Karavansara

East of Constantinople, West of Shanghai

Category Archives: My Projects


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The return of “Pizza, Chinese or Kebab?”

mod-pizza-maddy-default-e1479167621575I am always looking for new directions in which to expand the offer of this blog, and the Autumn is the perfect time for experimenting.
So here’s one of the many things cooking.

Two years back on my Italian-language blog I did a thing called Pizza, Chinese or Kebab? – it was a series of very informal interviews with creators (writers, graphical artists, bloggers), trying to move away from the typical, and boring

“my, you’re so cool/what’s your inspiration?/what’s your next project?”

sort of interview.
I stole the format from Empire magazine’s interview page How much is a pint of milk?, and adapted it to the crowd I usually hang out with online. Continue reading →


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Non-Native English Writers

Something bizarre just came up.
For the third time in two months, an article was published – this time by no less than WIRED, and penned by Bruce Sterling – about Italian genre fiction available to the English-speaking public, and for the third time my work was ignored.
Even in articles written by Italian writers.
And not just my self-published stories were ignored – which would not be strange1, considering those articles completely ignored any self-published book anyway.
No, even my traditionally published work was ignored, even when the articles talked wonderful things about the other books from my English-language Italian publisher, Acheron Books.
The other books, but not mine.

Which caused me to pause and ask myself…

C’mon, does my stuff suck that bad?

And mind you, that could well be the case – even if I am not convinced.
Not completely, at least.
So, what gives? Continue reading →


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The end is nigh

I just passed the 10.000 words mark, and the halfway point in my planned outline.
The end of the story I am writing is finally in sight.
As it usually happens, now that all the pieces are on the chessboard and things should begin to finish, I need a moment to carefully plan the next moves.
What will happen, in what sequence, where.
I need to up the action.
All three major characters will have their big action scenes (one each, carefully mapped and choreographed, and one involving the whole team), the evil plot will be revealed, justice will triumph and the main bad guy will have his just desserts.
Which means roughly 8000 words…  Continue reading →


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Playing in the background

I’ve often mentioned I keep music playing in the background when I write.
It keeps the real world away, it gives me a rhythm when writing, and it helps set the mood of some scenes, sometimes.

In the past I have shared some of the records that form my personal soundtrack when writing – often records specifically connected with certain series or stories.

What I’m doing now is a little different – just a gallery with the records that are in rotation as I write in these days.
The specific records are also there to represent the full discographies of these artists and bands, that are my personal writing background music.

Here goes. Continue reading →