Science Fiction/Fantasy/YA 257 pages This novel tackles some pretty fundamental themes. Told through the experiences and voices of two young people, Will, an innocent boy from a rural settlement, and Leah, a rather more worldly and sophisticated girl from a city, the story is woven through their separate adventures in their different worlds until the …
Continue reading Children of the Furnace, by Brin Murray: #BookReview
Regular readers will know I've been having serious problems with my Mac recently. I hoped it had been fixed (at great expense!). But another update was needed this morning and it has failed and set the machine on a downward spiral to utter uselessness, again! There is clearly something wrong with the update system, either …
Continue reading Yet Another iMac Fail!
What a week! First, an apology for the delay in posting. If you have the time and energy to read this post in full, you’ll understand why it’s late. Last week’s episode of this series suggested I was on track for the edit. Raring to go, in fact. I hadn’t bargained on the continuing power …
Continue reading Progress on the WIP: #SciFi in the Making.
310 pages. Science Fiction and Fantasy. What an engaging tale this is. It says a lot for the quality of the writing and the compelling nature of the story that I continued to read this despite some pretty difficult issues in my online/working life at the time! I’m a reader who loves books where characters …
Continue reading Catling’s Bane, by D. Wallace Peach: #BookReview.
A new and very positive review for War Over Mars has now appeared on both Goodreads and Amazon. You can read it here. https://read.amazon.co.uk/kp/card?asin=B0749NW6W8&preview=inline&linkCode=kpe&ref_=cm_sw_r_kb_dp_AtWHAbQ4J5NG6&tag=stuartaken-21
Do you sometimes struggle to find the ‘right’ word for your writing? I do. Perhaps, in improving myself, I can help other writers. Today’s words: Luxuriant/Luxurious, Down in the dumps, Iktsuarpok. Words often misused: English, because of its inheritance of words stolen from many languages, often uses words that superficially appear to mean more or …
Continue reading The #Write #Word? Post 7
The rewrite is now under way and progressing pretty well considering… ‘Considering what?’ I hear you cry. In answer, I’ll simply direct you to a previous post here. Added to what’s in that post, my Mac continues to play silly buggers for reasons I’m at a loss to determine. I’ve looked at the ‘help’ and …
Continue reading Progress on the WIP: #SciFi in the Making.
Do you sometimes struggle to find the ‘right’ word for your writing? I know I do. Perhaps, in improving myself, I can help other writers. Today’s words: Final Ultimatum, Alternatives, Zeugma, Redundancies: words serving no purpose. In speech, they’re spacers, giving the speaker time to think. But in writing they slow the reader’s progress. Final …
Continue reading The Write Word? Post 6
The first draft has been read, notes made, hair pulled out, swear words shouted, mutterings and curses mumbled. And, occasionally, whoops of joy that I’ve actually created a story have been heard. Now the work begins, however. Some chapters are out of synch. My ruminations on this element had me wondering whether to move the …
Continue reading Progress on the WIP: #SciFi in the Making.
Gremlins? The wicked hand of fate? Bad luck? Or simply a random event that’s not personal at all? On Friday, I rose at my customary hour (between 07:00 and 08:30 now I’ve retired from the ranks of the wage slaves). My Mac had a little notification, top right, advising that some updates hadn’t been installed. …
Continue reading When Inanimate Objects Conspire Against You!
Do you sometimes struggle to find the ‘right’ word for your writing? I know I do. Perhaps, in improving myself, I can help other writers. Today’s words: Discombobulate, Clear as mud, Cruelly, Tricolon. Synonyms are alternative words that might say exactly what you’re trying to convey. Discombobulate: (early 19th C American in origin) to confuse. …
Continue reading The Write Word? Post 5
This is the monthly reminder that the writing contest table has been updated. It lives under the ‘Resources’ tab. I update the table frequently, in fact whenever I come across new contest details. I also subscribe to sources for information to pass on to you here. Submit your entries in plenty of time. There …
Continue reading Creative #Writing #Contests Table Updated
I finished the first draft of the current novel on 19 January, with 63269 words written. For reasons I’m unclear about, I neglected to write one of these posts on the following Wednesday, my regular day for this. I probably forgot in the joy of getting the story on the page! So, my apologies for …
Continue reading Progress on the WIP: #SciFi in the Making.
I have recently been interviewed on a website to which I contribute a short monthly column. You can find the interview by clicking this link. And the picture above? Well, it's drab January here in UK, so I thought I'd warm us up with a picture of summer in the Greek Islands. And there's a …
Continue reading Getting to Know the #Author
Below you'll find a link to a short post from the blog run by the writing group I belong to. It shows, in very few words, how I came to be published instead of only self-published. And it offers the chance of a similar route to other writers. http://www.hornseawriters.com/2018/01/local-publisher-takes-shine-to-hornsea.html
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Antidote to the Novel
Stuart Aken 