This week’s progress report reveals I’m now 19799 words into the second rewrite. It’s been a bit of a bitty week with various appointments here and there as well as necessary work in the garden, so the writing has not been the only draw on my time. I’m still enjoying the process, and hope to …
Author: stuartaken
A Gentle Post About Book Reviews.
Tempted to invite me to review your book? I receive a good number of ‘pitch’ letters sent via the contact page on this website. Let me point out to all authors, their agents, and publishers, eager to do the same for their books that I’ve signed the True Review Pledge. That means I write honest …
Searching for the Right Words? Tip #19
This series aims at helping writers find the right words to express their meaning. Your thoughts and comments are welcome. Do you want to inspire readers with joy, stoke their terrors, romance them with love, overwhelm them with horror? This set of posts looks at ways of influencing mood by selecting the ‘right’ words for …
Searching for the Right Words? Tip #18
This series aims at helping writers find the right words to express their meaning. Your thoughts and comments are welcome. Do you want to inspire readers with joy, stoke their terrors, romance them with love, fill them with horror? This set of posts looks at ways of influencing mood by selecting the ‘right’ words for …
Inevitable Ascension, by V.K. McAllister, Reviewed.
First, a gentle warning for authors tempted to invite me to review their books: I read this book as the result of a particularly effective ‘pitch’ letter sent via the contact page on this website. Let me remind others eager to do the same for their books that I’ve signed the True Review Pledge. That …
Continue reading Inevitable Ascension, by V.K. McAllister, Reviewed.
Progress on the WIP: SciFi in the Making.
This week’s progress report reveals I’m now 71847 words into the first rewrite, which takes me 8302 words further than last week, most of this is new work, as the story needed revision due to research. In fact, I’m now writing the final chapter of the current version. However, I was struck by an idea …
Searching for the Right Words? Tip #17
This series aims at helping writers find the right words to express their meaning. Your thoughts and comments are welcome. Do you want to inspire readers with joy, stoke their terrors, romance them with love, fill them with horror? This set of posts looks at ways of influencing mood by selecting the ‘right’ words for …
Searching for the Right Words? Tip #16
This series aims at helping writers find the right words to express their meaning. Your thoughts and comments are welcome. Do you want to inspire readers with joy, stoke their terrors, romance them with love, fill them with horror? This set of posts looks at ways of influencing mood by selecting the ‘right’ words for …
Progress on the WIP. SciFi in the Making.
This week’s progress report reveals that I’m now 63545 words into the first rewrite, which takes me 17762 words further than last week at this time. I’ve had to take out some of the original story as a result of additional information I’ve gathered from the last lot of research. It’s actually given the story …
How Did the Author Do That?, by Dr. John Yeoman PhD, Reviewed.
This historical novel, set at the very end of the 16th century in London, is more than merely a damned good novel. It’s purpose is to help other authors improve their writing through example. John Yeoman is a well-respected writing tutor, amongst other things. He displays a wicked, sardonic, sense of humour in the story, …
Continue reading How Did the Author Do That?, by Dr. John Yeoman PhD, Reviewed.
Searching for the Right Words? Tip #15
This series aims at helping writers find the right words to express their meaning. Your thoughts and comments are welcome. Do you want to inspire readers with joy, stoke their terrors, romance them with love, fill them with horror? This set of posts looks at ways of influencing mood by selecting the ‘right’ words for …
Searching for the Right Words? Tip #14
This series aims at helping writers find the right words to express their meaning. Your thoughts and comments are welcome here. Do you want to inspire readers with joy, stoke their terrors, romance them with love? Or, maybe you need your reader to sink into despair along with your protagonist? This set of posts looks …
The Construct of Time
Worth your time to read!
Time is just an agreed upon construct. We have taken distance (one rotation of the earth, and one orbit of the sun) divided it up into segments, then given those segments labels.
-Author Unknown
Before man decided to differentiate between the periods when the sun had risen, and when the moon had taken its place, there was no such thing as time. Before days, hours, and minutes ever existed there were merely rotations of the earth that brought about phases of light, and periods of darkness. But our quest for intellectual enlightenment, coupled with human curiosity urged mankind to quantify and label the earth’s rotations.
Early Egyptians divided the day into two twelve hour periods, erecting huge obelisks that rose into the sky, allowing them to use shadows to track the sun’s movements. The Greeks and Persians used water clocks called clepsydra. And Plato even went as far as to develop…
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Progress on the WIP
Another week has passed and I've been prodding those keys with vigour. The WIP is now up to 45783, with 4865 of those words new to the story. Several developments are emerging following my research, and the story is twisting and turning with a life of its own. This is the first rewrite, so there …
Searching for the Right Words? Tip #13
This series aims at helping writers find the right words to express their meaning. Your thoughts and comments are welcome here. Are you hoping to inspire readers with joy, arouse their fear, romance them with love? Or, maybe your story needs the reader to sink into despair along with your protagonist? This set of posts …

