Currently Browsing: Icy Sedgwick
13 Dec 2012
Wish me good luck as I wave you goodbye
The end of the year fast approaches, with the usual flurry of forward anticipation with plans made for 2013, and quiet reflection on the preceding twelve months. 2012 seems to have gone by in a flash – it almost seems like yesterday that the Olympics dominated the television, and just five minutes since our street held a Jubilee street party. However, looking back on all of this, it seems that this... read more
5 Dec 2012
Looking Back
This time of year is traditionally used as a period of reflection, to look back over the previous year to identify successes and failures, and to begin to plan ways in which we can generate more of the former and avoid the latter. I’m currently doing a teacher training course, and there is an entire module dedicated to reflection, intended to allow practitioners to think about what they’ve been... read more
27 Nov 2012
Dealing with Feedback
If you only ever write for yourself, and you’re disinterested in the opinion of others to your work, then you possibly have one of the most creative and liberating hobbies in the world. If, on the other hand, you write for public consumption, to entertain or enlighten others, then sooner or later you will have to let other people read your work. Like most things in life, the reaction can go either... read more
23 Nov 2012
The Joy of Reading
How many of you can remember the days when you could happily sit and read for hours, even if it was only Enid Blyton or Roald Dahl? Do you remember your excitement at unwrapping another book at Christmas? Or maybe you remember your confusion when asked to read a book for school and your classmates considered it a chore, and not a joy. I’d guess a lot of writers fall into those camps. So how many of... read more
24 Oct 2012
Just Say No
There is a somewhat powerful refrain throughout American Psycho that one should “Just say no.” There’s something both elegant and frustrating about it – in principle, saying no should be so easy that you can “just” say it, but it’s frustrating because in reality, it’s often far more difficult. Writers are often particularly stricken by an inability to say no,... read more
11 Oct 2012
On Publication
We’re looking at the Path to Publication this month, and while I have a published book available to buy on Amazon, I still don’t feel like I’m enough of an expert to really discuss publishing and how it works. After all, it’s a changing industry in a constant state of flux and what is true today might not be true tomorrow. All I can do, is communicate what I know and what I’ve... read more
17 Sep 2012
The End Is Nigh
The theme for this month is “Final Preparations” and it seems fairly apt for me. At the time of writing, I’ve only just written ‘The End’ on my work in progress although really, it’s never the end – try as I might, I never consider things entirely finished. This is still only a first draft, so there’s time for me to polish it before it goes to the beta... read more
7 Sep 2012
When Reviews Go Bad
In the wake of the ‘bought reviews’ controversy, how useful can reviews be? When e-publishing began to overtake traditional publishing as the preferred paradigm, many of those “in the know” bemoaned the lack of gatekeepers within the indie community. The way they figured it, the battalion of agents, editors and publishers that lined the gauntlet of traditional publishing ensured... read more
