March 30, 2015
I had a really strange dream a couple of nights ago. I don't know how it began, like most dreams the action seemed to have started some time before I became aware of it. I was evidently involved in a promotional event for Discord's Apprentice resembling a village fête or town show. However, I was not giving a talk or being interviewed. I scrambled into a barrel mounted on a stand like a cannon or a cement mixer next to a stall, which could have been a tombola. (I put it down to watching a television programme involving a visit to a vineyard and antiques.) I don't think I was going to be fired from it, or that I was going to be a raffle prize, but I will never know, because as I was looking up at a circle of sky, someone came running up, shouting 'Guess what!' I tried to tell them I was busy, but they insisted that I go with them.
"The Pope's bought your book!" they said, dragging me with them to the high street where, outside a newsagent, was a board with the latest headlines: 'Pope Buys Book'. I was overjoyed. This is it, I thought, I've made it. Now, I'll sell millions of copies and I'll never have to market my books again.
Then, of course, I woke up and realised how ridiculous it was. I have no idea whether the Pope likes reading fantasy novels, but I somehow doubt it, and whether his custom would make Discord's Apprentice an instant besteller is also dubious. Shame. But then, I am a writer of fiction.
Posted by K. S. Dearsley. Posted In : FantasyFiction
March 24, 2015
I have an announcement to make (shoulders back, deep breath)–Discord's Apprentice, Book II of The Exiles of Ondd, will be launched in June on Kindle and Smashwords. At least that's the plan. June seems ages away at the moment, all of nine weeks, but I know it will go by in a flash.
I'm planning a series of 'activities' and 'events' in the run up to publication day. These will be announced on my website, which I shall be revamping shortly, this blog and other sites such as Goodreads, Smas...
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Posted by K. S. Dearsley. Posted In : Coming Soon
March 16, 2015
Could you sum up who your are in 50 to 100 words? The chances are, if you have something published you will be asked to. Many magazines like to include a short paragraph about the writer after their work or on a contributors' page. Having a few basic sentences ready can save a lot of time.
You need to show a little of your experience or what makes your writing different. There's no room for a CV. The information you include will probably be similar to what you would put in a cover letter,...
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Posted by K. S. Dearsley.
March 8, 2015
I was recently sent a copy of
Acumen, and I've been dipping into it whenever I've had a free moment this week. It's a literary journal containing mostly poetry and fairly scholarly interviews and reviews. The poetic forms and the content match, following a loose, freer style that fits modern themes. Some of the poems are in a light vein and some cover eternal subjects, but in the issue I've seen there were no traditional forms or classical subjects. Nonetheless, the poems were written with di...
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Posted by K. S. Dearsley. Posted In : Competitions
March 3, 2015
There are at least two 'A's in my alphabet. The first is Alfie Dog Fiction, which has had a thorough makeover. The site has hundreds of short stories available for download, mostly priced 39p. It's now a lot clearer and easier to use, both for readers and authors.
You can find stories either by category or by author name, and I'm glad to report that mine is now listed under 'K' again. (For a while it had gone off to sulk with a few other 'K's and 'J's at the end). The new version of 'Your...
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Posted by K. S. Dearsley. Posted In : Competitions
February 22, 2015
Sometimes subjects to blog about are obvious, for instance, when there's news of a publication or event. At other times, it isn't as easy. The trouble isn't that I can't think of anything, but that there are so many subjects, it's hard to pick one. Today, I have come up with a solution. Starting next week, I shall choose a subject to blog about according to the alphabet. I've already made a list, and I have enough ideas to keep me going for at least the next five years! They are the usual mix...
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Posted by K. S. Dearsley. Posted In : Inspiration
February 15, 2015
Life's full of difficult decisions. Lately, I've had lots of different writing-related tasks to do, and I've found it hard to know what to tackle first. Time to make a list! I have a story waiting to be written, a feature half-researched, work to rewrite, a story to key-in, potential markets to check and marketing to do. Thankfully, nothing has a deadline, but that leaves no clear favourite to start with, so I've put together a series of questions that might help me to avoid wasting time dith...
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Posted by K. S. Dearsley.
February 8, 2015
This week I was invited to an adult education class. The tutor had to hang around at the main entrance to let all the students in, and as they arrived at the classroom in dribs and drabs I was struck by a certain lack of hospitality. I would happily have introduced myself and tried to make small-talk to break the ice, but everyone was too busy texting, playing games or looking something up on their mobiles. Their impoliteness was not confined to ignoring me, but ignoring each other as well. T...
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Posted by K. S. Dearsley. Posted In : Inspiration
February 1, 2015
A recent BBC documentary about the artist Hans Holbein, who painted so many of Henry VIII's court, was fascinating, and not only for the insights his work provided into the sitters' personalities. He had written Anne Boleyn's name as 'Anne Bollein'. Spellings in Tudor times were not as standardized as they are now, and Holbein probably wrote the name as he heard it pronounced. As the artist's surname also ends in 'ein' this could mean that it was pronounced the same way. So Anne Boleyn was ei...
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Posted by K. S. Dearsley. Posted In : Linguistics
January 25, 2015
Today is Burns Night, the annual celebration of Scotland's national poet. He wrote in his own dialect, and while many people (including, I suspect, some Scots) might struggle with it, every poet owes him a debt. Robert Burns broke the chains that bound poetry to classical forms and helped us all to escape the 'thees' and 'thous' and archaic language.
Now, poets can write sonnets or haiku, odes or free verse. They can write about eating the plums someone had saved in the fridge ('This is J...
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Posted by K. S. Dearsley.
