse the reader.’

Episode 58 – Patty Jansen – Show Notes

  • Do something on the manuscript every day
  • Being a rebel and going with the flow
  • Writing after 4pm and into the evening
  • Themes – down to earth, gritty and difficult topics – sex, religion and politics. Duality in the problems the characters face.
  • Writing workshops – the value is not the critiques you receive but what you learn from reading other people’s work. The bigger the group the better
  • Handling critiques
  • Online Writing Workshop for Science-Fiction, Fantasy and Horror
  • The three rules for writing; don’t bore the reader, don’t annoy the reader & don’t confuse the reader.
  • Concentrate on telling a good story. Get a reader and an editor and don’t sweat the small stuff.
  • Non-fiction reading – the psychology of marketing and political biographies. In fiction, writers who can write across genres – Harry Potter/Robert Galbraith
  • Ambassador series – different ecosystems, politics and conspiracies, action, Kiwis in space. Currently working on book 9.


‘It is up to you. It’s not up to them to write your book.’

‘It is a fantasy setting but it obviously has reverberations in the real world.’

Links

#57 – Lucy Snyder – Write Through The Roof

Welcome to Write Through The Roof, the podcast for writers who want to improve their craft.

Episode 57 – Lucy Snyder– five times Bram Stoker award-winning writer

‘Tell us what characters think about what they’re seeing.’

Episode 57 – Lucy Snyder – Show Notes

  • Writing the type of fiction she’d like to read
  • Defining ‘weird fiction’
  • Science facts writing and reading informs science-fiction
  • The benefits of writing a poem a week
  • Coffee with milk
  • Themes of real-life loss and trauma mixed with the supernatural
  • Epiphany during a Clarion Writing Workshop – learning about the five-point plot structure
  • Using description as an opportunity to reinforce characterisation – what matters most is what the character thinks about what they’re seeing.
  • Popular fiction and literary fiction
  • Writing a space opera web serial – Broken Eye book Patreon – Eyedelon Magazine
  • Launchpad workshop – astronomy for writers
  • Caitlin R Kiernan, Christa Faust
  • Garden of Eldritch Delights – a collection of fantasy, science fiction & horror stories. Batching up stories of similar themes
  • Next up is the fourth book in the Jessie Shimmer urban fantasy series

‘Poetry is great cross-training’

Links

#56 – Alex Harrow – Write Through The Roof

Welcome to Write Through The Roof, the podcast for writers who want to improve their craft.

Episode 56 – Alex Harrow – queer SFF author

As I edited it, it just got queerer and queerer.’

Episode 56 – Alex Harrow – Show Notes

  • A secret closet pantser who also loves index cards and Scrivener – ‘dots connector’
  • Daily writer but not all writing is at the keyboard
  • Agile method of writing in sprints
  • Trinity of drinks – coffee, tea and water
  • English as a second language influenced the approach to writing from a ‘voicey‘ perspective
  • Need to see more queer characters as protagonists.
  • Found families and enemies to lovers
  • Good critique partners are essential
  • Moderator of #queerspec Twitter chat
  • The ever-expanding ‘To Be Read’ pile
  • Classic fantasy, Seanan Mcguire, Xan West, RoAnna Sylver
  • Interrupting cats
  • Getting in touch with non-readers. Understanding what stories touch people
  • Empire of Light inspired by the need for more queer protagonists in sci-fi and fantasy
  • Queering up your bookshelves.
  • Upcoming projects include an alternate history set in post war Dresden – queer Agent Carter

‘Not all writing happens at the keyboard’

‘I wrote this book out of spite’

Links

#55 – Orna Ross – Write Through The Roof

Welcome to Write Through The Roof, the podcast for writers who want to improve their craft.

Episode 55 – Orna Ross – poet, novelist & non-fiction writer

“Formally practising with free writing gives you all sort of training as a writer but also as a human being.”

Episode 55 – Orna Ross – Show Notes
  • Wanting to write fiction when writing non-fiction and vice versa
  • Write for the first couple of hours each day
  • Writing full time led to procrastination
  • Coffee. Never tea.
  • Themes of conversations around difference.
  • Self-awareness – free writing – writing fast, raw, exact & easy with no end-game
  • Meditate for 15 minutes, then free writing for 15 minutes, review once a week
  • Closed Facebook group
  • Creatives need to stay open to change
  • There are no short cuts to becoming a good writer
  • Ezra Pound, Yeats, George Eliot – Middlemarch, modern poetry movement – rap, performance, slams, in the pub & in the street, Instagram poetry
  • Keepers – inspirational poetry collection. Self-published as a low-risk experiment but began to question assumptions
  • Non-fiction project – Go Creative nine book series for creative business people
  • Trying a different approach to launch – once target for pre-orders is reached, the book is launched
  • Agility in independent publishing

“Writing as a stolen pleasure.”

“Coffee is the fluid of the devil.”

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#54 – Sandra Ireland – Write Through The Roof

Welcome to Write Through The Roof, the podcast for writers who want to improve their craft.

Episode 54 – Sandra Ireland – writer of tartan gothic

“I like to be scared when I’m writing.”

Episode 54 – Sandra Ireland – Show Notes
  • Morning writing – not as creative in the afternoon
  • Goal of 500 words per day
  • Ritual of two cups of tea and one cup of coffee in favourite mug
  • Dark, creepy with a heavy dose of menace, toxic relationships
  • Landscape as a starting point for writing – sense of place to inform writing
  • Manipulating people’s fears and shadow sides.
  • Not just scaring the reader, not just horror but writing about what personally scares you. Vulnerability and readers not knowing what is imagination and what is true.
  • Currently writing non-fiction about the folklore surrounding the Mill (setting of Bone Deep). The words coming out faster with non-fiction.
  • Fiction as a therapy – creative release.
  • Giving herself the permission to be creative.
  • The tribe with the right vibe – people who understand to bounce ideas off.
    Be careful who you share your writing with.
  • Brontes, Benjamin Myers – The Gallows Pole, Julie Myerson – The Stopped Heart
  • A resurgence of gothic writing – perhaps as a reaction to current events
  • Bone Deep – inspired by work as a tour guide in a water mill. At times the mill felt unwelcoming. Modern story with a strand of an old folktale (Border Ballad).
  • The key struggle for writing students is a lack of confidence. One technique is forcing students to share their work.
  • Upcoming – The Mill (non-fiction) and The Unmaking of Ellie Rook
  • Residencies – productive but sometimes lonesome

“Write about what scares you.”

“It’s a basic human drive to be creative.”

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#53 – Vanessa Garcia – Write Through The Roof

Welcome to Write Through The Roof, the podcast for writers who want to improve their craft.

Episode 53 – Vanessa Garcia – novelist, playwright & journalist

“Write the scenes you want to write.”

Episode 53 – Vanessa Garcia – Show Notes
  • Sesame Street writers room
  • Intersperse long projects with shorter projects
  • Playwriting is collaborative with the director and scenes devised in the moment
  • Writing whenever you can.
  • Cuban coffee – cafecito
  • Obsessed with Cuba – overcoming economic and familial embargoes. Obsessed with erased stories for refugees. Motherhood.
  • Write the scenes you want to write. Don’t worry about bridges connecting the scenes.
  • Discipline. Time carved out for writing and sharing your writing
  • Hiding away from writing advice
  • Using spreadsheets for interactive theatre – audiences following different stories happening at the same time
  • Reinaldo Arenas, Leonardo Padura, TV shows ‘I’m Sorry’,’Broad City’ and kids TV.
  • Amparo – inspired by a call from a marketing company then turned into an experiential theatre work. The story of the family who created the real Havana Club Rum.

“Storytelling and then story selling.”

“There’s writing coming out of TV which is just as literary.”

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#52 – Kirsten Imani Kasai – Write Through The Roof

Welcome to Write Through The Roof, the podcast for writers who want to improve their craft.

Episode 52 with Kirsten Imani Kasai – writer, academic & editor

“I like grit and blood and meat in my work.”

Episode 52 – Kirsten Imani Kasai – Show Notes
  • Pantser at heart using an outline as a roadmap but allowing serendipity
  • Novels allow layering
  • Tea – Yorkshire Gold with vanilla cream or port and red wine
  • Writing described as dark and weird
  • Exploring love, romance, illness, death, spirituality and metaphysics
  • A different slant on romance – short story ‘Bleat’
  • Influence of growing up in a religious family – biblical imagery and spiritual cannibalism
  • Accepting valid criticism – lyrical writing and ‘purple prose’ – limiting adjectives
  • Allowing time to get a critical eye on own work
  • Challenges with current work ‘Girlstown’ mixing visual elements, fiction and non-fiction
  • Cindy Crabb ‘Things That Help’ 90s zines, Angela Carter, Octavia Butler, Helen Zahavi – Dark Weekend
  • House of Erzulie inspired by recurring dreams of a gothic house. Researching gothic literary elements. Triptych – three narrators across time. Epistolary structure and mirroring different POVs

“Too much structure hinders the creative process.”

“The first draft is work but also play.”

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#51 – Hester Fox – Write Through The Roof

Welcome to Write Through The Roof, the podcast for writers who want to improve their craft.

Episode 51 with Hester Fox – artist & writer of gothic historical fiction

“A love letter to New England set at this beautiful house.”

Episode 51 – Hester Fox – Show Notes
  • Not necessarily writing every day but doing things ‘writing-related’ every day
  • Tea, snack, cosy-up with the cat or coffee shop ambience
  • Conversion from pantser to plotter
  • Dark, gothic with a happy ending – strong female relationships and romantic love
  • Embracing the darkness as an exposure therapy
  • Making every word count
  • Critique partners – sharing chapter by chapter. Feedback and accountability.
  • Cadence and rhythm in a first draft – making notes to keep the momentum going
  • 19th-century authors – Jane Austen, Dickens, Hardy. More recent – Shirley Jackson, Daphne du Maurier, Susanna Kearsley, Simone St.James, Josh Malerman
  • Historic homes in New England and day job as inspiration for The Witch of Willow Hall. Interacting with objects and houses on a daily basis
  • Second novel – The Widow of Pale Harbour – 1840s Maine during Poe-mania and a gender-flipped retelling of Beauty and the Beast

“Juicy relationships set against a dark background.”

“Making every word pull its weight in a sentence.”

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#50 – Cathi Stoler – Write Through The Roof

Welcome to Write Through The Roof, the podcast for writers who want to improve their craft.

Episode 50 with Cathi Stoler – award-winning crime writer

“When I was younger I wanted to be a spy.”

Episode 50 – Cathi Stoler – Show Notes
  • Writing crime as a pantser
  • Not a plot spreadsheet but a character spreadsheet
  • Real dialogue and real-life crimes – identity theft, fraud, violent crime and how people are affected
  • Eavesdropping
  • Crime writing conferences in the USA – Malice Domestic, Bouchercon, International Thriller Writers Conference
  • Taking classes and getting your character’s details right
  • John LeCarre, Ian Fleming, Sue Grafton, Alison Gaylin, Meghan Abbott, Catriona McPherson
  • Technology, social change and crime writing
  • Bar None

“You’re not going to commit a crime but you like to read about it.”

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#49 – Rosalie Morales Kearns – Write Through The Roof

Welcome to Write Through The Roof, the podcast for writers who want to improve their craft.

Episode 49 with Rosalie Morales Kearns – feminist fiction writer and publisher

“Do you write every day?” “I wish!”

Episode 49 – Rosalie Morales Kearns – Show Notes
  • Novels give a chance to explore characters and a long history
  • Life getting in the way of writing every day
  • Hot chocolate and milkshakes
  • Magic realism and fabulism
  • Connections – how they are formed and how they affect people
  • Being conscious of the choice of what to show ‘in scene’ or summarise
  • Example of The Frog Prince.
  • Tools to play with during revision
  • Trying to be more organised in plot outlines
  • Creating a synopsis of your novel to highlight potential plot issues
  • Charlotte Bronte, Toni Morrison, Margaret Atwood, Angela Carter,
  • Alexandr Solzhenitsyn
  • Kingdom Of Women – inspiration
  • Historical saga and dealing with the balance of research

“There’s no single right way to do it.”

“Don’t over think it in the first draft.”

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Persistence – the unsexy secret to success

Today’s post is for the NaNoWriMo people amongst us and part of #NaNoInspo blog tour.

Hello NaNoers

It’s Day 7.

By now you’re probably over the initial blush of excitement which spurs on your Nano project.

If you’re lucky, the words are still flowing and you’re riding high.

But the fairy dust has probably fallen from your eyes and you’re staring into a white abyss with a stupid blinking cursor wondering what the fuck you signed up for.

I’ve done NaNoWriMo a bunch of times and for the first seven times, I flailed at about 20,000 word mark.

I learned the secret over time.

It’s not sexy.

It’s not cool.

It’s boring and hard and takes lots of time and it’s unrelenting.

But it’s the secret to writing success and probably the tip you don’t want to hear.

It’s the one thing that all successful writers have in common. No matter which genre.

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#48 – Icy Sedgwick – Write Through The Roof

Welcome to Write Through The Roof, the podcast for writers who want to improve their craft.

Episode 48 with Icy Sedgwick – blogger and writer of dark fantasy, gothic horror & westerns

“I couldn’t write po-faced literature if I tried.”

Episode 48 – Icy Sedgwick – Show Notes
  • Flash fiction can be more challenging and more fun than novels
  • Writing something every day but not necessarily fiction
  • Fun, entertaining, whimsical pulpy adventure. Standing up against wrongs, taking on bullies or oppressive regimes
  • Westerns – rabid fan base
  • Improving dialogue
  • The balance between ‘write what you know’ and ‘making stuff up.”
  • Plotting while keeping it fresh
  • Roald Dahl, Neil Gaiman, Stephen King, Oscar Wilde, JK Rowling
  • The Stolen Ghost inspired by a childhood trip to Glamis Castle. Took 11 years to finish.
  • Being a hoarder and recycling ideas
  • Finishing Book 3 of dark fantasy series

“Coffee as black as possible. As nature intended.”

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#47 – Grant Faulkner – Write Through The Roof

Welcome to Write Through The Roof, the podcast for writers who want to improve their craft.

Episode 47 with Grant Faulkner – NaNoWrimo Executive Director & writer

“One part writing boot camp, one part rollicking party”

Episode 47 – Grant Faulkner – Show Notes
  • Length of project depends on the story idea. Balancing fiction and non-fiction to better inform both styles of writing
  • Plantser
  • Writing most days – experimenting with 15 minutes per day
  • Themes – trying to look behind the veil and transgressions
  • Writing regularly – showing up and writing every day is the key
  • Active reading
  • Discipline, creative momentum, confidence
  • Trying something new by telling a story through unsent letters
  • Lydia Davis, James Salter, Denis Johnson, Elena Ferrante, Leonard Cohen, Roland Barthes
  • Pep Talks for Writer – 52 Insights and Actions to Boost Your Creative Mojo
  • Vulnerability, Creative Community, Writers Block, Playfulness, Improvisation
  • Vomit versus Gush
  • Grant issues Madeleine a challenge

“Every writer should experiment with their creative process.”

“A goal and a deadline is a creative midwife.”

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#46 – Peter McLean – Write Through The Roof

Welcome to Write Through The Roof, the podcast for writers who want to improve their craft.

Episode 46 with Peter McLean – urban & grimdark fantasy author

“Grimdark doesn’t work like that. If your leg gets cut off, you’re going to get gangrene.”

Episode 46 – Peter McLean – Show Notes
  • Writing binges. Plotter and pantser
  • Strong black coffee and whiskey
  • Thriller writer at heart but in the fantasy genre
  • Aftermath of war, Peaky Blinders, retired service people as sensitive readers
  • Defining “grim dark” – consequences and more in line with reality
  • Reading and writing
  • First novel published was the fourth novel completed
  • Ed McDonald, Sarah Pinborough, Crab- cakes and Courtesans – republican Athenian social history, Anna Smith Spark, Joe Abercrombie, George RR Martin, Stephen King, Tanith Lee
  • Exploring different POVs
  • Writing urban fantasy but reading swords and horses fantasy
  • Priest of Bones inspired by a gangster character in a Joe Abercrombie novel and Peaky Blinders
  • The explanation behind the name Talonwraith

“I am one of the most undisciplined writers you’ll ever meet.”

“Just years and years of practice. I don’t think there are any shortcuts.”

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#45 – Elizabeth Spann Craig – Write Through The Roof

Welcome to Write Through The Roof, the podcast for writers who want to improve their craft.

Episode 45 with Elizabeth Spann Craig – cosy mystery writer & writing tip gatherer

“Don’t discount the elderly.”

Episode 45 – Elizabeth Spann Craig – Show Notes
  • Started off as a pantser
  • Understanding your genre’s patterns
  • Muscle memory after 26 books
  • Old fashioned puzzle mysteries – escape for the reader
  • Key theme – don’t discount the elderly
  • Set the bar the low
  • Twitterific Writing tips
  • Doubling down on production and reading more
  • Agatha Christie, MC Beaton, Anthony Horowitz
  • A reader’s suggestion inspired Cleaning is Murder
  • Traditional and independent publishing – getting rights back

“Set the bar low.”

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#44 – Charles Christian – Write Through The Roof

Welcome to Write Through The Roof, the podcast for writers who want to improve their craft.

Episode 44 with Charles Christian – award-winning journalist, podcaster & author

“People get carried with their gadgets… and forget about the human element.”

Episode 44 – Charles Christian – Show Notes
  • Novella length is favourite length. Better for ebooks and easier to consume.
  • Writing every day and learned discipline from career as a freelance journalist
  • ‘All written out’ by freelance journalism
  • Green tea, dark chocolate, chips and baked beans
  • Exploring how one event can change the entire direction of life – JB Priestly
  • Stop doing courses and start writing your own stories
  • Stick to the brief, meet the deadline & work count – who, why, what, where, how
  • Asking the question – is this project fun to write?
  • Neil Gaiman, Terry Pratchett, Douglas Adams, MR James, David Sedaris, Richard Brautigan
  • Genre fiction tips: less about the gadgets, more about the characters

“Get on with it and be business-like about it.”

“If I can’t be bothered reading it, I can’t expect the reader to.”

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#43 – Trevor Young – Write Through The Roof

Welcome to Write Through The Roof, the podcast for writers who want to improve their craft.

Episode 43 with Trevor Young – PR and marketing specialist

“If you’ve got a blog you’ve got a digital heartbeat. You’re not on rented land.”

Episode 43 – Trevor Young – Show Notes
  • Books are more permanent but blogging helps develop a writer’s conversational personal style
  • Writing in focussed short sharp bursts; doing less but doing more
  • Fiction at night with beer and non-fiction in the morning with coffee
  • Joining the dots, identifying a trend and developing a philosophy
  • Tips on writing 1300 characters micro-stories – start with one tight idea
  • Writing Melbourne Noir. Inspired by childhood reading of Ed McBain and Ian Fleming
  • With non-fiction you need to know your market but with fiction you can write what you want to read
  • Creating an alter-ego for fiction writing
  • Seth Godin, Dorie Clark
  • Micro Domination and the changing nature of blogs
  • New book coming in October 2018 – Content Marketing for PR

“Getting more done by doing a little bit every day.”

“Edit your way to greatness.”

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#42 – Valerie Stivers – Write Through The Roof

Welcome to Write Through The Roof, the podcast for writers who want to improve their craft.

Episode 42 with Valerie Stivers – writer, editor & journalist

“The spirit of the book comes alive when you’re cooking from it.”

Episode 42 – Valerie Stivers – Show Notes
  • Personal non-fiction is the favourite or novels if the words are flowing
  • The Muse has to know where to find you
  • Afternoon tea and scones
  • Connections between people – both non-fiction and fiction
  • Training in an old-school newsroom – learning to write concise & communicative copy
  • Time pressure of modern newsroom – erosion of standards in journalism
  • Cooking along with writing
  • “Outrun your inner critic” – from Pat Barker
  • Food styling – the skill of the photographer
  • Ivan Doig, George RR Martin
  • Eat Your Words – The Paris Review Daily

“I want to show other people what’s inside my head.”

“Those years I spent getting yelled at by old newspaper guys were priceless.”

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#41 – Nin Harris – Write Through The Roof

Welcome to Write Through The Roof, the podcast for writers who want to improve their craft.

Episode 41 with Nin Harris – author, poet & Gothic scholar

“I really love to dig into the guts of a novel to see how it works.”

Episode 41 – Nin Harris – Show Notes

  • Inspired to write short stories by Angela Carter
  • Both a plotter and a pantser
  • Water or rooibos tea
  • SFF and gothic but writing about the human experience
  • Identity, memory and difficult connections between people
  • Gothic in space
  • Reading carefully – go outside your fishbowl
  • Throwing books across the room – like a book poltergeist
  • Beat sheets: major beats and minor beats; cause and effect
  • Frances Hardinge, Graham Joyce
  • Different writing depending on mood. Academic v fiction writing

“The first draft does have a bit of vomit in it.”

“For me, space is very gothic.”

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#40 – Kira Leigh – Write Through The Roof

Welcome to Write Through The Roof, the podcast for writers who want to improve their craft.

Episode 40 with Kira Leigh– content marketer, artist, tech & games writer

“I’m a nerd so I just think of it as role-playing as another person.”

Episode 40 – Kira Leigh – Show Notes
  • Prefers long-form articles because ideas are so big
  • Playlists and peanut butter sandwiches
  • Anger
  • Nabokov
  • Trying YouTube
  • A disappointing career in tech turned into a successful writing career
  • Describes current career as ‘Tech creative’
  • The Russian Masters and random bloggers on Tumblr and reddit
  • Use of online comments to build characters
  • Writing reviews for anime
  • Reaching people is the intent of writing
  • Writing for LinkedIn

“If I feel like I’m stale, I go read Nabokov.”

“A typo is like a palette knife mark in someone’s story.”

“LinkedIn is the place to be for content writers and even artists.”

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#39 – Alexandra Sokoloff – Write Through The Roof

Welcome to Write Through The Roof, the podcast for writers who want to improve their craft.

Episode 39 with Alexandra Sokoloff – thriller author & screenwriter

“You are directing a movie onto the page.”

Episode 39 – Alexandra Sokoloff – Show Notes
  • Good and evil and what good people can do
  • Screenwriters have to be plotters. Journey from impro to screenwriting
  • Milk
  • Exploration of violence against women using a female serial killer
  • Using screenwriting techniques to become better authors
  • Multi-task while appearing to have a social life
  • Taking your favourite movies and working out what the classic movies are doing: Silence of the Lambs, Jaws, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Casablanca, When Harry Met Sally, The Hunger Games, The Wizard of Oz
  • Editors want a movie in their head
  • Shirley Jackson, Daphne du Maurier, Denise Mina, Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Mo Hayder, Tana French, Val McDermid
  • Huntress/FBI series – to be read in order – like a binge watch TV experience
  • Hunger Moon is an unhappy read for Trump supporters

“If you’re going to talk about good and evil, you need to talk about people and what people do.”

“I do this with a total agenda of changing rape culture.”

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#38 – Gail Carriger – Write Through The Roof

Welcome to Write Through The Roof, the podcast for writers who want to improve their craft.

Episode 38 with Gail Carriger – comedy of manners paranormal romance author

“The strength of the romance genre lies in the Heroine’s Journey.”

Episode 38 – Gail Carriger – Show Notes
  • A militant plotter and a purger
  • 2000 words per day and only re-read words written the day before
  • Novellas in the independent publishing world
  • Chronic tea drinker – import from England
  • Gentle, frivolous, strong female friendships and the help of others
  • The Heroine’s Journey
  • Give yourself permission to suck
  • Beta readers with different coloured pens and revision pass for funny
  • Scrivener
  • Moving back into YA high fantasy
  • Tamora Pierce, Mercedes Lackey
  • Queer characters and power of normalisation
  • Competence: with queer main character.
  • Shared world of characters but stories are stand-alone

“No one but you has to read your first draft.”

“My goal is at least three LOLs per page.”

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#37 – Emma Viskic – Write Through The Roof

Welcome to Write Through The Roof, the podcast for writers who want to improve their craft.

Episode 37 with Emma Viskic – award-winning crime author

“I kept one word from the story. It was Commodore.”

Episode 37 – Emma Viskic – Show Notes
  • Plantser, vomit and polish
  • Writing at the extreme ends of the day
  • Belonging, communication and loss, deaf and indigenous characters. Exploration of themes throughout a series
  • Training wheels novels
  • Taking the first sentence from a novel chapter to build a short story
  • Short stories teach how to cut words, cut characters and have a clean line throughout
  • The difficulty of a crime short story
  • A 10 month unfinished vomit draft
  • Each book is written in a different way with different pressures; first book, second book and third book
  • Hilary Mantel, Peter Temple, JM Green
  • And Fire Came Down – scars and fire season

“Sending them to the farm to play with the other words.”

“There’s vomit and there’s polish. It’s a mess.”

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#36 – Michelle Worthington – Write Through The Roof

Welcome to Write Through The Roof, the podcast for writers who want to improve their craft.

Episode 36 with Michelle Worthington – award-winning picture book author

“Kids are so bombarded with visuals these days, they love verbal storytelling.”

Episode 36 – Michelle Worthington – Show Notes
  • Picture books can be scribbled on the back of napkin or receipt
  • Learning the industry & the craft after getting the first book published
  • Coffee and Mum chocolate
  • Writing a story for one person in particular. Empowering kids who are not represented in other books.
  • Reading and ask your audience what they’re reading and why they like it.
  • Talking with teachers about child development and the stages.
  • Be a lifelong learner
  • Authors are small businesses. The best businesses are the best storytellers.
    The story you create around yourself as an author. Creating your author brand.
  • Publishers are looking for people to work with, not stories
  • 80s picture books with Australian voice; Mem Fox, Mulga Bill, Man From Snowy River, YA, Stephen King, Jackie French, Nevermore
  • Pugs Don’t Wear Pyjamas based on a real person with a real pug.
  • Worries about creativity after publishing fifteen books. Stop and listen to your creative voice.
  • Coming up  – Beards and Middle Grade fiction

“Lovely words that not only look good but sound good too.”

“Authors are small businesses.”

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#35 – Shona Husk – Write Through The Roof

Welcome to Write Through The Roof, the podcast for writers who want to improve their craft.

Episode 35 with Shona Husk – speculative fiction romance author

“I like a fast and dirty draft.”

Episode 35 – Shona Husk – Show Notes
  • Writes quickly but as a plotter, edits aren’t generally structural
  • Dark mint chocolate, not coffee
  • Dark angsty and tortured heroes
  • Every other genre plus romance
  • Write novellas to learn characterisation and three act structure
  • Learning – Stealing Hollywood by Alexandra Sokoloff, podcasts, the Story Grid and movies as a reference
  • Katharine Kerr, Marie Brennan, Jim Butcher
  • Different dynamics in heterosexual, gay and lesbian romance
  • Servant of The Forest: YA Cinderella re-telling
  • Hybrid publishing – write first and then look for the right market
  • Ballet classes as research for writing

“All the wonderful world building with a happily-ever-after.”

“I write faster with chocolate.”

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#34 – Fiona Ross – Write Through The Roof

Welcome to Write Through The Roof, the podcast for writers who want to improve their craft.

Episode 34 with Fiona Ross – songwriter, singer & jazz journalist

“I get more creative and crazy as the day goes on.”

Episode 34 – Fiona Ross – Show Notes
  • Go with the flow – music and lyrics go together
  • A late night writer – daytime writing doesn’t feel right
  • Piano, pencil, notebook and cup of tea
  • Songwriting is always inspired by a personal experience.
  • Journalism and interviews – the purpose is to reveal the person being interviewed
  • Discovering journalism voice – it’s about the artist
  • Interviewing legends, jazz history and research. Women in jazz and bringing jazz up to date
  • To Kill a Mockingbird, F Scott Fitzgerald, Upton Sinclair, Ricki Lee Jones, Billy Joel
  • Family history of writers
  • Didn’t set out to write a concept album but ‘Black, White and a Little Bit of Grey’ has an intertwining story
  • Marketing and genre

“I won the reading cup when I was at primary school.”

“If I’m not jazz and I’m not pop, what am I?”

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