Came across the site I Write Like which compares your own writing with more esteemed writers.
I uploaded the first 3 chapters of Railroaded and IWL said I write like Cory Doctorow.
I then uploaded the first 3 chapters of my WIP and IWL says I write like P.G.Wodehouse.
I’ve never read either of these writers but I know a little about each one and it seems a pretty good mix.
Naturally, I thought what would a mixture of Ben Ellis, Cory Doctorow and P.G.Wodehouse look like?
I went to MorphThing and mixed up these great writers.
What a strange looking fellow…but what a writer!
Holy crap! Hell must have frozen over, eskimo’s must be buying ice AND arabs must be buying sand plus other such impossibilities because one of my short stories is actually getting published.
Spikethecat had a competition called ‘The Last Laugh‘ so I submitted my story ‘The Lost Journeyman’. Recently I got an email saying it had been chosen to be published in ‘The Last Laugh’ anthology, along with 11 others.
In the top right of the site I’ve written ‘unpublished’, so I’ll cross that out as soon as I have a hard copy or ebook in my grubby little hands. One down, two to go.
So until then, let’s run some numbers.
All my writing has been rejected a total of 35 times, the 36th time this short story got accepted. So 1 in 36 times I’m successful, which, if my maths serves me right, means I’m batting 0.027, not major league.
It also means I’m accepted 2.7% of the time, which means I’m doing better than being rejected 99% of the time.
Thank you cold, hard maths for providing me with a warm embrace.
I’ll let you know when this anthology is available to buy.
MYOWS is a fairly new site (still in beta at time of writing) where you can upload your original work and manage it’s copyright protection.
How does it do that?
By uploading a piece of work you are agreeing it is yours and giving it a creation date (the date you uploaded it). You then get an online certificate proving the work is yours which can be made accessible to anyone, eg. a court or someone that has violated your own copyrights.
I suppose it’s like sending your lawyer a date-stamped, recorded envelope with your original work to remain unopened until such times that proof is needed. However, this is free and a lot easier.
There’s a wave of graphic/information geeks out there who are making seemingly boring data look attractive via the medium of flow-charts, graphs, pie-charts, etc.
Information is Beautiful is the best known site featuring loads of ‘Infographics’.
Charting The Beatles is a great one charting the lyrics and songs of The Beatles.
GraphJam contains loads of funny and inane ‘infographs’.
So it was only a matter of time before the multitudes and reems of writing books could be condensed into one simple flow-chart poster. Anna Hurley has done all the hard work over at her blog, plus the full size poster is for sale so you can stick it above your laptop and get on with things.
This isn’t a guide on how to write a novel from scratch, but how to edit it so it’s ready for publication. The future of agent rejection letters and emails may simply feature a print out of this poster.
I’m now off to add a dinosaur into my novel.
My initial goal this year was to start writing my second novel on January 1st…well, 3 months down the line I still haven’t actually broken ground on it but I have been researching and note taking and thinking and sketching like a madman.
I’m very close to starting, I can feel it. I’m also realising that my researching is turning into procrastination which isn’t a good thing. I need to feel comfortable before I start and that means having an idea where I’m going, which means I need a vague idea of the end. It doesn’t matter if this changes as I go but I don’t feel mentally prepared if I set off with no idea of the character’s motivations, goals or the point of the book. Like going on a journey without knowing the destination, do I turn right or left as I leave the front door?
I submitted a short story to Strange Horizons, an online speculative fiction magazine, and reading their thorough submission guidelines was an education.
They have a great section called ‘Stories We’ve Seen Too Often‘ which details up to 37 plots which they’ve seen too many times.
Some of them are blatant no-brainers such as ‘it’s all a dream‘ or ‘you meet all your loved ones in Heaven‘. Others stress that stories revolve around characters and their motivations, not technology, politics, scenery and other inanimate objects.
Worringly, rape and violence against women is mentioned more than once.
There was a good article on The Guardian, ‘Ten rules for writing fiction‘, coming on the back of Elmore Leonard’s 10 Rules of Writing.
The first rule I’m going to make up is; Learn who Elmore Leonard is.
If you’ve done any research into writing tips and rules you’ll have come across quite a few of these, especially the first rule of writing; write.
The best ones are the specific ones; ‘don’t open with the weather’, ‘do not search amazon.co.uk for the book you haven’t written yet’,'avoid detailed descriptions of characters’, ‘Introduce your main characters and themes in the first third of your novel.’ and ‘Do give the work a name as quickly as possible’.
There are some I’ll blatantly ignore; ‘learn poems by heart’, ‘keep a diary’, ‘write slowly and by hand’ and ‘have fun’.
Came across the ‘Power 2010‘ site via ‘Big Brother Watch‘. It previously gathered political ideas from the public, ideas people wanted to see implemented regardless of political leanings, eg. proportional representation, fixed parliament terms, etc. Watch the vid for a better explanation…
Power 2010 are now in Phase 2, which involves everyone voting on their favourite ideas. Power 2010 will then take the 5 most popular and try to convince everyone running for parliament in the General Election this year, to support all 5 reforms.
I’ve just read ‘English Short Stories 1900 to the Present‘ and by far my favourite short story in there was ‘The Intensive Care Unit’ by J.G.Ballard. A great little story where people live in isolation from each other and only have contact via tv screens and cameras, much like webcams basically.
A family eventually meet-up with disastrous consequences, highlighting human nature.
I can’t find a sample online so you’ll have to buy a book yourself, try this one.
With the unveiling of Belle de Jour as a highly educated cancer research doctor the other day, the reactions have varied from surprise that it wasn’t one of the esteemed journalists previous guesses, relief that it’s over and shock that it may glamourise prostitution.
I’m more intrigued about struggling doctorate students having to resort to offering personal services so they may become professionally qualified to look after us in the future.
Apparently this isn’t a new thing, I’m just living in a cave.
So, I’m a citizen of a country that doesn’t fund it’s top students adequately? I kinda knew that.
