While with my brother we were on the hunt for the field mice that have taken residence in the darker corners of our house, and while we were trying to ascertain if it is a hedgehog or something larger that has been raiding our trash bin, the local news informed us that the number of sheep and fallow deer attacked by wolves in our area is increasing.
The countryside is going wild.
Continue readingToday is the international book day, or so I am told – good internet practices require a blog post about the joy of books. The book that changed your life, the first book you read, the book you hate, the book you are reading right now…
And yet, it’s not like we never talk about books hereabouts.
Today, on the other hand, I was discussing with a friend and she asked me Why?
More specifically: Why do you write?
And it turns out that when you write, at least part of the reason has to do with why you read – and why other people read. So it fits perfectly the book day theme. And the answer to the question is not so simple.
Today is Easter, the day in which everybody and their sister, in the neighborhood, suddenly remember they own a lawn-mower – and if they don’t they come and ring your door to borrow yours.
But apart from the insufferable racket, it was a quiet day.
I did not do much writing (as it usually happens when I am going through a Phil Rickman novel), but I was able to create a new folder and stuffed some research material and a TXT outline in it. Once again it’s the sort of project I’d love to do straight away, but right now I’m too spent and tired to try. There will be time – let’s leave the ideas time to sediment.
One of the stories I was writing sort of died when I found out the magazine I was aiming for only accepts stories from Canadian citizens and residents.
But I got another call – this time for a weird western.
I hope to be able to work on it this coming week.
I like weird westerns, and it would be a good opportunity.
Apart from this, it’s been a very easy, overcast day.
My neighbors mowed their lawns.
All of them. Repeatedly.
This is probably one of those “funny and surreal” things that happen in the everyday life of a writer and that I was told I should share to further my platform and extend my reach or something. So, here goes.
In the last two months we have been exchanging a lot of very frustrating mails and calls with our power provider – a power bill we were expecting in January never materialized, lost who knows where, and we wanted to know how much was the amount we were supposed to pay.
Continue readingThis is one of those “fun and surreal” stories it was suggested to me I should share to build my author platform. The ridiculous things that sometimes happen to a writer, oh my, what a cartload of laughs. I should do a brief cartoon of this one. But I can’t draw so here we go, it went like this…
I wrote the first Aculeo & Amunet story as a very first submission to an American anthology. It was, if I remember correctly, 2012. The story bounced back – deservedly, I should add – and I let it sediment for a while and then revised and rewrote it for self-publishing. Without a word-count limit and with the freedom to push the story in directions I wanted to explore.
Continue readingThe First of February came with a heavy snowfall, that started in the night and added up to the 30 cms we had got a week ago. This caused the day’s plans to go somewhat askew – we were supposed to drive to the supermarket for provisions, and will do it tomorrow instead, and spent the warmest hours of the afternoon shoveling snow off the lane.
This is the sort of thing I should post as an example of the funny surreal things that happen to writers when they should be writing instead. Shoveling snow or, like two days ago, running barefooted in the snow to try and catch the postman before he disappears.
What a cartload of laughs, uh?
You read of things like that and instantly you decide to follow me on Patreon.
But I’m being uselessly snarky.
I did need a bit of exercise, and shoveling snow was a good opportunity.
I keep writing, and tonight it’s going to be one long writing session. Also, I’m going to try a new writing trick. Then on the weekend I’ll be working on another project.
My brother is an amateur criminologist with a thing for Jack the Ripper – maybe I have already mentioned in the past his blog, Red Jack – and yesterday he mentioned to me two interesting facts:
And today a friend, a widely published British writer, mentioned on Facebook the fact that he once sought immortality through his art – or, if not sought, he sort of gave it a thought – but nowadays he’s sceptical. He observed, and I agree, that our books are not a reliable portrait, as they represent a snapshot of what we were in a certain moment in time.
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Karavansara 