The Feckless Goblin

Who or what is your favourite horror monster and why?

2012-01-27T11:12:00.000-08:00

Okay, I’ll start you off: My favourite monster is the shark from Jaws. Why? The shark is a freaking genius of simplicity.

Imagine: You’re in this big body of cold, blue water and you know damn well something is down there. None of your five senses can pick it up – you can’t see it, smell it, hear it, feel it or hear it before it’s too late. Somewhere in the depths of the ocean, this soundless behemoth is rushing up towards you, jaws open, eyes rolling back.

Bham!

Okay, you can swim. Go ahead. Knock yourself out. Swim as fast as you can dumbo, won’t do you no good!

No one can swim faster than a shark, not even Aquaman.

Here’s another thing that makes it scary: The shark exists in real life. We’ve seen documentary’s and pictures of it. People have even been in the water swimming with them. The shark from Jaws is a Supershark but it’s a Supershark with a history we already know and fear.

And here’s something else: The shark is, like any monster worth its salt, merciless, relentless and focussed.

All it wants to do is swim, eat, shit and make little sharks.

To help it catch its prey, the shark has ultra-senses that enables it be the efficient killer of the deep. It can pick up a vibration in the water over three miles away. It can scent a miniscule drop of blood in the water.

This shark has superpowers!

Above all shark can swim faster than you. You’re in its territory. Even if you’re on a boat you’re not safe. The boat can sink and, when there’s a Great White around, in books and films, the chances are the fecking boat is going to damn well sink.

The shark has a neat shape. No distracting tentacles, hideous talons or suction thingies, it’s just a big, sharp mouth on the end of a bunch of tight muscle. It’s perfectly, horribly simple. And that’s its real beauty. When you see it in the water it elicits a primordial fear in all of us. It’s the perfect product of evolution. A big, chunky, sharp toothed-fecking eating machine.

And finally: The shark has a great theme tune. Without the theme tune you really wouldn’t know that Monsieur Carcharodon carcharias was coming.

Face it, how many of you don’t know the theme from Jaws?

I rest my case, your honour.

So who’s your favourite horror monster and why? Answers as usual in the comments section below.

GUEST BLOG: 10 Characteristics of the Perfect Horror Monster by Brian Fatah Steele

2012-01-24T04:24:00.000-08:00

The perfect horror monster? Sigmund Freud would’ve had a blast with that concept. Joseph Campbell would’ve just thrown some random book of mythology at your head. Jean-Paul Sartre had the quote, “Hell is other people.” Perhaps, if anything, the truly monstrous is relative and personalized, unique to the individual.

But, hey… monsters are cool! From Lovecraft’s Cthulhu chomping on your sanity to DC Comic’s Doomsday leveling a city for giggles, we get a kick out of them. And if we should attempt to objectively describe ten characteristics of the perfect horror monster, well, that’s just fun. However, we may need to dig deeper than sharpened claws and alien origins.

Something Recognizable. No one’s imagination springs anew from a vacuum, and even if it did, nobody else would understand what you were talking about if you tried to describe the creepy stuff in your head. As much as Howard Philip spoke of things “unknown and eldritch,” he brought up tentacles a lot, too. Readers understood tentacles, and knew they were gross. A great deal of Christian symbolism relies heavily on images of bats and goats when detailing the Devil. Why? Because humans can more easily conceive of animal parts than a living darkness that wants to torment their souls for eternity.
Something Perverted. No, not in a sexual way. I’m talking about taking something familiar and comfortable, then twisting it into horrible new proportions. This is why toys, pets, grandmas, doctors and anything we usually perceive as innocent or benevolent is instantly rendered terrifying when revealed in a distorted manner. You’ve recognized it, but now it’s been transformed into an incorrect version of itself. Hello, Pennywise!
Something Imminent. Whatever threat or danger presented by our monster, something must somehow be displayed as impending. Here we get our blood-dripping fangs, our cybernetically implanted laser guns, and our crackling beams of dark magic. We need something that can cause immediate harm, and therefor, immediate fear. Any demon-possessed maniac swinging a chainsaw at you is a good example of this.
Something Subdued. While the giant scorpion tail or exoskeleton made out of razor blades is freakin’ horrific, we need more for our perfect monster. It needs a presence, an aura of sheer malevolence that we feel in our guts. Perhaps a certain sound it makes, or the way it moves, something about it affects us on a deeper level. This is the malignancy that lingers and haunts us later. We’re now in Hannibal Lector territory, but with actual shark teeth.
Something Revealed. The horror lurking in the shadows is always disturbing, but sometimes knowing can be worse. A glimmer of knowledge, a snippet of information, that’s all we get, but it’s enough to know we’re screwed. Have we discovered its origin, its destination, its reason for eating everyone’s faces? That little puzzle box you’ve been trying to open just got a whole lot more ominous.
Something Reserved. It needs intellect, or purpose beyond being a mindless killing machine. Unreasoning zombies are bad, yes, but you can take out one with a shovel to the skull. This thing had a hidden agenda, secret abilities and maybe even disposable minions. Maybe we don’t really know it’s origin, just what it wants us to think. This is a singular monstrosity hellbent on something we can’t even fathom, deceptions behind the lies, and chances are we’ll never know everything.
Something Abstracted. In some manner, this perfect monster must transcend our rational mind. Whether from a post-apocalyptic future, the pits of hell, or the planet Yuggoth, it has to have some ties to a concept that forces us to suspend belief. This is an atrocity incarnate, so logic isn’t really going to apply here. Some part of it will factor outside the realm of reason, a large part of why it’s so terrifying. Dracula does not care if his snack believes in him or not.
Something Actualized. Dropping back into the real world, there has to be some aspect of it that we comprehend as well. Remember the giant scorpion tail? Kind of like that, but we’re more into the essence of our monster now as opposed to the appearance. Should we give it a name, or has it named itself? We understand names, and we even can conceive of the future, hell, and other planets. Nyarlathotep was bad as The Crawling Chaos, but somehow it sucks way more when it’s smiling at you from across the coffee shop.
Something Conscious. At the end of the day, our perfect monster must somehow reflect the human experience. We have to see some identifiable part of ourselves in it, and feel that connection on a cognitive level. There has to be something that makes us say, “This monster represents this,” or “Is a manifestation of that.” Whether these allegations are true or not is irrelevant, because some part of us will feel as if we’ve conquered it… right up until it tears our limbs out.
Something Unconscious. Finally, we must empathize with this perfect monster on a more emotional level. It has to speak to us in some deep, almost primitive fashion. We acknowledge it is an avatar of nightmares, a walking obscenity, and accept this fact. While we may not agree with this abomination’s existence, we agree that it does indeed exist. The monster buried inside all of us finds comfort in its more obvious abhorrent nature, but we will never voice this.

So there you go, ten characteristics of the perfect horror monster. A bit philosophical overall, but deconstructed to more base creative elements. Needless to say, if anything remotely this nasty decided to stroll down the road, I’d sob like a little kid. Regardless, I’d still love to see it through my tears those last few moments before all the screaming and the bleeding ensued.

BRIAN FATAH STEELE, a member of the indie author co-op Dark Red Press, describes the majority of his work as "Epic Horror with lots of Explosions." Along with multiple books, his articles and stories have appeared in various e-magazines and online journals. Steele lives in Ohio with a few cats that are probably plotting his doom. Surviving on a diet primarily of coffee and cigarettes, he occasionally dabbles in Visual Arts and Music Production. He still hopes to one day become a Super Villain.

http://brianfatahsteele.com

http://www.darkredpress.com

How to improve your writing whilst lying down

2012-01-24T01:11:00.000-08:00

For some reason (I wasn’t drunk or high on cocoa beans) I started thinking about the resources I use in my writing. I was sitting in front of the fire, wearing my red velour evening jacket, smoking a pipe and pondering the imponderables of life, as you do of a Sunday evening when Sherlock’s finished and your old man’s blaring La Traviata out at full crackle from his Crossley 54 Radio.

And then I thought, hey, for a hobby, you know, writing’s pretty cheap. You don’t really need a whole lot of resources – a lap top, pen and paper, the love of a good therapist.

Ah, I snort, quaffing another one of the Christmas Turkish Delights nobody else wanted and slurping the last of the Cranberry juice lifestyle coaches say is so good for you. But what about all those books you’ve bought and read over the years?

And then it struck me: My most important writing tool is my Kindle.

There I’ve said it. Happy now people?

I decided last May to take the plunge and buy a Kindle and I have to admit that I was sceptical. The usual, old timers response to new technology I’m afraid: You can’t beat the weight/feel/smell/taste of a real book.

This I quickly found to be bollocks. It’s better than a book. It doesn’t weigh you down and you can carry all your damn books around in your fecking pocket. How can that not be better? You get a wider choice of books and you don’t have to wait a week for them to turn up at your door. HOW is that NOT better?

And what about the in-book dictionary? It means I don’t have to pretend I know what a word means because I can’t be arsed to get the dictionary off the shelf, I can look it up there and then and five minutes later forget it…without hardly moving a fecking muscle!

But the thing it also allowed me to do was simply this: It allowed me, or encouraged me, to read MORE. Whereas I used to read one ordinary book a week, with the Kindle (and please note there are other equally suitable electronic readers out there) I’m reading two or three.

Currently I’m reading Cool Hand Luke. I’ve seen the film countless times but never knew there was a book until Scott Roche mentioned it in the comments section of one of my previous blogs.
And it’s a good book in its own right.

I also download a wider variety of stuff now…good and, sometimes, hopelessly bad. Of course, you learn from the good, get energised by it, but you can also learn from the bad and be energised by that too. Look at all the genres: horror, thriller, western, comedy…Okay, so I haven’t downloaded (at least knowingly) any chick-lit yet, but I may do. I may snuggle down in bed and see what Seventeen Ways to Ruin a Casserole has to offer.

I may…then again, I may not…

What other past-time allows you to improve your skills whilst lying on your back and just moving your eyes?

Guest Blog: What makes good horror by A W Marsden

2012-01-23T01:00:00.000-08:00

What’s that? Corner of your eye… no, don’t look. See. That’s it. Over there, at the very edge of your field of vision, in that fuzzy zone between colour and shadow. It’s gone now. But it was there, wasn’t it? You believe your own eyes, don’t you?

What about that noise? The little rustle from the far side of the room. Just rubbish settling, plastic uncurling in the wastebasket. Or is it?

I grew up on Goosebumps and Are You Afraid of the Dark? Every night after school, I would rush in, get changed out of my uniform, grab a plate of Jaffa Cakes from the fridge, and settle down in the living room to be scared.

Not every tale scared me.

So I started reading the books, harassing the librarians for more every week. The books did scare me. Not just when I was reading, but long after I’d put them down. Alone in my room. As I turned the lights off. It was my own imagination that scared me the most. I was hungry for more.

So began my love affair with all things dark and macabre.

These days, I still get scared. I sometimes scare myself, late at night when writing. Getting too caught up in your own little worlds is a hazard of the job, I suppose. It’s not the buckets of blood and gore that scare. It’s the sudden movement you think you saw a moment ago. The sound that you don’t recognise. The strange coolness that makes the hairs stand up on the back of your neck when you realise you’re the only person in the room, in the house, but the door is open to the landing and the stair just creaked and at any moment something will walk or crawl or shuffle or lumber through the door.

Our imagination, given enough fuel (by enough I mean: very little), can wreak havoc on our vulnerable nerves. When Ofelia (Pan’s Labyrinth) eats two grapes despite the Faun’s dire warnings, it is not the grotesque image of the Pale Man, eyes-in-hand, that frightens us. It is the thought of what he will do to us if he catches us that makes our hearts hammer and our knuckles bite deep into the arms of the chair. We get that not from him, but the sketches on the walls of children ripped apart and eaten.

The opening of Jurassic Park still sticks in the mind long after the film is over, a fierce yellow eye and a flash of teeth are all that hint at the poor worker’s fate before Bob Peck orders his men to “Shoot her!” A serene lake dissolves into view to the sound of gunshots, while we breathe deep and try to calm ourselves.

A trope of theatre for centuries, the worst violence almost always occurs off stage. Only the bloodied daggers are testament to the atrocity that Macbeth has visited upon King Duncan, yet in our minds eye we play over and over every cut and thrust of the blades as they pierce Duncan again and again.

Good horror, in my humble view, uses scares that we cannot see, forcing our own imagination to do the work. Even with modern CGI effects bringing every little drop of blood and viscera to the lens, the best scares are when something appears for only a moment. I’m not talking about that overused cliche ‘jump-moment’ either. That tactic is a tired, pathetic excuse for horror. Give the audience a clue, the slightest one. They are intelligent, they will scare themselves easily enough.

But why? What does horror set out to do, other than just scare people? After all, the blood, gore, monsters, death and jumps are all capable of inducing fear.

These aren’t enough, because they don’t get people to think.

There are many horrors in the world today, real, tangible. From Gaddafi’s bloodied face on the front pages of the tabloids, to the bodies falling from the World Trade Centre towers, through mutilated corpses of women and children online. These things are terrible. But people easily form detachment from them. I’ve seen young teenagers reblog gore-fest pictures right alongside fluffy kittens and cute topless girls on Tumblr as if they’re just texting their mates a ‘hey’. To them, it isn’t real.

Horror has to be real, to remind people of what is good and bad in the world. Good horror does that by scaring us deep in our hearts and souls, with the creepy sense that something is not quite right in the world. Everything is not okay, you are not okay. I am not okay, I promise. And we need to do something about it.

Now, what was that? Over there, corner of your eye…

You can find out more about A W Marsden at http://terrierandy7.com/

The Feckless Goblin Writing Competition: Hell in a Hand Cart

2012-01-21T10:07:00.000-08:00

Haven't had a competition for a while (purse strings in a bit of a knot) so thought I'd get one going to start off your newish year.

Okay doods and doodesses, and those in between, the competition is this:

Describe Hell in one sentence.

Your job, most excellent writer, is to give a chilling feel for Hell in ONE, yes ONE, sentence. Brownie points will be given for brevity but the winner will be the one who can instill a sense of dread and damnation in a just a few words. HINT: You don't have to describe a physical place.

PLEASE NOTE: I got this idea whilst drinking scotch.

But how do I enter Ziggy?

Put your entry in the comments section below. You can enter as many times as you like. Entry is, as usual, FREE. All I ask is that you let your twitter/facebook/cult followers know about the competition and link them to it.

And what do I get Ziggy? For these six hundred and sixty six hours of blood, sweat and tears trying to think of just one sentence to describe the underlying essence of Hell and chill your dear readers to the bone?

The winner will get a £20 Amazon Voucher (or exchange rate equivalent), e-mailed to them the day the result is announced.

So, get writing doods and doodesses, before I renew my subscription to My Dog's Dead Weekly.

The competition is open until the end of February. Whence I will call on Satan to judge your miserable attempts to describe his domain.

Now...back to me scotch...mmmmmmm...much nicer than fishcakes and rocket....hic...

Guest Blog: Making Good Horror by "Smokey" Joe Mayes

2012-01-21T01:37:00.000-08:00

I love good horror stories. As far back as I can remember, I’ve loved being pushed to the edge of my nerves, being terrified to the point that I couldn’t sleep, wondering if the ping, ping, ping outside my bedroom window was the sound of killers breaking in or simply magpies pecking at the dog’s dish again.

I grew up watching Dark Shadows, Night Stalker, Rod Serling’s Night Gallery, and any horror movie that was playing after midnight on the UHF channels on Friday and Saturday night.

I never stopped to think about why I liked these, let alone why certain stories had the power to frighten me. I just loved the feeling of being carried off to another world, being in the middle of the action, and being completely powerless to alter the outcome.

While I enjoyed the crisp telling of a good horror story on television and in movies, the first book I remember being truly terrified by was Stephen King’s “The Stand.” I had just completed basic military training where 30 of my closest friends and I shared not only military training but also seemingly every germ any of us had ever encountered. For more than a month, it was a continual transference of viruses so coughing and sniffles were rampant for all of us.

As the story unfolded it became apparent that during the time I’d spent in basic training, a new strain of virus had been launched on the world. I plunged into the book as I battled my perpetual cold symptoms, every sniffle and sneeze convincing me that Project Blue had claimed another victim. Captain Trips had me and I was not going to survive to the end of King’s epic masterpiece.

After I finished the book and crawled out from under the covers, I asked myself why this book scared me, why I had bought into King’s story. Why did this book scare me when others had failed?

The answer was simple: I believed this could actually happen to me.

The symptoms of King’s killer superflu weren’t far-fetched. It wasn’t like the victims were covered in paisley warts or grew third arms in the middle of their foreheads. The onset of the superflu was marked by simple sniffles and sneezes, symptoms I’d experienced often in my life and was, in fact, experiencing as I read the book. I could have been part of King’s 99% of the population affected by this killer bug.

Over the years, as I’ve watched, read, and especially written in this genre, I’ve thought back to the simplicity with which King roped me in. I noticed that all good horror stories (in addition to good storytelling, of course) presented the terror as something that could happen to the audience. It was presented as something that could happen to me.

Of course all the other elements of a good story have to be there for the horror to work. The writer must create believable characters the reader (or audience) cares about. The theme of the story has to resonate with the reader and the action must engage them, propelling the story – and reader – forward.

If the reader isn’t emotionally invested in a story’s characters, the action will have no impact. Here’s an example (as well as shameless self-promotion): the opening scene of my short story “Love Stinks” presents a graphic murder scene. A man lies dead on the kitchen floor, a kitchen knife buried to the hilt in his lower abdomen. Blood and effluvium fill the room and a woman and small child are witness to it all.

But there isn’t any horror. There is no emotional reaction to the graphic display depicted in this scene whatsoever, in fact. It’s intentionally a simple recitation of the facts, a sterile description of the scene in the kitchen. As a result, there is no horror associated with it.

Why?

First, we don’t yet know or care about the characters involved. We don’t know the man who’s been killed. We don’t know the woman or the boy who stand over his dead body. In other words, this didn’t happen to real people because we don’t know who these people are.

Later in the same story, however, there is another murder scene involving the two main characters. At this point in the story, however, there is an emotional reaction because now we know them and empathize enough to care what happens to them. The fact that the reader cares about the characters makes this scene matter. It makes it horrible.

Another distinction between horror and any other good fiction is the nature of the action. The action must be such that it creates fear for the characters and, by extension, the reader. There has to be a genuine danger and the stakes of the characters’ conflict have to be graver than in other fiction forms.

Of course, putting a character the reader cares about in danger isn’t unique to horror. For example, in John Grisham’s “The Firm,” Mitch McDeere is a truly sympathetic character. He’s presented to the reader as very likeable, someone who has pulled himself up by the bootstraps to make a life for himself and his wife. Grisham puts this likeable character in grave danger by pitting him at odds with dangerous elements, people who want him dead and against whom there appears no defense for poor, overmatched Mitch.

But while certainly a well-crafted thriller, “The Firm” would never be considered horror. We have some of the elements of horror: good story, likeable characters, grave danger, and fast-moving action.

So what’s missing? Why didn’t “The Firm” scare me?

Because I didn’t believe it could happen to me.

I am not an attorney with a high-dollar law firm. I am not – and likely will never be – in circumstances like those faced by Mitch McDeere. I care about him making it out alive but I never once fear for myself.

In The Stand, 99% of the population was affected and I could easily imagine myself in that 99%. I could imagine myself as a writer in an empty Colorado hotel, tormented both by guests from yesteryear and by writer’s block (King’s “The Shining”). I’ve been to the beach and could be eaten by a shark (Peter Benchley’s “Jaws”). I could even imagine myself as one of the poor citizens of Haddonfield, tormented by the killing machine that was Michael Myers in “Halloween.” These horror stories all stir the nerves because they present situations in which I could imagine myself.

And triggering that imagination in the reader is the real challenge facing the horror writer. It’s not the horrific action alone that gives the audience the chills. Don’t believe me? Check out any of the “Final Destination” movies. Absolutely horrific events happen in these stories but, frankly, the stories are pure camp because the elements of a good story aren’t there. It’s gore for gore’s sake and leaves the audience laughing rather than hiding under the covers.

So the final element of delivering a good horror story is to know thy audience. The writer has to know who will be reading the story and how to manipulate their imaginations to the point that they put themselves in the middle of the action, or at least could imagine a scenario in which they could find themselves there.

In other words, the writer has to be at least as invested in the reader as the reader is in the story.

It’s the only way to make them believe it could actually happen to them.

Find out more about Smokey Joe Mayes at http://smokeyjoemayes.blogspot.com/

10 Films that lived up to the original book

2012-01-20T05:10:00.000-08:00

You know how it is Avid Reader. Your favourite book is about to be made into a movie starring a major league actor, you wait with heart beating fearfully, you go to the cinema with sweaty palms…and you weep into your hideously expensive diet coke and popcorn because the director, the actors, the scriptwriters, the producers and even the damn second reserve camera man have all conspired to rip the heart out of your…yes YOUR…story.

In truth, it’s easier to find book to film failures than it is to find successes. Our Dear Avid Reader can name at least 100 films that disappoint compared to one or two that live up to the dream.

I’ve put together a list of 10 films that I think did the original book justice. This is my personal list and not based on anything other than my likes and dislikes. It’s also based on the films I’ve actually read the book for and then seen the film.

The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler: While the novel is one of my favourites and a great example of the genre, with great one liners and sharply drawn characters, the film is also in my top 10 list. Humphrey Bogart nails the role of Philip Marlowe and when I read the books again, I can’t see anyone else but him.
Jaws by Peter Benchley: To be honest, Benchley’s novel was no great shakes and could have sunk into the depths much the same way as his shark did in the final scene of the book. It took Spielberg’s early magic to bring it to the big screen and make it one of the blockbusters of the Seventies.
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson. Both versions were faithful tellings of Larsson’s original tale. If I had to choose I’d put the film just ahead of the book.
Let the Right One In by John Ajvide Lindqvist: Okay, here’s an admission. I’m not keen on films that have children as lead characters. I made an exception here. The original Swedish film uses the vampire myth to tell a story of isolation and is quite a faithful retelling of the book.
The Shawshank Redemption by Stephen King: Alright, alright Avid Reader, I know this is from a short story (Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption) but it counts as well. Of all authors, Stephen King has the worst track record of print to film. Most of the films of his books are fatally flawed so it’s nice to see that at least one works.
The Haunting by Shirley Jackson: The original attempt at Jackson's novella is one of the most atmospheric ghost films ever - forget the sometimes hammy acting and concentrate on those breathing doors and don’t forget the spiral staircase. It was followed much later by the Liam Neeson/Catherine Zeta-Jones remake, probably one of the worst adaptations of a novel ever, ever, EVER!!
Hombre by Elmore Leonard: I started reading Leonard because he writes great dialogue and it’s something I feel I’m weak on. Hombre is one of my favourite westerns, not only for Paul Newman’s stellar performance but because it has oft forgotten bad guy Richard Boone in it. The book’s not bad either.
Brighton Rock by Graham Greene: Again dear Avid Reader, the original not the remake. Dickie Attenborough’s performance of the malign and ruthless Pinky still rates him as one of the best on screen psychos in my opinion. If you haven’t read it, Greene’s novel also is a brilliant insight into 50s gangland life in England.
No Country for Old Men by Cormac McCarthy: I like McCarthy’s writing style in both this book and The Road. The No Country film was helped by great performances from the leads including the always reliable Tommy Lee Jones. If I had to make a choice, I prefer the book to the film but it’s a close call.
Blade Runner by Philip K Dick: Known to all sci-fi geeks as Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? The novel is much less known than the film now. Despite being continuously dragged out with a new directors or remastered cut, Blade Runner remains one of the most enduring Sci-Fi films of the last 30 years.

Okay that’s my choice. Now where’s yours? It’s easy, as I said, to pick your bad films from favourite books, so rack your mushy brains and come up with your favourite adaptation…Answers in the comments section below as usual.

Guest Blog: Great Horror Must Not Be Horrible by Carl Plumer

2012-01-18T02:42:00.000-08:00

Horror can’t suck (no pun intended). It has to scare the pants off you.

It has to be the devil’s rollercoaster ride. You have to feel something. And that something is FEAR.

The best horror, for me, makes you feel two things when it’s over:

thank god I’m alive and
thank god that wasn’t me.

You want to be so scared you can’t move and you can’t look away. You have to feel that the protagonist, whether he or she matches your gender or not, is YOU. You have to feel not only empathy, but a personal involvement at a core level. If he/she doesn’t make it out, then you don’t make it out (of the cave/house/woods/swamp/planet/the belly of the beast, etc.)

Here’s what I think.

Too much stuff masquerading as horror misses the point. I don’t want to see bodies ground up (I’m just not turned on that way.). I don’t want to see people tortured (See previous comment.). I want to see people put in a perilous, no-way-out, impossible-to-survive situation...and survive. I think that such a situation is both akin to real life and the opposite of it.

Here’s what I mean.

It's my belief that daily we are all caught in a life-and-death struggle, only we don’t know it. We live at a superficial level of life, never diving beneath the surface. But the reality is, DEATH is watching. In the form of cancer and other diseases, car wrecks, plane crashes, suicides, poisonings, a cruise ship capsizing, stray bullets, and all that.

We ignore these truths, perhaps because it’s the only way to get along in life, to take care of our day-to-day necessary chores, to keep our bodies functioning and a roof over our heads. We sedate ourselves with drugs, alcohol, sometimes religion, and always TV.

But Death doesn’t care.

So a good horror movie or book or audiobook or podcast or even old radio show provides you with a means to look over the edge and into the abyss. It gives you time to reflect that you will die. Probably not as horribly as described in the horror vehicle of your choice. Perhaps, if you’re lucky, even slipping away in your sleep. Or, in my hoped-for exit scenario, whilst saving a small child from destruction, such as swiping it out of the way of a runaway vehicle, while sacrificing your life in the process. But that’s just me.

Horror lets you be scared. Because you should be. But you’re too busy working, laughing, playing, dreaming. Good horror not only lets you be scared, it lets you defeat Death for one more day. Because good horror, true horror must adhere to the Unspoken Rule: somebody must survive in the end. And that somebody must be the hero or heroine, because that somebody represents US.

They are us and we need more time!

Enjoy your life while it lasts (and may it last a long, long, long time).

For more such rants, see my blog at www.carlplumer.com. Thanks for reading.

And now it's your turn: What makes good horror? Answers on a postcard or in the comments section below.

What can we learn from old B Movies?

2012-01-12T03:02:00.000-08:00

I've rediscovered some old, black and white film gems on YouTube recently. This one looks as though it was made on a shoestring budget using a detergent bottle for the exploration vehicle. It reminds me of the imagination you needed back in the days of yore when then was no such thing as CGI.

Some of you may decide this is rubbish, but I think it's a little gem. And it's free. It also reminds me, much like the legendary films of Ed Wood, not to take my own work too seriously. In the 50s and 60s B Movies were dished out nineteen to the dozen without much thought to structure, deeper meaning, good acting or whether the sets wobbled, they were there to entertain.

10 dumb writing facts for aspiring writers

2011-09-20T02:27:00.000-07:00

If you put a 100 monkeys in a room with typewriters, the chances of one of them completing a copy of a Shakespeare play in its lifetime would be 1 in 6 million billion.
If you took all the books that had ever been written, tore out their pages and placed these pages end to end, they would stretch to the moon and back 13.6 times.
If you took all the books that had been read by more than a 100 people and did the same thing, then it would only just stretch into the upper atmosphere of our own planet.
37% of newly bought books spend 6 months on the shelf before they are actually read. 49% of these never actually get read.
Foucault’s Pendulum by Umberto Eco has been unofficially named as the most unreadable book on the planet, closely followed by Stephen Hawking’s A Brief History of Time.
You are statistically more likely to be injured by a falling toad than write the year’s number one bestseller. Whilst there is normally only one winner in the bestseller list, in 2010 17 people were injured by toads that “just fell out of the sky” following violent storms, including one fatality (figure from the NATSUSA).
18% of budding writers admit that they write because there is something lacking in their lives. 23% say that they write for money. Only 4% admit that they write because they don’t have any friends.
Writers who write their books directly onto a PC/laptop, write their novels on average 36% quicker than writers who write the old fashioned pen and ink way and then transcribe onto a PC/laptop. However, writers who begin with pen and ink are 13% more likely to finish and publish their work than someone who writes directly onto a PC/laptop.
Most grammar experts believe that the apostrophe will disappear from writing some time before the end of the next decade simply because of the evolution of language.
62% of writers will buy a boat of some description within 10 years of becoming successful. Of these boats, 84% will sink within the first 5 years.

Have you got a favourite writing statistic? If so, then add yours in the comments section below.

And the winner is...

2011-07-26T08:13:00.000-07:00

Thanks for all those who entered the Great Opening Bits writing competition and deepest apologies for the time it's taken for me to announce the winner...The judge for this competition was trainee supervillain, film scholar and writer of Westerns, horror, adventure and gothic fiction Icy Sedgwick. You can find out more about her work at www.icysedgwick.com

And now, for the winner...who is, and always shall be known to the world as Rabid Fox (or Wagthefox if you're on Twitter.

From my bedroom window in the house where I grew up, I used to watch the hayfield sway with a gentle wind. Gusts like angels raced through the grass. I wished I could run with them, follow them to whatever heaven they called home, but the house is gone now, the field fallow, and I'm fairly sure I'm dead. I'm not breathing, anyway.

Rabid will be getting a £30 (or dollar equivalent) gift voucher to use on Amazon.

Thanks again for all of you who entered.

Welcome to hyphenation land

2011-07-12T14:40:00.000-07:00

I watched Battlefield: Los Angeles the other night.

It ticked all the boxes for the alien-invasion-taking-over-the-world-ain't-life-full-of-fecking-heroes-shit scenario. It had a Staff Sergeant who had lost all his men in Iraq or Venezuela or some such place and had to earn the respect of his crew by shoving a grenade up the ass of a passing alien whilst playing the banjo (the Staff Sergeant, not the alien) and eating a pack of spicy Doritos. It had a uniformly distributed range of ethnicity to suit all film-goers and a suitably large CGI budget for blowing things to kingdom come.

The aliens were bog standard mindless drones and somewhere in the plot it transpired they were being controlled from a central source (believe it or not they were hiding in a hole nearby, as dumb-ass aliens tend to do) so there was a chance for Sergeant Fantastic to save the day and the human race in one fell swoop with the aid of his, by the end of the film, bloody faced men. These included black-man-whose-brother-you-got-killed-but-who-will-learn-to-love-a-white-man-who-just-wants-to-blow-shit-up, as well as those adoring follow-you-anywhere-die-hard, fuck-who-sucked-out-my-brain marines with equally stereotypical lives.

Yeeh-hah. Hell, no!

I have to admit, I quite enjoyed it.

It went well with my red wine and Chinese spare ribs and Char Sui rice.

I could write that shit. Sure I could. With my eyes closed, while shooting fecking aliens, playing the violin and sucking the dick of the nearest horse whilst singing dixie (me, not the horse).

To keep the war theme going, I'm also reading a book. Norman Mailer's The Naked and The Dead. None of the characters in Mailer's book are really like-able. Whereas the characters in Battlefield: Los Angeles stand up as cardboard cutouts, the one's in Naked and The Dead are 3 dimensional, fleshy, warty, broken, twisted and human. It's a long book. But it has depth.

The characters spew. And I don't use that word lightly.

So I ask, while flicking peanuts at the cheese plant in the corner, do my own characters have depth? Do I have something to say about them or are they just cardboard alien-fighting-ethnically-correct cutouts, the same as a million other genre characters that pretend to have flesh but are just poor cutouts on a well-trodden stage (see what I did there, I did metaphor...or is that an analogy...I forget...).

Here's the thing. Writing shit is easy.

Hey, but writing is just writing, yeah? You put pen to paper and get all that crap out and someone's bound to like it. Who knows, maybe in a hundred years it'll be seen as a seminal work of fiction and people will read me in schools, if they still have those things when we're all underwater stroking our gills (look, I did a euphemism).

Am I proud that I finished the damn thing? Or am I proud because it was damn good?

Any dick brain can write and finish a book. They just have to sit at their PC long enough and drink enough. But the thing is, at the end of that hard long slog, it's got to be worth something, hasn't it?

I was having a conversation with an old work colleague of mine (she's not old, we've known each other for a while, I mean). I like a bit of photography but have gone off it since I went to Chester Zoo and every one had a camera. Flicker is full of photos. I have a friend who can actually call himself a photographer. But thinking about me, I have to have a reason to take photos. It's easy to take good photographs nowadays. You just point and shoot. But your photos have to say something, and though I'm reasonably competent, I've never thought that mine said much. Got nice colour in there, nice posing, but hell, it's just like everyone elses.

I have nothing to say photographically. I can point and shoot. But I ain't doing much more.

Which brings me back to my writing. I know I overdo the angst bit on this blog, but it has a reason. Does what I write have any point? I asked my friend this and she countered with: but you're a good writer.

There are a lot of good writers out there, there are a lot of good photographers out there. The point is what separates the best from the rest.

I'm not talking about the ones who write the most or the ones who sell the most. I'm talking about the ones that endure. The one's, when we read them, we remember. Not only their name but also their characters and there plotlines. The one's that are not just another book (or film or photo) but something that transcends, the one's that stay with us.

So if you're a writer think about this (and here I'm going to go back into metaphor or fecking analogy or some fecking stuff), what kind of hack are you: are you an alien drone dishing out the same old crap or are you the staff sergeant who's going to blow-up the aliens sorry ass????

See what I did there, huh? See? And by "blow-up the aliens sorry ass" I mean with a grenade not mouth to ass...

Dementia Rules: Wheelie Bins and Broken Plates

2011-06-15T03:57:00.000-07:00

My dad has been in the bin. Not actually in it, per se, though he almost fell in, but he’s been in the bin outside.
Looking for stuff.

Specifically, looking for his favourite plate. He glued his plate together a while back when it first broke and gets a bit tetchy if he doesn’t have his evening meal on it (mangy tray and all). Over the weekend, Big Chris, my brother-in-law, broke it again while he was doing the washing up. Naturally, he said sorry and then put it in the bin.

Monday morning, I look out the window, and there’s dad, leaned over in the wheelie bin, frantically scrambling for something. At some point I think he’s going to tip over and go head first. My first thought is that I could rush out and close the lid, seal it shut. Then say my dad has gone missing. Imagine the headline: MAN FOUND IN WHEELIE BIN. Then again, that wouldn’t be fair.

My second thought is: God forbid. That’s when he suddenly emerges with the two halves of his favourite plate. He looks around furtively (as only kids and those with dementia can) and then sneaks down the side path to the back of the house and the safety of his shed where he hides it.

He’s intending to glue it back together.

But dementia is a terrible thing. You forget stuff.

And for the moment, my father has forgotten that the plate is there. He will find it sometime in the near future, pick it up, look at it, put it down, pick it up, look at it, trying to fathom why it’s there and what he was going to do with it. He may actually get round to gluing it together again if he can remember how to do that and the fabled plate may suddenly appear on the washing tray at some point in the distant future.

My dad doesn’t like change.

It confuses him. Agitates him. And then he forgets. But then he’ll remember and he’ll get agitated again. He looks for stuff, long lost, in bizarre places where no one in their right mind would put a thing. When I ask why he is looking for said object in such a strange place (e.g., the back of the fridge), he replies: Well, you don’t know.

Meanwhile, my dad's three legged cat, Mr Tibs, has been trying to scratch its ear with its missing limb. It's a bizarre sight. I may have to record it for You Tube one day...

The Feckless Goblin guide to surviving The Rapture

2011-05-18T13:07:00.000-07:00

In case you’ve been hidden away in a barn with your pet goat these last few weeks, you’ll be aware that Saturday 21st May marks Judgement Day with the onset of The Rapture. For all those who have been striving to make their careers as Indie Writers, this, of course, will be a bit of a bummer.

Stop writing now, kids. The Rapture is a coming.

My dad’s cat is looking forward to it. Yes it is. For quite a while, the cat has been trying to convince us that The Rapture will actually happen and that we should drop everything and open our hearts to the big JC.

Foolishly, we have ignored the cat. On Saturday, it will be able to say “told you so”, though we haven’t been able to get across to said mog that said Rapture doesn’t apply to dumb animals (or does it? You decide). It will meow in a Cheshire Cat kind of way. Then we may kick it to death.

What is The Rapture?

The day when all good people are beamed up to heaven while the rest of us poor sods suffer various catastrophes from Tsunamis to nuclear meltdowns as the world slowly implodes (be calm children of the apocalypse, apparently it’ll be finished by the middle of October).

Some right wing zealots believe that there will also be a Zombie Apocalypse but I think that may be a case of wishful thinking on the part of zombie lovers everywhere who have been wishing the end of the world on us for at least the last ten years.

For more on The Rapture, watch the following informational video from the Department of Fences (commonly known as somegreybloke):

Is The Rapture real?

Does the Pope have a glass eye? You know, a big part of me, in fact all of me, wants this to be real. Not the Pope thing. The Rapture thing. Now, in case you’re wondering, I’m not likely to be transported to the heavens come May 21st (and, let’s face it, neither are most Christians.

But, come on guys, wouldn’t it make for a more exciting world if it was all coming to an end?

Well, it is at some point, because people apparently die or some such stuff...begs the question that, if we all die at some point and get judged in some sky kingdom thing by a guy with a white beard anyway, then what would be the reason for The Rapture...or maybe God just got bored and thought: fuck it, let’s blow the whole place up and start again.

In which case none of us are gonna make it!

So, The Rapture is probably another fake, end-of-days fuck fest just like all the others. Sorry to disappoint you. The only guarantee is that someone, somewhere, is making money out of it.

7 ways to make the most of Rapture Day

Have a Rapture Party. Make sure you’re all there at 6pm local time when The Rapture in your neighbourhood starts. Be sure to invite “good” people in the hope that one of them will be beamed up in front of you.
Tell Christians who believe The Rapture that they should be at a local bus stop by 6pm. Be sure to film the queue.
Invite Christians to your party and scare the hell out of them by pretending to be Raptured. This can be achieved with the help of a few good friends, some torches, a bit of heavenly music and some cupboards.
In the run up to The Rapture, why not sell tickets on e-bay – that little bit of extra money might just get you through the ensuing Armageddon.
As The Rapture also marks the return of Christ, why not purchase a fake beard and smock and walk around your neighbourhood looking suitably pious and asking people if they have repented yet. Better still, gatecrash a church service and shout “Daddy’s home!”
Make more cash by convincing believers to sign over their worldly goods as a mark of their faith.
Take some of your old clothes and shoes and leave them lying around the neighbourhood after 6pm. Alternatively, leave tiny mounds of your grandmas ashes in strategic places like your local supermarket. Even more alternatively, leave a pile of hot pooh with the note: “Have been taken up.”

Things to look forward to if The Rapture really does happen:

Less queuing at places like Alton Towers and the soup kitchen.
More homes for the homeless.
No one to tell you that what you’re doing “is just plain wrong.”
The fun that can be had taunting the ones who thought they were going to be taken up and didn’t get taken up.
Great photo ops for all those natural disasters.
No longer having to pretend that you’re good.
I was going to say that the one downside would be all those people saying: “I told you so.” But then they’ll be beamed up and the one’s left behind will be too desolated to say such a thing.

Next week I’ll be blogging on Post-Rapture Depression.

Or maybe I won’t...See you on the other side losers.

How will you be celebrating The Rapture. Let The Feckless Goblin know, as usual, in the comments section below...

The GOB Writing Competition

2011-05-13T10:11:00.000-07:00

There are old people roaming the street, ringing doorbells. They are in pairs, wearing gingham and tweed and they look quite frightening. My dad is huffing and puffing for no particular reason. I wonder if they are connected.

Maybe they’ve come to take him away....Or maybe that’s just a good place to start a story.

As I’ve been away for a bit, I thought the best place to pick up again would be to have a writing competition.

And so here it is: Ta-Daaaaaaa!!!!

The Great Opening Bits Competition (or GOB comp for short)

You should know by now that all good stories have a strong opening hook which makes the reader read on.
Your mission, dear friends, is to write the first four sentences of a story that people will want to read. You can go scary, mystery, lovey-dovey, erotic, chaotic...the choice is yours.

But, my favourite Feckless Goblin, what will I win?

The GOB competition is open until the end of June and the person who writes best opening bit will get a £30 (or exchange equivalent) Amazon Voucher to spend on what they want.

How do I enter the GOB competition?

The competition is FREE to enter.

Just write your entry in the comments section below as per usual. You can enter as many times as you like. Remember, you only get 4 sentences per entry to entice your reader...

Once you have entered, and this is important peeps, Tweet your followers about the competition and include the hashtag #GOBcomp.

Who’s going to judge the GOB competition?

I dunno yet! Okay? I’ll find someone...maybe not someone famous but...definitely someone who’s still alive. I’ll update soon with a name (not one I’ve just made up).

Why the hell did I buy that Kindle? And other early morning thoughts...

2011-02-18T22:19:00.000-08:00

It's five in the morning and my eyes ping open. I try to get back to sleep. I try to empty my mind. But it's no use. My mind is full of junk.

First I'm thinking: Why did I buy that Kindle yesterday? I don't really need it. I've got books on my iPhone and I haven't read half of those. Then I'm thinking how I get the clothes my dad's been wearing for the last four weeks (and which are beginning to really smel)l off him and into the washing machine.

I'm becoming a dab hand with a bottle of Febreeze. I spray it at the furniture like some fussy old maid, spray the carpet, even spray it at my dad, surreptitiously of course. Unfortunately, he needs more than a good spray. Maybe I could stand him outside for a while and let the natural breeze take away some of those odours. In the meantime, the cat looks at me like I'm an idiot and my father watches New 24 for more hours than is healthy for a human being.

The early hours are good for writing if I can't sleep. Obviously, it's not much good for writing if I am actually asleep. I might discover deep truths, or at least some fabulous lies. At the moment, though, I'm too busy obsessing over whether I should have bought the Kindle. My brain is saying: unnecessary expense. It says that a lot lately. Like a beeper going off. For instance, I have to buy a car soon. My brother-in-law has managed to purloin me an old Peugeot for not very much. Ideal for running around in, which is all I need.

But my brain has suddenly decided, after 40 odd years ofsublime indifference, that it suddenly likes cars and I've been looking at this red MG that looks kinda sexy...which I don't need...not at all...but...mmmmmmm.

This has got me thinking, at five in the morning no less, that my life is full of junk. From the Kindle to the laptop I'm working on, to all the crap on my floor, including the electric toothbrush and the goddamn iPhone. It's all junk. Realise this people, someone went out and actually invented Febreeze. Somehow, I'm not sure the Great Lord of Creation had that in mind when he zapped us with his creation stick.

And I hate to harken back to the old days, when life was simpler. But it was, wasn't it?

When we lived in caves, all we had to worry about was getting food or keeping warm. Then, as if things weren't just right, we had to go and do something stupid like evolve. Primarily, this involved finding new things to worry about. We started having conversations with our neighbours, actually talking to each other, building settlements, learning "new" skills, discovering art.

Cooking used to be about just getting stuff on a plate, now you have to create a masterpiece every time you go into your mass produced kitchen where pointless gadgets gleam and whisper: use me, use me, you never needed me before, but now that you have me, you need me, need me soooo much!

Here's a crazy notion: Why don't we stop evolving and producing useless crap that means nothing and go back to living in caves...

Why? Because it's cold and damp and...yes, harsh. You don't want to live in a cave. You want to lie in a nice warm bed with a nice laptop and a nice cup of tea in your nice house with your lovely two kids and cock-eyed spaniel that's got a little snuffle and your fridge full of organically farmed beetroot and freshly laid eggs and meat cut into neat chunks by some faceless miscreant who, right this minute, is sitting up and wondering why he can't get to sleep and what the point of life is...

Ah, five in the morning. A time to ramble about things inconsequential. A time to let all those thoughts out onto the page. A time rational human beings should be asleep.

Footnote: My dad has just got up to go to the toilet, farted loudly and gone back to bed. I bet he's not thinking dumb things...

Guest Blog: The Pros and Cons of Being a Writer by Adam J. Shardlow

2011-02-16T02:22:00.000-08:00

On the plus side...

Never having to wear a suit - As a writer you can wear whatever you like. Ageing shorts and t-shirt combo, distressed jeans coloured with last nights Chinese hoisin sauce, dressing gown that smells of sleep, Goofy slippers and bandanna. You can even do a Hemingway and go naked. This has the helpful economic advantage of keeping laundry bills to a minimum. Basically, you can wear whatever or as little as you like. No one will ever know.
A short walk to work - You get up, breakfast, watch the news and then sit down to work. No having to step out into the wilds of the city streets, no having to deal with dawdlers and bus queue pushers, no having to spare change for the man with drool hanging from the corner of his mouth or avoid the water filled pot hole. You’re at work in seconds, dragging valuable time from the lack commuting that can be put into your current magnus opus. Valuable time that is yours to do with as you wish.
At home during the day - You can order whatever you like and parcels will be delivered straight into your hands. No more worries that delivery companies will push those annoying little cards through your door telling your that you weren’t in (obviously) and your carton of brand new reading material has instead been left at a vast concrete hanger twenty five miles outside of town and you have two days to come and get it before it’s returned to sender.
Time to yourself -You sit and reflect on your current work. You have the time to be creative, to move about your apartment deep in thought, playing creative mind games and dabbling with new forms of writing style and experimental artistic projects. Your time is your own to plumb the depth of creativity. You dictate what you work on and have the freedom to follow the creative flow.
Your own space - You work at a desk in a book lined den. Your MacBook is set up and connected to the world. You have fresh coffee whenever you want it, warmed bagels for lunch. You can listen to your music, relax in your favourite chair and watch the sunset from the panoramic window before you, marvelling at its majesty, as your fingers tap away at those keys.
Forging your own path - You write what you want to write. If you decide the world needs the first ever 1000 page fictional account of the life of a parasitic pinworm, then so be it. You can create works so challenging, so original, so daringly innovative, that your place in the literary canon will be secured for generations to come.
Adoring fans - You have fans who visit your web page every day. They read your blog entries in minute detail and make insightful comments. They hang on your every Twitter and Facebook update, they send you gifts in the post. At signings the queue snakes around the block, each fan asking you in excited, nervous voices for your signature and photo. You give each fan as much time as possible, building your base, cementing sales and a world tour.
Conventions - You get invited to writing conventions where you give inspirational speeches to the next generation, many of whom remember what you say and in turn become writers because of you. Being such a guru they ask you to write the introductions for their next book, your name and fame helping them to carve out lucrative careers.
Agent lunches - Your agent takes you out for expensive lunches at fabulous London eateries to discuss your current work; how it will be marketed, showing you cover designs and giving you the tour details. All the bills are paid and they send you home first class.
Film options - Hollywood, realising the golden egg that you are, beats a path to your door to option your entire back catalogue and turn them into blockbuster movies in which you have sensibly taken a percentage payment, meaning that you can afford to buy property in London, New York and Paris. This fame however, will never change you. You remain a dedicated artist, creating great works of literature.

However...

Never having to wear a suit - You are sitting naked in front of a computer screen in the middle of the day and don’t give a damn.
A short walk to work - You’re fat. You don’t get enough exercise. You barely leave the flat and have worn tracks into the carpet from using the office wheely chair as a convenient method of transport for getting to the kitchen.
At home during the day - Morons and religious freaks, can rattlers and do-gooders, double glazing salesmen, drive tarmac-ing, collection agencies and pedlers. Each and everyone knocks on your door and expects you to answer and contribute.
Time to yourself - You check Twitter, Facebook, web bookmarks, writing blogs and other sites less savoury to mention - normally every hour. You watch the news, then catch a comedy and remember that you recorded a film two weeks ago that needs to be seen. You do the washing, read a comic book, play the latest PSP release. You Skype, IM, text and take a long lunch. You do the ironing and clean the shower, make the bed and cook a meal for the evening and then wonder where the day has gone.
Your own space - You haven’t seen anyone for two weeks. You could die and no one would know until your decaying body juices soaked through the floor into the flat below.
Forging your own path - You haven’t been paid in six months. Your bank statements only come in the colour red.
Adoring fans - Does your Mum count? Really?
Conventions - You never get invited. You have to pay the entrance fee like everyone else and spend the entire weekend in the bar getting drunk.
Agent lunches - You’re not convinced your agent knows your home telephone number and you’ve only met him once. You bought your own coffee.
Film options - You have a Blockbusters membership card. That is as Hollywood as life ever gets.

More about Adam

Adam J. Shardlow is an author. He spends his day sitting in front of a computer making stuff up until his head hurts and he can longer see straight. Many say he writes works of fantasy, others say its science fiction, some shake their heads in irritation and give a long drawn out sigh before claiming the genre is in truth supernatural thriller, whilst one clearly mad individual with a long white beard and rolling eyes chants from a street corner that it is speculative fiction. Whatever it is, it’s his own style, and on these pages you can find some of his works. Others you will have to find in a bookshop. There is also a blog where he can bore you with all the mundanity and minutia of his life.

Visit Adam J Shardlow's website.

Self-publishing: Are the alarm bells starting to ring?

2011-02-08T00:19:00.000-08:00

There you sit, master or mistress of your own destiny, Indie author extraordinaire. You have five books on the Amazon bestseller list and you’re not doing too bad on iTunes either.

Then you wake up.

It’s just a dream. A damn dream! You wipe the cold sweat off your brow. Wait. You remember. It wasn’t a dream. It was real...but...but

People got greedy

Companies GOT greedy. That’s why it all fell apart. They wanted to increase their margins (whatever they are). They wanted to maximise profits. They wanted to...dare I say it...control their product.

Control you.

Really? Those nice people at Amazon? The lovely guys at Lulu? All those fine, upstanding bods at Smashwords?

You betcha!

People generally get very greedy, very quickly.

Ka-ching! There’s money in them there hills...

You see, there’s a big market out there in cyber world. And there’s a battle going on for its soul. Companies can both take a slice of Indie authors and the people who buy their product. They can begin to dictate, they can squeeze your differentials (oooh, matron...and no, I have no idea what that means either).

They can even crash and burn those bridges and leave you without a way to peddle your wares.

We’re ripe for the picking. We should be classed as vulnerable adults. It they can abuse us, they will. If they can keep us in line and make us behave, they will. Even now, some faceless corporate whore is plotting against the Revolutionary Indie Author Movement.

Those little beeps your PC makes? Maybe that’s Amazon trying a bit of mind control (well you did download that free hypnosis MP3) or iTunes putting out sneaky subliminal messaging.

Call me Mr Paranoia

The discussion point at the Feckless Goblin is this: Are the major players like Amazon and iTunes mobilising to slap us Indies in the face? Is our brave new world about to disintegrate around us? Is it all a dream?

Your thoughts, as always, are most welcome. Jot them down in the comments section below.

Guest Blog: Pros and Cons of Self-Publishing by Scott Nicholson

2011-02-07T08:06:00.000-08:00

Because I've been both indie and trad, I've blogged this topic a few times but it always comes out fresh. I love every single aspect of my new business—writing, marketing, formatting, conceptualizing, accounting, networking—but you might not.

So maybe I can encourage you or scare you away, whichever makes you happiest. Because happiness is more important than book deals.

PROS

You are boss. The mad scientist in your own lab, cooking up your Frankenstein monster. And you always get the creature you deserve.
You keep all gross proceeds. Actually, you will be spending it on business investments, but instead of receiving 4 to 15 percent of list price, you will be earning 35 to 70 percent on ebooks and probably 25 percent on paper books.
You choose the cover, genre, and overall presentation based on your understanding of your core audience.
You have control of your content and can react quickly in a rapidly evolving landscape, without worrying about what's best for corporate shareholders or a larger structure, only what's best for you and your products.
You write whatever you want.

CONS

You are boss, but would you really hire yourself if you had to apply for the job?
A hundred percent of nothing is still nothing.
You may not understand your audience at all, or you may have no audience.
You're stuck with your content because no one wants it or buys into it.
You may suck and never know it.

More about Scott:

Scott Nicholson is author of 13 novels, including the bestsellers The Red Church and Disintegration.

His new releases are the romantic paranormal mystery Transparent Lovers and the mystery Crime Beat.

He's also a freelance editor and runs http://www.hauntedcomputer.com.

Guest Blog: 10 Laws for Author Self-Promotion by David Rozansky

2011-02-05T14:17:00.000-08:00

All writers must promote themselves.

The book business depends almost entirely on word-of-mouth recommendations. The only person who can promote a writer’s work to readers is the writer.

Books are marketed through word of mouth almost exclusively. Word-of-mouth advertising has two requisite conditions: the book must be good enough for people to recommend it once they read it, and there must be an environment for people to discuss books they like. Author self-promotion serves to make both requirements happen.

Here are my 10 Laws of Author Self-Promotion.

The Law of Use

The author must use his or her own product.

If the product is finanical advice, the author must live by that advice. If the product is fiction, the author must read genre-specific novels. If the product is gossip, the author must be a social butterfly. And so on.
The author must experience the product just as the reader would. The writer must also read his or her own work, repeatedly, and understand readers’ ability to access the book, by actually buying it retail. The writer must always carry a reading copy of his or her latest book.

The Law of Sales

The writer must sell his or her own product.

The Law of Sales forces writers to hone their sales pitch for the book and find those parts of the book that are most interesting to the readers. Besides hand-selling books to readers, the author should also sell books to bookstores. The writer must always have at least one full case of his or her book nearby. Direct sales are not the ultimate goal. If the buyer goes to a local bookstore, an Amazon link or even the library, the sale is a success.

The Law of Samples

The writer must regularly give away free samples of his or her product.

Until there are enough readers recommending the book, sales just will not happen. To generate the first round of recommendations, it is necessary to give the book away. The author’s name (or characters, setting or series) will stay on the tips of people’s tongues through repeated sampling. Many authors supply free sampling of daily work through their blogs, but even so, it is still important to give the book away to those who like to recommend books.

The Law of 200 Friends

The writer must tell his or her circle of contacts about his or her product.

Generally, 200 people is about the size of one’s personal sphere of contact. To implement this rule, make a list of everyone familiar enough to converse with. Add organizations on top of that.

Then the author must tell these people that he or she is a writer, and must give them the best sales pitch for his or her book -- not only to sell them the book, but to give them a simple “recommendation pitch” to repeat to their own friends. Give out samples to this list regularly, along with promotional cards or bookmarks that contain ordering ifnormation. Inviting this complete circle of contacts to the publication party is a good way to launch any book.

The Law of 3 Feet

A writer myst tell everyone who comes within three feet about his or her product.

Hhard-selling will drive people away. Instead, passersby should be made curious about the writer or the book. Again, for this to work best, the author needs to have a copy of the book at hand. Some writers give the book away to everyone within three feet. This is an expensive option but it does pay off, if the book is a good book.

The Law of 5 x 5

The writer must try to sell the book five times a day, five days a week.

I have found that if one does a thing five times a day, five days a week, it becomes a habit. Selling the book is critical. Making it habitual is the way to overcome the dread of it.

This does not mean sell to five people. Standing in front of an auditorium of 10,000 counts as only one sales pitch. It’s not how many people the author reaches, it’s about how many times a day he or she actively makes a sales pitch.

The Law of Reviews

The writer must get his or her book recommended in positive critical reviews.

Authors need to get their books in front of reviewers who will like the books. Note that phrase: “…who will like the books.” A negative review can seriously hurt books sales, and “good-bookness” is subjective. Savvy authors contact only reviewers who have given positive reviews to similar books or who have an obvious passion for the book’s topic.

Reader reviews are also helpful, and more book bloggers pop up daily. It doesn’t matter that a reviewer is not well known, it only matters that the writer can pass around a link to the review.

The Law of Crowds

The writer must give the sales pitch for his or her book to large crowds.

Savvy authors leverage their time by making a single sales pitch before a large crowd. They avoid expensive bookstore signings and aim for large crowds in controlled settings, such as seminars they themselves produce, and sell books at the back of the room. The Law of Crowds also extends to mass media.Authors should approach radio producers, television producers, newspaper editors, and bloggers daily, to offer themselves up for interviews. Getting on TV is hard for fiction writers, but radio is more accomodating, and book bloggers are ravishly hungry for fiction authors.

The Law of the Internet

A writer must use the Internet to market and sell his or her book.

The Internet is everywhere, and a sales ptich on the internet will reach the most number of people, worldwide, at the least cost. In many cases, the cost is “free.” Social media make it relatively easy to inform a large number of people about a book. However, social sites are resistant to hard-sell marketing; authors should encourage questions and casual conversation rather than making overt sales pitches.

There are as many ways to share a sales pitch on the Internet as there are stars in the sky. Authors should pick those few meothods that are most appropriate.

The Law of Writing

A writer must write prolifically and well.

This is the most important law. The more material there is to read, the more readers will be attracted and the more readers will talk about that work. There is also a ticking clock. Readers should have something new from the author every week or two, to keep the author’s name fresh in the readers’ minds. Major works, like a new book, should be presented about once each three to six months.

If a reader likes a book, not only will she readily recommend it, she will be hungry for more. This “I love it and I want some more of it” marketing is more powerful than word of mouth. Writing is the most powerful marketing tool to sell more writing.

More about David A. Rozansky
David A. Rozansky is the publisher of Flying Pen Press LLC, a Denver-based small press. He is a freelance writer, editor and publisher whose experience in publishing goes back to 1989.

Guest Blog: Be the Top Turd in the Pile Of Writer’s Poo! By Jake Bible

2011-02-04T10:18:00.000-08:00

Crazy title I know, but it actually explains how I decided to write my first novel.

There is a lot of talk lately about the quality of writing out there (print and ebook) and I now agree with it pretty much 100%.

But, If I had agreed with it back in Spring 2009 then I wouldn’t be writing this post, because I never would have even started my first novel, DEAD MECH.

Back in 2009 I received my first iPod. I was immediately looking for podcasts to listen to and started filling up that little sucker to capacity right away. During all my searches I found a bunch of free fiction podcasts (Pseudopod, The Drabblecast, Escape Pod, etc.) and in most of these podcasts were promos for free podcast novels.

Well, who am I to give up free stuff?
I downloaded several novels and dove right in. The interesting thing was that I was listening to the intros of the podcasts and many of the authors were getting publishing deals for their books. Some were small publishers and some were big New York publishers.

This intrigued me mainly because the whole submission process for getting your work published is what had always held me back. But, if I already had a loyal following and could show genuine interest then maybe a publisher would take a look at me, right?

Mediocre writing
The real butt kicker was that some of these writers were putting out mediocre work at best. Don’t get me wrong, there were (and are) a ton of high quality podcast novels out there. But, one writer in particular had a huge following and some amazing download stats for their work and I knew I could write better than them. I knew I wasn’t going to be Hemingway, but I could certainly put out some pulp better than that.

I set myself a goal to learn everything there was about podcasting, started writing my novel, recorded it as I was writing (don’t do this!) and within a couple months I was getting great feedback and large download numbers.

Flash forward to May 2010
One year after I started writing the novel, I had a publishing contract. And in September 2010, one year after launching the podcast, I had a published book in the market! Not too shabby!

Now, don’t get me wrong, I worked my butt off to make it all happen. I wrote a novel that had a great idea (giant battle mechs in a futuristic wasteland controlled by zombies), I also wrote it as a drabble novel (see my website for more details) which had never been done before and I had a TON of help from some really great people.

It didn’t just “happen"
But, without my goal of dominant mediocrity, I wouldn’t have even started down my path.

So, what does this have to do with you? Very simple: write your book, even if you don’t think it will be perfect or up to some super high standard you have set. Bring that bar down and go for it! Whether successful or not, you will learn so much.

There aren’t any valid excuses to keep sitting on your butt with an idea that’s just going to waste. The key is to be honest with yourself. Do you want to write a perfect novel or do you want to get your novel out there and into the hands of the masses?

You’ll probably suck, you’ll probably have your ego and soul crushed, but you never know until you try!

Stop being whiny little wieners and get your stuff written! There are no excuses in this world anymore! Reach for that fourth place finish!

You too could be the next top turd in the pile of poo!

More about Jake Bible:

Jake Bible lives in Asheville, NC with his wife and two kids. He is the author of many published short stories and the creator of a new literary form: the Drabble Novel. DEAD MECH is his first novel and represents the introduction to the world of the Drabble Novel, a novel written 100 words at a time.

Learn more about Jake and his work at http://jakebible.com. Links to his Facebook fan page, Twitter and his forum can be found there, as well as his weekly drabble release, Friday Night Drabble Party, and his weekly free audio fiction podcast.

Join Jake as he rushes the Amazon Kindle charts on March, 1st and tries to push DEAD MECH to the top! Info can be found here: http://jakebible.com/the-amazon-kindle-dead-mech-rush/

10 preoccupations writers can do without....

2011-02-01T14:46:00.000-08:00

Add up all your writing worries and you could, maybe, fill a 1,000 page novel with angst.

Writer’s worry about many things: When to write, what to write, where to write, why the hell they are writing. The list goes on. Is this character the right one to take on that character? Should he be a boy or a girl? Should I base the story in this town or that city? Have I killed off that shady character too soon?

Don’t sweat so much.

What’s my word count?

We all play this game. We have it in the corner of our PC and we glance at it far too often. We writers like word counts. As if it means anything. Words joined together make a sentence to mean stuff. Volume of words doesn’t mean spit.

My first draft sucks

Breaking news: Most first drafts suck. That’s why they’re first drafts. They’re usually followed by a second or third. No one has ever had a first draft professionally published. If they say they have, they’re lying. Check their work for plagiarism. Or just go at them with a fork.

Am I a plotter or a pantser?
I hate this question. Sometimes I plot, sometimes I just write what comes into my head and have a happy hope it leads somewhere nice. Those who are pro plotting say it stops your plot from getting out of hand. Pro Pantsers say that just letting fly makes their writing more inspired. Which ever one you chose, or if you want to chose both, do me a favour, be happy in your choice.

Spelling and grandma

Who cares if you can’t spell or only have the rudiments of grammar? That’s why god invented spell checkers and editors. Personally, I hate apostrophes. If I had a gun and I could see an apostrophe, I’d shoot the damn thing. People who sweat about spelling and grammar should get out more. What matters is your idea. What matters is your gift for transmitting that idea.

Writers write

I hate this dumb comment. It immediately makes me want to stop writing. It’s supposed to make things simple but all it does when a writer sees it is make them think about why they can’t write and then it makes them go and get a coffee and have sex with a badger. Saying writers write to a writer is like saying you can’t write, give up now.

Can I be an overnight writing success?

No, you can’t. Live with it. Self-publishing, Indie, the whole social media thing. It all takes time. Make the effort to learn all sides of your craft/business. Build slow. Gather knowledge. Think about what you’re doing. Don’t be afraid to experiment. You can do it while you’re writing that great novel. It’s easy. You just have to connect. Don’t sweat, it’s not that difficult.

The muse. WTF is she playing at?

You sit at your PC, waiting for the words to come. You type, delete, type, delete. For two hours you try to encourage the muse. Then, when you’re in bed, she flits in and throws an idea or two into your head. The muse is a bitch. If I had a gun...yeah, yeah, yeah....

So your question for today is this: The muse does this because....answers on a postcard.

Is my novel really any good?

The $64,000 question. Unfortunately, it’s not for you to decide. Your peers decide. Those people out there. And they don’t care much about your feelings. You’re just as likely to get a good review as a bad review...you know why, because people are like that. If they were all the same, you wouldn’t need writers to explore the human condition.

My advice: Have the courage of your convictions and don’t get hung up on the reviews. Don’t get over excited by the good ones, and don’t sink into the pit of despond by the bad ones. Remain on even ground. After all, it’s only a book.

No, is it really, really any good?

Yeah, you may have inadvertently written a classic. It might even, in years to come, be used in schools like To Kill a Muckybird or Lord of the Fleas. Listen up: It’s beyond your control. Don’t sweat. Get on with the next book. If you’ve written a classic, when you’re dead they’ll engrave something on your tombstone about it.

And finally: Why am I doing this?

Because you’re a writer. And didn’t you know...writers write...

Got any neuroses you’d like to share with the Feckless Goblin. As usual, scamper over to the comments section and let us all know...

Guest Blog: Dialogue by Tony Noland

2011-01-30T03:06:00.000-08:00

"I don't know why you're even arguing this."

"I'm arguing because it's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard, Kate. Starting a scene with dialogue is fine, but plopping the reader down into the middle of the conversation? All that does is confuse everyone."

She shook her head. "No, the uncertainty creates a lure, a hook that draws the reader in. Without some context, pronouns without clear antecedents prompt the obvious question, WHAT is the subject of this conversation? For that matter, WHO are these people? Even more specifically, are you a man or a woman?"

"What? What's that supposed to mean?"

"Well, you called me 'Kate', and my action tag up there uses the pronoun 'she'. I'm obviously a woman, but what about you?"

"You aren't necessarily a woman. Female, yes, but you could be revealed to be a very mature girl, using an adult's vocabulary. Or you could be a computer or a robot. I've seen that kind of twist in science fiction stories. I read this one by Robert Silverberg -"

"Don't change the subject," Kate said. "My point is that, by their presence or absence, the writer can deliberately use dialogue tags to reveal OR conceal."

"Nice rhyme."

"You are most gracious, my lord."

"Huh?"

"Or should I say, nothin' to it, General.

"General?"

"Or how about, you're just teasing me, Bobby Thompson!"

"Kate, I think you should lie down."

"No, I'm just making another point about dialogue. Look, did you see what I did there? With any one of those responses, I not only let the reader know roughly what kind of society the two of us are operating in - a formal aristocracy, a military structure, or a teenager setting - I also gave the reader a clue as to what our relationship is."

"Oh, I get it! If you're deferential and call me 'my lord', you must be at a substantially lower rung on a rigid social ladder. However, if you call me 'General' in a familiar way, then although your military rank must be far enough below me to warrant the use of the title, our personal relationship is such that you feel comfortable using the colloquial sentence structure!"

"Exactly, and in the young adult example, our relationship is clearly set as a flirtatious one between peers. Not only that, but in all three examples, I've told the reader that you are a man, or at least a male, without ever using the words he, his or him."

"Hey, that's great!" he said. "With just four or five words, the WHERE of this scene is outlined, at least from a cultural standpoint, and we've got a good start on the WHO, since I now have a gender, a name, and an idea of our relationship. That's a fantastic economy of words, Kate."

"Thanks, Rob. The WHAT is now apparent from the content of our speech – we're talking about dialogue. WHY is a plot issue, not a dialogue issue, and HOW is self-evident from the vocabulary we're using. However, the WHEN is still a bit uncertain. What century is this? More information will help to nail that down, but rather than state it overtly via the dialogue, it can be done more subtly via the interstitial action tags."

"What do you mean, interstitial action tags?"

She smiled and adjusted the antimatter feed ratio in the cryo-arc lamp. "They're little bits of action. If you use them right, they can tell a lot more than the bare facts of what the speaker is doing. However, you don't want to have too many of them in a conversation, because then it will look like we're twitchy and overcaffeinated." Kate ran a fingertip around the edge of her glass. "Even if we are eating dinner, for example, making a point of mentioning every bite taken, every time one of us reaches for the salt and every sip of wine will get tedious to read. Even facial expressions don't need to be mentioned very much," she said. "It's better to let the dialogue be the focus, and just let the readers fill in the blanks."

"That's a good idea," he ejaculated.

Kate fumbled the spiced almond she was about to eat, then jerked backwards, recoiling from the splash the almond made as it fell into her glass of merlot.

"Don't do that." she said, dabbing at her blouse. "Please don't do that."

"What? What'd I do?"

"You 'ejaculated' in the middle of a conversation."

He blushed. "You know perfectly well that I used it in the sense of -"

"I know what you meant. Just don't, OK? And if you can possible help it, don't splutter, shriek, bellow, state, whimper, whine, expostulate, utter, roar, or any other similarly unusual verb. Just say or ask."

He shook his head. "The reader will get bored if it's nothing but 'he said' and 'she said'. That's tedious repetition," he averred.

"No," she said, "it's invisible repetition. The reader won't even notice it, whereas that 'averred' you used in your last sentence is like a gilt rococo frame around an ordinary picture. It doesn't matter what you actually said, the reader is stuck on that strange dialogue tag. You were obviously trying too hard to use a verb other than 'said', with the only result being that you sound like an overused thesaurus."

"You're being overly fussy and structural. English is a rich language, with a thousand ways to shade expressions of meaning."

"I agree, and if you use them in the actual spoken part of the dialogue, the reader will be impressed with your erudition and eloquence. However," she continued, "keep all that fluff out of the tags. A lot of times, you can skip the tags altogether. If you show someone doing something, then go right into their speech, you don't even need a 'she said'. "

"Hang on, you just used 'continued'! What happened to 'only use said', huh? You just broke your own rule!"

"Yes, Rob, I did." She crossed the room to the bar, poured a large tumbler half-full of Jonnie Walker Blue Label. After taking a sip, she came to where he was sitting, stepped out of her shoes and eased herself down onto his lap. The silk of her blouse whispered against his tie. Kate ran her fingers through Rob's hair and gently lifted the glass to his lips.

Her breath was warm against his ear. "I broke my own rules, Rob, because I am the writer, and I can do whatever the hell I want."

More about Tony Noland

Tony Noland is a writer, blogger and poet in the suburbs of Philadelphia. His work has been featured in e.zines such as Evolve, and in the anthologies, 12 Days – 2009, Unluck of the Irish, Inhuman and Chinese Whisperings: The Yang Book. The most popular of any of Tony’s poems, Ode to the Semicolon has been featured on numerous grammar websites.

Tony is active on Twitter as @TonyNoland. You can
find his fiction and writing blog "Landless" at http://www.TonyNoland.com.

"The Yang Book" http://bit.ly/b9PjIQ
Blog: http://www.TonyNoland.com/
Twitter: http://twitter.com/TonyNoland
Facebook: http://on.fb.me/aSvNy1

Guest Blog: Erotica and the Sexes by Eden Baylee

2011-01-28T07:38:00.000-08:00

I’m not going to write about how men and women perceive erotica, whether one defines it as erotic and another as pornographic. I think it’s subjective, and the topic has been covered to death.

I’d rather provide some real examples of my own experience with writing erotica, and the difference in reactions I’ve encountered with men and women.

Women I know, and even women I don’t know personally love the fact that I write erotica. Their reactions range from interest about the stories to where my inspiration comes from to how I structure my work day.

It’s great talking to them because they are incredibly supportive in every facet. If there has been discomfort around the subject with anyone, I have not felt it. Even my mother-in-law is reading my book. This is a damn cool woman whom I highly respect, and she also reads a lot. For this last reason alone, I must admit I had apprehensions about giving her my book. I am, after all, married to her son.

What was she going to think of me? I’m happy to say she read the first two stories and sent me a note saying she found them steamy and well written. I couldn’t have asked for a better review than that.

I had to wonder why I assumed she was going to judge me. I’m a writer, and it’s fiction. Just because there’s lots of sex in the stories doesn’t imply I’m a sex addict, right? It would be akin to saying that because Stephen King writes horror, he must be a psychopathic axe-murderer—a ridiculous notion. It then dawned on me why I had been nervous. It had to do with some of the men’s reactions I’ve received when I told them I wrote erotica.

I’ve been writing full-time now for a year. During these months, I’ve occasionally socialized with men—some strangers, some acquaintances, and others whom I’ve known in one capacity or another.

When the conversation came around to what I did, or what I was doing, there have been some odd reactions to my response. They fall into one of a few different buckets.

He immediately feels like he can start talking to me about sex, sharing some intimate sexual fantasy he’d like to fulfill. I’ve suddenly become his new best friend.
He tells me I don’t look like someone who’s capable of such “dirty” thoughts (not sure if that’s supposed to be a compliment or an insult).
He is really intrigued and wants me to recite passages from my book (as if I can call up my words at will and recite them like some Shakespearean Sonnet).
He looks at me with raised eyebrows and becomes quiet. I have no idea what he is thinking.
He giggles uncontrollably until I tell him to stop … several times.

It’s endearing, amusing, and awkward at its worst. Little fazes me, and to be fair to most men, I don’t think their reactions are mean-spirited, so there’s no point in getting annoyed. Perhaps it speaks a lot more to their interest in the subject matter, and the discomfort with knowing that someone probably thinks about sex, on a daily basis, more than they do.

I tend not to believe in stereotypes, nor oversimplify the reasons for the differences between the sexes. The belief that men are more visual than women, so they prefer to watch erotica rather than read it has as many studies that support the hypothesis as it has that disprove it.

The primary audience for erotica is women, but men read it too. It’s sensual foreplay, like watching porn, which supposedly men enjoy more than women do—yet another stereotype.

No science here, just my observations. I delight in the differences between men and women. It interests me because people interest me. Perhaps I’ll notice these differences less over time, but for now, I’m savoring the experience.

About Eden Baylee

Eden Baylee remembers hiding under the blankets with a flashlight and reading an erotic novel. It was past her bedtime—she was eleven.

Since then, she has continued to read and write erotica. Her first book, Fall into Winter, is currently available for sale. It contains four erotic novellas; two take place in the fall, and two in the winter, thus the title. Though common elements unify them, each story is unique and stands alone. The themes include: younger man, older woman; ménage à trois (MFM); BDSM; and past lovers looking for a second chance.

Website: www.edenbaylee.com/
Facebook: www.facebook.com/edenbaylee
Twitter: twitter.com/#!/edenbaylee

Guest Blog: You have to write by Amy Rose Davis

2011-01-27T02:31:00.000-08:00

Ravenmarked: The Taurin Chronicles by Amy Rose Davis will be released in e-book format on the 1st February 2011

A confession: I don’t get writer’s block and I’m not convinced it exists.

This isn’t to say that I don’t sympathize with writers who find themselves uninspired, frustrated, or stuck. I do sympathize, and I’ve been in all of those positions.

I also understand that it can be really tough to find time to write. Demands and noise and obligations scream at us from every direction, at best distracting us and at worst completely preventing us from seeking the Muse.

But the truth is that when I sit down to write, it doesn’t matter how uninspired, frustrated, stuck, distracted, or tired I am. I can always write at least a few hundred words. And when those few hundred are written, I’m usually able to keep going.

What’s the secret? A little thing that you all know, deep down in that secret writing place you don’t always talk about…

You have to—wait for it—WRITE.

Those few hundred words that I bang out when I’m brain dead are usually crap. I almost always delete them all. But the few hundred after them? Sometimes, they’re damn good. Occasionally, they have a flash or two of brilliance. I just have to get started, and the words will almost always flow. Even if they don’t, I can at least rest in the knowledge that I’ve done 300 – 500 words of crap. To me, that’s better than nothing.

Here are some things that I think help me avoid writer’s block:

Deadlines:

I worked as a commercial freelance writer, and over the course of several fairly large ghostwriting gigs, I learned to produce a lot of copy very quickly with tight deadlines. I also wrote for a construction trade journal with some tight deadlines. Deadlines are “very clarifying,” as one of my friends says.

With fiction writing, we often don’t have “deadlines.” I suggest setting your own. Once I said that my novel Ravenmarked would be published by February 1, 2011, I found it a lot easier to make time to edit and revise and format.

Blogging:

Granted, I only officially started my blog about four months ago, but I’ve managed to blog almost every day. Even when we took a vacation in November, I set up posts to publish before we left.

I don’t have a big following, but it *is* a following, and I feel some sense of obligation to post at least some small thing every day. That obligation forces me to write at least a few hundred words, which often puts me in the right frame of mind to write other things.

Dividing my attention:

This may not work for everyone, but I do best when I’m multi-tasking. I’m happiest and most productive when I have several projects in various stages—something in first draft stage, something in rewriting stage, something in development, etc.

For one thing, when I’m stuck on one project, I have other options, so I’m always flexing some portion of my writing muscle. For another thing, I don’t have time to ruminate or wallow or ponder my next idea when I finish one thing. There’s something right there to move on to, so I keep moving forward rather than waiting for new inspiration to strike.

Too often, brain-death encroaches when there’s nothing waiting in the wings.

Thinking of my writing as a business:

It’s true this is more of a self-talk kind of thing, but it works for me. I have about six hours of uninterrupted writing time every weekday when my kids are at school. When distractions encroach and I find myself tempted to run errands, have lunch with a friend, go shopping without kids along, watch a movie, or surf the dreaded Interwebz, I have to remind myself that my writing is my business now.

At any other job, I wouldn’t be allowed to just blow off my work for no good reason. I have to remember that if I want to earn a living as a fiction writer, part of that process involves making the decision to keep my writing time sacred.

I realize that not every writer has the freedom to write basically full time as I do. But I know some writers who have insanely busy day jobs (sometimes even more than one) and still manage to produce high-quality pieces on a fairly regular basis. They use their limited time very wisely and don’t seem to let distractions or illusions of writer’s block get in the way. They just sit down and write.

Writing begets writing. Sit down and write.

Find out more about Amy Rose Davis:

Facebook: www.facebook.com/amyrosedaviswriter

Twitter: www.twitter.com/amyjrosedavis

Blog: www.modicumoftalent.com