Writing | Karavansara

26 November 2018
by Davide Mana 6 Comments

Coming soon-ish: The Heart of the Lizard

There is one thing that can really make things look up even on a cold rainy day, when you are writing for a living, and that’s being asked by your publisher how many more stories in the same series can you write, per year, should the first one you just delivered be a success.

The obvious answer being “as many as you need,” of course – but in the meantime you feel real good because you know you’ve done a good job.

It happened to me a few hours ago, three days after delivering The Heart of the Lizard, my first (hopefully, of many) tie-in novella for Andrea Sfiligoi’s 4 Against Darkness fantasy solo roleplaying game, set in the gaming world of Norindaal.

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Anything you damn well want.

25 November 2018 by Davide Mana Leave a comment

23 November 2018
by Davide Mana 4 Comments

British vs American

I have a problem.
OK, I’ve got a lot of those, but one in particular came up in conversation this afternoon, and the problem is, Brits and Yanks don’t speak (and more importantly, don’t write) the same language.
And because these two different languages as English, I mix them up, and (some of) my readers cringe, and it’s very very embarrassing and all that.

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15 November 2018
by Davide Mana 2 Comments

A coin tossed from the bridge

I have mentioned in the past the movie Le Bossu (On Guard for the English-speaking markets), a fine French swashbuckler from twenty years ago that I like very much and used to watch every time it passed on TV hereabouts, and now have on DVD and watch at least once a year.
Great action, fine story, excellent cast.
Great movie, watch it!

Original Cinema Quad Poster – Movie Film Posters

In the movie, the main character, Lagardere, recalls the time when, as a Paris street urchin, he had developed a stunt that allowed him to make some money: he would ask the passers-by to toss a coin in the Seine, and he would dive behind it from a bridge, and retrieve it as it sank in the water of the river.
He even had a short rhyming song, to hook the punters.

Needless to say, Lagardere’s skill of diving from bridges and disappearing under the surface of the river will come handy later in the story.

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14 November 2018
by Davide Mana 7 Comments

Short stories collections and learning the tricks

It sounded so simple, right?
Pick a few short story anthologies, and use them as a writing handbook. To learn how to write short stories.
Easy.
Until they ask you to actually name the frigging books.
To chose.
To make a list.

Because you need to make a choice.
Who’s in, who’s out?

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14 November 2018
by Davide Mana Leave a comment

Writing, magic and everything

The first book I ever read by pulp giant Walter B. Gibson was not a Shadow novel, but a beautiful hardback called The Book of Secrets.

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As I think I have mentioned in the past – if I didn’t, I’m doing it now – as a kid, between ten and fourteen, having discovered a big box of magic tricks in my grandmother’s attic, I had developed an interest in stage magic.
I was pretty good at coin, card and sponge balls manipulation, but really I never got anywhere – a modest amateur. But I read a lot of books on the subject, and Walter B. Gibson, to me, was the guy that wrote books about magic I could not read because my English was not good enough.
In the end, my English improved, I stopped doing magic tricks, and I bought me a copy of The Book of Secrets. Continue reading →