So as I stated in my last post, I completed the tasks left dangling over into this week (the report analyses,) in addition to completing more keyword lists for a couple of shopping centres, listing their stores and opening times, relevant brands as well as their seasonal opening hours, which gave a good 6-7 words in each Ad Group designated to a specific store as was demanded. I did the same for a financial advice/investment company, targeting keywords towards their products and services such as ISAs, financial advice and loans, but you've heard all this before, so I won't go into too much detail.
The above tasks took up the whole day, each keyword list gaining over 500 rows of words each and the prior week's reports taking over half an hour to finish, but as of next week the story may change because I've been asked about working elsewhere for a while, within the AMNET subsidiary but on other projects, which I am currently deciding upon. You will see what I choose next week and ideally I'll have more to write about then, so until next time, have a nice day!
Tuesday, January 28, 2014
Monday, January 27, 2014
My Latest Endeavours
A week ago today I uploaded the prologue to a novel yet to be completed. Since then I have written a general outline and a plan for that novel, and since then I have written the first 2 chapters, the project currently clocking in at around 14,700 words, which is quite impressive given that I only started writing this project 7 days ago. Although back in November/December 2013 I wrote the ending to this particular project, I didn't re-start it from the beginning until a week ago now, which is what brings me to the crux of this post. I've often wondered how novelists are able to write a full book, edited and shelved, within a single year (of course they already have a publisher and agent most likely, plus experience etc.,) which is when I thought about an experiment.
Writing Order
You see, when I wrote SKYSCARR (began August 2011, finished the first draft July 2013,) I already had an idea for the ending in mind and had also sketched out the entire storyline just as I've done with this new project, but this time I made a slight twist that I think has made a great difference: To write the ending first! Now this of course is only mildly different to what I had previously done with sketching the outline and therefore describing the progress of the narrative, but alas, this is not very effective for me and I will tell you why. The reason, I believe, is not so much to do with story progression, but rather character development, because when you write that final chapter there is the final product right in front of you, the character living and breathing as I want to see him in the end, his responses to the situations as I wanted to see him and everything that I would otherwise look forward to, over and done with.
Yes, I know, I've squashed the primary anticipation of when the story ends -I hope- rather poignantly, but this is but a small price to pay for keeping a clear head as I make my way through the novel, which I think makes one stay on track, to keeps one's wits about the story so as to not make shortcuts that might otherwise ruin the story and crush the excitement as a result of lazy, sloppy writing, because the writer was focusing too much on the endgame. Always remember folks that if you write badly to begin with and the novel's dry and stale, then why should a dear reader stay with you from chapter 1 through 20. Just a thought.
Writing Quotas
Yes, yes, all great writers have 'em: Stephen King writes at least 2000 words a day, and doesn't leave his computer till it's done. Iain Banks did a similar thing, writing on average for about 3 months max to get a first draft finished and many other writers all do similar things, following day orders and to-do lists almost, shuffling down the road to a novel's completion. When writing my first novel I didn't use any such things, which lead to me hitting a wall from time to time, periods where I'd not write anything for a month! This problem has been addressed as well because I've set myself a quota of 2000 words per day and have been keeping to it, in addition to my new year resolution of reading for at least an hour per day. This is why I've managed to write over 10,000 words in next to no time; it doesn't take a genius after all to note that 2,000 words every day in a 7-day week equals 14,000 words. That's pretty much a short story completed, two weeks later (28,000) we're talking novelettes and the week after that of course taking us over 40,000 words, which is technically where a novel-length work begins. Given these simple mathematical sums, we can therefore deduce where exactly a novel will end if we keep to that quota. To apply that to my new novel would mean that -given a target draft length of 70,000 words- it woulds in theory take a little over a month to write on this schedule, which is a hell of a lot shorter than doing the same in 2 years.
Writing Time
Of course I realise that writing big amounts is foolish unless it's any good, which is what second drafts are for, but it's good to think that the first draft can be over and done with very quickly because the clock is always ticking after all. But the final point that I will address is time; when are creative juices flowing optimally? When should one put pen to paper or fingers to keyboard and bash out that quota. Well several months ago I spied an article on this (in either the Mail or Guardian I think) where the thesis was to write during the morning when the creative juices are -apparently- flowing optimally, citing George Orwell as an example, who -according the article as I remember it- often wrote first thing in the morning, sat in bed with his typewriter upon his lap. I've been trying this as of late, going to bed at 12:30am and rising at 6:30-7:00 am and I have found it a great help; in fact, I think has become my favoured strategy. What I do is quite simple. Write 1000 words, at least, first thing in the morning, taking time to read what I wrote yesterday to tidy up any superficialities like spelling etc. Then what I do is go about my daily routine and when I'm fully awake -in the afternoon or evening for example- I tidy up what I wrote in the morning -apparently writing when still half-asleep leaves you with quite a few typing mistakes to correct- and move on to complete my second 1000 words. This is soon followed by my reading for the night (currently Cloud Atlas & i-Robot) which totals into at least one hour.
Now of course one has to remember that I am but a lowly student whose life is inundated with work and textbooks to read and assignments to complete, which is partly the reason why I write in the morning so early, because it still leaves me ample time to print, write and read things associated with my course, which can itself offer some inspiration from time to time. Ultimately I thought that I should share this change in tactics and use it as an addendum to my post on writing uploaded on January 13th. I hope that both serve you well!
Thanks for reading.
Writing Order
You see, when I wrote SKYSCARR (began August 2011, finished the first draft July 2013,) I already had an idea for the ending in mind and had also sketched out the entire storyline just as I've done with this new project, but this time I made a slight twist that I think has made a great difference: To write the ending first! Now this of course is only mildly different to what I had previously done with sketching the outline and therefore describing the progress of the narrative, but alas, this is not very effective for me and I will tell you why. The reason, I believe, is not so much to do with story progression, but rather character development, because when you write that final chapter there is the final product right in front of you, the character living and breathing as I want to see him in the end, his responses to the situations as I wanted to see him and everything that I would otherwise look forward to, over and done with.
Yes, I know, I've squashed the primary anticipation of when the story ends -I hope- rather poignantly, but this is but a small price to pay for keeping a clear head as I make my way through the novel, which I think makes one stay on track, to keeps one's wits about the story so as to not make shortcuts that might otherwise ruin the story and crush the excitement as a result of lazy, sloppy writing, because the writer was focusing too much on the endgame. Always remember folks that if you write badly to begin with and the novel's dry and stale, then why should a dear reader stay with you from chapter 1 through 20. Just a thought.
Writing Quotas
Yes, yes, all great writers have 'em: Stephen King writes at least 2000 words a day, and doesn't leave his computer till it's done. Iain Banks did a similar thing, writing on average for about 3 months max to get a first draft finished and many other writers all do similar things, following day orders and to-do lists almost, shuffling down the road to a novel's completion. When writing my first novel I didn't use any such things, which lead to me hitting a wall from time to time, periods where I'd not write anything for a month! This problem has been addressed as well because I've set myself a quota of 2000 words per day and have been keeping to it, in addition to my new year resolution of reading for at least an hour per day. This is why I've managed to write over 10,000 words in next to no time; it doesn't take a genius after all to note that 2,000 words every day in a 7-day week equals 14,000 words. That's pretty much a short story completed, two weeks later (28,000) we're talking novelettes and the week after that of course taking us over 40,000 words, which is technically where a novel-length work begins. Given these simple mathematical sums, we can therefore deduce where exactly a novel will end if we keep to that quota. To apply that to my new novel would mean that -given a target draft length of 70,000 words- it woulds in theory take a little over a month to write on this schedule, which is a hell of a lot shorter than doing the same in 2 years.
Writing Time
Of course I realise that writing big amounts is foolish unless it's any good, which is what second drafts are for, but it's good to think that the first draft can be over and done with very quickly because the clock is always ticking after all. But the final point that I will address is time; when are creative juices flowing optimally? When should one put pen to paper or fingers to keyboard and bash out that quota. Well several months ago I spied an article on this (in either the Mail or Guardian I think) where the thesis was to write during the morning when the creative juices are -apparently- flowing optimally, citing George Orwell as an example, who -according the article as I remember it- often wrote first thing in the morning, sat in bed with his typewriter upon his lap. I've been trying this as of late, going to bed at 12:30am and rising at 6:30-7:00 am and I have found it a great help; in fact, I think has become my favoured strategy. What I do is quite simple. Write 1000 words, at least, first thing in the morning, taking time to read what I wrote yesterday to tidy up any superficialities like spelling etc. Then what I do is go about my daily routine and when I'm fully awake -in the afternoon or evening for example- I tidy up what I wrote in the morning -apparently writing when still half-asleep leaves you with quite a few typing mistakes to correct- and move on to complete my second 1000 words. This is soon followed by my reading for the night (currently Cloud Atlas & i-Robot) which totals into at least one hour.
Now of course one has to remember that I am but a lowly student whose life is inundated with work and textbooks to read and assignments to complete, which is partly the reason why I write in the morning so early, because it still leaves me ample time to print, write and read things associated with my course, which can itself offer some inspiration from time to time. Ultimately I thought that I should share this change in tactics and use it as an addendum to my post on writing uploaded on January 13th. I hope that both serve you well!
Thanks for reading.
Friday, January 24, 2014
Carat Media Internship: Journal Entry #13
* This post is for 16th January; this week's will be ready for either the weekend or next week. Thanks
So here I am again, back from the holidays well-rested to continue my work at Carat Media. The familiar sight of the office greeted me as unchanged, a tranquil familiarity that really settled me back down into beginning the internship once again and while much of it I was already acquainted with, there were some differences.
The first task was very familiar, to complete a keyword list for a client with whom I have become very knowledgable of in my time there, this week's list focusing on birdseed for different species of domesticated birds. Whether it was a Budgerigar, a Cockatiel or merely a farm-variety fowl, I had to create keyword groups from all the different products listed and associate them via the species into which our feathered friends fell. This was done in the first couple of hours without much hassle, the list also using the latest offers as a keyword group (in total, about 400 rows.)
The next task however took me back to week 11 where I helped compete a PowerPoint for a client to advertise our use of Facebook as a viable marketing tool. This task was similar, with the first part focusing on identifying the key benefits to using Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn as marketing tools, while the latter part of the task revolved around putting it all together into a PowerPoint (3 slides long) in order to demonstrate the advantages as creatively as possible.
So here I am again, back from the holidays well-rested to continue my work at Carat Media. The familiar sight of the office greeted me as unchanged, a tranquil familiarity that really settled me back down into beginning the internship once again and while much of it I was already acquainted with, there were some differences.
The first task was very familiar, to complete a keyword list for a client with whom I have become very knowledgable of in my time there, this week's list focusing on birdseed for different species of domesticated birds. Whether it was a Budgerigar, a Cockatiel or merely a farm-variety fowl, I had to create keyword groups from all the different products listed and associate them via the species into which our feathered friends fell. This was done in the first couple of hours without much hassle, the list also using the latest offers as a keyword group (in total, about 400 rows.)
The next task however took me back to week 11 where I helped compete a PowerPoint for a client to advertise our use of Facebook as a viable marketing tool. This task was similar, with the first part focusing on identifying the key benefits to using Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn as marketing tools, while the latter part of the task revolved around putting it all together into a PowerPoint (3 slides long) in order to demonstrate the advantages as creatively as possible.
I really don't think I'm great at creative execution on PP,
but hopefully it gets the message across
The slides will be relayed to the guys upstairs later in the week for them to modify and standardise so that they really are worthy of being presented to clients, but the meat of the slides is already there so hopefully it will serve us well in the future.
The final task was a bit of a pain to complete since Excel was running a little slow and in the end I didn't manage to finish it, though I will next week. A client's campaigns needed evaluating; that's the Contextual campaigns and Remarketing campaigns with -obviously- different standards set for each one due to their intentions (Remarketing focusing on customers who have visited the site and is therefore more targeted than the Contextual material, for instance,) which didn't do much to make the task any harder, only a little more time-consuming. Needless to say, the campaigns were of several different categories e.g. the contextual side of the strategy had around five separate campaigns for different product categories, which I sorted easily in Excel through grouping them all together into a single item, which made the task much easier to get to grips with. There were three spreadsheets in total: a Keyword report, an Ad Group report and a Placement report, the main differences between them being in the evaluation of keywords, ad groups and website placements for creatives, respectively. The performance wasn't brilliant but with the tweaks that I've highlighted I hope it can be improved once it's been fully analysed in the coming weeks.
Without further delay I'll bid you goodbye until next week, where I complete this task and may hopefully engage in brand new ones to test my limits in those areas. Thanks for reading!
Monday, January 20, 2014
A Prologue . . .
“He’s been making good progress since the crash, his eyes now track from left to right and from up to down as they should; no sign of prolonged trauma and there were no serious bodily injuries save for the broken arm and foot. However, Mrs Watson, I would advise caution and patience with Sam at present. His head suffered quite a bang as I’m sure you’d imagine and still hasn’t yet fully recovered his ability to communicate. You may notice his slow response to questions, his lack of emotion and generally lackadaisical outlook.”
“How long will that last?” A concerned, high voice drifted down the white corridor.
“I’m afraid you can’t ever be too sure with cases like this, Mrs Watson.”
“Julia, please.” She was obviously tense.
“Very well, Julia,” the doctor replied empathetically, “the problem is not so much Sam’s brain at a biological level but more at a psychological level. The shock has left him, frightened, quite shaken up, if you will, and as a defence mechanism, his mind is pushing his ‘Self’ into a cocoon, a personal space in his own head where he can find peace. We see such phenomenon in certain personality disorders and Post-Traumatic Stress Syndrome, an emotion-numbing exercise of sorts.”
“Does he have Post-Traumatic Stress Syndrome?” She asked.
“We don’t believe so, he hasn’t seen any kind of impairment in emotional functioning as a result of debilitating flashbacks and a constant fear since one month ago when the crash happened: No, we think this is a classic case of straightforward Amnesia, his head injury causing him to forget the whole ordeal. Though if his expression problems persist, then there may be cause to think that the likelihood of Post-Traumatic Stress is more prudent.”
“Oh God, will he ever be the same again?” She sounded like she was on the verge of tears.
“Oh, yes, yes, we think he will. This is just the first stage after his accident, so we’ve no intention of ruling anything out. Our best advice at present is to keep sending him home with you, let him ask you questions, talk to him about fond memories, about your life together before his crash and in some cases, if you hit the right memory, it all comes flooding back. Keep up with what you’ve been doing so far Julia, because we tend to find it does patients like your husband a world of good.”
“I hope so.”
“I do also Julia. Come, let’s see how he’s doing.” The doctor said cheerfully.
Sam’s door creaked open, the white light flooding into the room, nearly invisible against the hash light on the ceiling. His physical injuries had cleared up quickly over the last month he thought and he could still recall those concrete facts of life and general knowledge as clear as day, like he was grabbing the pebbles of wisdom from the great stream of knowing, but why, he asked himself, could he not remember those he knew, the facts of his life? He reached out for the memories often, knowing that something was missing, something queer in his head, but when he looked it was just gone, snatched away and disappearing, laughing, into the untrimmed forest of his thoughts. The woman was here again, Julia, she called herself, who was -according to her unabridged memory- his wife of the last ten years. And that doctor was with her too, a nice enough guy he thought, and the first person he saw when he came round a month ago. He’d been staying and leaving the hospital over the last few weeks, reporting back, going home and reporting back and going home again with Julia to talk about the elusive past and those memories that he’d lost. It felt like a mirror had shattered, that when he’d hit his head, the glass just broke into thousands of shards to never be seen again, just vanishing like they never existed, like he’d never existed. Julia smiled and he saw that look in her eyes again; he didn’t respond, still wondering what their connection meant; obviously she was his wife, they were married and marriage was the apex of the social hierarchy of proving ones love to a fellow human, but there was something within that stopped him smiling back, instead putting on the face of a scared dog, fearing something that he didn’t see but knew was there. He feared that look in her eye, that look of happiness that came because her husband was alive and well, yet oddly fearful because it looked… forced, for lack of a better word, he thought.
“How are you Sam?” The doc smiled, teeth bright like those you’d find in a toothpaste advertisement.
“I’m fine.” The words rolled out of Sam’s mouth slow and dull.
“Are you alright Sam?” Julia asked, her smile small and red-lipped, the colour matching her hair. Sam flicked his eyes to her, but he sensed that his facial expression had betrayed him as a look of concern flashed across her face, but then it was gone in an instant:
“Yes, yes of course I’m fine, Julia. I’ve never been better.” He smiled back, whispering his final sentence to himself as his eyes sunk to the floor. A small fire burned within him as he eyed the ground below his feet, a fear of something. But what? He asked the question over and over in his mind as the doctor and his wife struck up another conversation. He caught bits of it like “…recovery time…” and “…flattened affect…” but the rest of it was a whisper to him. By the time they’d finished he was long gone for a while, to a flowery fissure filled with roses and daffodils and the greenest grass; a place, he asked himself, had he visited before, in the real world somewhere; but he didn’t respond to himself, only distracted himself from the boredom of existence. Whatever life was, his was here.
Saturday, January 18, 2014
Winterfylleth -THE THRENODY OF TRIUMPH (Album Review)
The reason as to why I'm reviewing this album is -partly- because they're from Manchester, my home city (a fact of which I'm glad,) but also because they have a great deal to offer as far as Black Metal goes, the reasons for which I will detail below.
Winterfylleth (deriving from the Anglo-Saxon word for October or "the fall of winter") are a band formed in 2007 and have so far released a demo EP, three studio albums and are due to release an upcoming split EP with Ukrainian Black Metal outfit, Drudkh, later this month. The album release chronology is as follows: The Ghost of Heritage (2008); The Mercian Sphere (2010) and finally the album which I will review today The Threnody of Triumph (2012.) The lyrics typically focus on English heritage and history/folklore, with a heavy use of imagery, especially that concerning geographical landscapes upon which events took place e.g. battles and famous historical events. Threnody is no exception, a beautifully haunting collection of dark yet romantic tracks that keep us rolling forward at full speed, throughout the whole offering to the conclusion. Here's the track list:
Winterfylleth (deriving from the Anglo-Saxon word for October or "the fall of winter") are a band formed in 2007 and have so far released a demo EP, three studio albums and are due to release an upcoming split EP with Ukrainian Black Metal outfit, Drudkh, later this month. The album release chronology is as follows: The Ghost of Heritage (2008); The Mercian Sphere (2010) and finally the album which I will review today The Threnody of Triumph (2012.) The lyrics typically focus on English heritage and history/folklore, with a heavy use of imagery, especially that concerning geographical landscapes upon which events took place e.g. battles and famous historical events. Threnody is no exception, a beautifully haunting collection of dark yet romantic tracks that keep us rolling forward at full speed, throughout the whole offering to the conclusion. Here's the track list:
1- A Thousand Winters
2- The Swart Raven
3- Aefterield-Freon (*best rendering of Norse graphemes that I can manage on a computer)
4- A Memorial
5- The Glorious Plain
6- A Soul Unbound
7- Void of Light
8- The Fate of Souls After Death
9- Home is Behind
10- The Threnody of Triumph
The Threnody of Triumph
A Black Metal Masterpiece
The album stabs you with a solid opening on A Thousand Winters, and keeps the knife twisting throughout; a track filled with reverb and a very warm sound, unlike traditional Black Metal, is the first thing that makes the album so great because despite this, they still manage to achieve a very dark atmosphere, without relying on poor production. This idiosyncrasy works very well in their favour, the guitars building into a sonic wall through which the reverb-heavy vocals penetrate, the steam train of the drumbeat carrying the sound forward, advancing the album.
A Thousand Winters: A Breath-Taking Opener
(Lyric video)
The first track is undeniably a fantastic introduction, the lyrics focusing on the story of a ghost trying to reclaim what it lost, the title deriving from the final lyric "...that it were a thousand winters, to thy death-day." This kicks off the entire concept of the album, the songs contained within based around a lamenting of the dead and a progression to the afterlife. Olde and/or Middle English lyrics are also commonplace here, which gives many of the tracks a very Romantic Era ambience despite the dark atmosphere, and this paradox of sound and message is a very strong appeal once again because not only do the lyrics and themes clash with the sound quite often e.g. The Glorious Plain is almost Wordsworthian lyrically, yet dark and heavy sonically, but Winterfylleth's whole brand of BM is very different to other bands because the sound is very much warm as opposed to the bereft-of-reverb sound that is characteristic of most Black Metal, which I think is quite strange given that many of their tracks tend to be set around Autumn or Winter, the coldest seasons of the year.
As their history suggests, Winterfylleth are a heritage/history-themed band, which is also reflected in their use of what looks like Olde English or early Norse in the third track's title, Aefterield-Freon, which means "mother-tree" I've heard though can't ratify, and is based on folklore. But this album goes beyond the mere mock-up in using clever titles because this track (as well as Home is Behind) is an instrumental English Folk track, not heavy or metallic in the slightest, utilising expertly-layered strings that creates such an epic sound, yet manages to convey such calm as if the eye of the winter storm has been reached, which is a nice break after hearing two heavy tracks clocking in at 7:36 and 7:48 respectively.
Without going into too many more tracks intimately, I will leave this album review by saying that I throughly enjoyed this album with over an hour of diverse music and fantastic musicianship on the part of all involved, with rolling drums, low guitars and above-all, innovative sounds marking a significant step in Winterfylleth's career. I highly recommend it to anyone with an open mind and anyone who likes ambient BM and/or historically-themed music with the instruments to match. If you do give it a listen then I hope that you enjoy it as much as I did!
Thanks for reading.
The Glorious Plain: A Darkly Romantic Ode to a Steppe
(Lyric Video)
(Lyric Video)
As their history suggests, Winterfylleth are a heritage/history-themed band, which is also reflected in their use of what looks like Olde English or early Norse in the third track's title, Aefterield-Freon, which means "mother-tree" I've heard though can't ratify, and is based on folklore. But this album goes beyond the mere mock-up in using clever titles because this track (as well as Home is Behind) is an instrumental English Folk track, not heavy or metallic in the slightest, utilising expertly-layered strings that creates such an epic sound, yet manages to convey such calm as if the eye of the winter storm has been reached, which is a nice break after hearing two heavy tracks clocking in at 7:36 and 7:48 respectively.
Aefterield-Freon: A Beautiful Folk Instrumental
(The Lyric Appears in the Songbook)
(The Lyric Appears in the Songbook)
Without going into too many more tracks intimately, I will leave this album review by saying that I throughly enjoyed this album with over an hour of diverse music and fantastic musicianship on the part of all involved, with rolling drums, low guitars and above-all, innovative sounds marking a significant step in Winterfylleth's career. I highly recommend it to anyone with an open mind and anyone who likes ambient BM and/or historically-themed music with the instruments to match. If you do give it a listen then I hope that you enjoy it as much as I did!
Thanks for reading.
Monday, January 13, 2014
How to Write a Novel (Proceed with Caution)
So after a long and hard days work you stare at your tired reflection in the coffee before you, wondering how the hell you ended up where you are: You're tired of the workaday life and in a surreal epiphany you realise that the source to finding a truly fruitful existence, is to create something instead. Sound familiar? If so then you might decide to write for a change, taking inspiration from all your favourite authors, years of experience, ideas that you've had since you were five years old and mixing it all together in the writers cauldron. This may seem the best starting point, pulling up the Mac screen with a preferred beverage and a small plate of biscuits and pouring forth all of that accumulated experience. Many authors do this and it is sometimes very effective for us, but be warned, for the road to completing a novel is perilous, filled with potholes, traps and dead ends and so I feel that I should share some tips that I have learned from my own -quite limited- experience.
PART 1: READ, READ, READ
Yes, it's cliche and yes you've probably heard this from far more seasoned authors than I, but if a point's good, it's worth repeating. Being an author who doesn't read is like a musician who says that he can't stand music, or a film director who never goes to the movies. I'd like to think that those who were inspired to write a novel were inspired probably by a book that they once read, but I can attest to the idea that a great deal of my writing was not born of the inspiration from novels, but from films, games, art and music, so I can sympathise with those who gather experience from other areas of media, but if you want to get the style down, halfway there is as far as you're ever going to get without reading around your genre and in its subgenres. But don't stop there either, because the more good writing you read, the better writer you will become, which means reading non-fiction as well, especially true for those characters in possession of knowledge that you yourself do not possess, such as detectives, scientists and military types (unless of course you have experience in those fields.)
In order to test the previous point: do what you were going to do and write say a prologue or first chapter of a novel and go away, read something of that genre and go back to it. Notice how shit it was? That's because you have made a mistake and thinking those thoughts of your previous writing can only be a good thing, because it shows that you have learned something. But simply reading is the preliminary work, not the meat of the job, which is why you also need to
PART 2: PLAN, PLAN & PLAN AGAIN
This is where your novel must take shape but unlike the previous point, this is disputed. There are some authors out there who write novels as the inspiration waxes and wanes, throwing all caution to the wind as it were; then there are others who plot out absolutely every scene, every encounter and every facet of the story to test straight away if the plot will work or not. Personally I dither between the two, with a general outline planned and some pivotal scenes preconceived in my mind, but without planning exhaustively every single scene in the book; most of the other scenes are written out with freedom in attempts to keep the action fresh and off-the-cuff in order to allow for flexibility with the story just in case what I'd planned wasn't very good. This is a classic case of each to his own I guess and you should ideally do whatever works for you, but if you do take the first route, be warned, for writing with no plan whatsoever requires a great deal of mental agility in order to write your way out of potholes before they overwhelm the action, which is why unless you are absolutely certain that you can make a story work despite unexpected complications that almost certainly will rise, then I would advise that you tread the path well trodden, rather than running naked into the dark forest of uncertainty.
PART 3: IT CAN'T DO ANY HARM TO GO BACK TO SCHOOL
Before you write your novel it might do good to relearn all that grammar stuff from school, just so you know how to construct time dimensions to keep up momentum and how to place sentences together to keep the action high i.e. a good, well-executed mixture of short- and complex-sentences. You can do all of this by simply picking up a good book on English grammar, one from university presses e.g. OUP, should suffice.
PART 4: HAVE FUN!
This is by far the most important step, because writing a novel is not easy and will kick you in the balls from time to time in frustration; it's not pleasant and things almost certainly will go wrong the first time you try it, even if you follow all the precautions and plan down to the last detail, there will be times where inertia rears it's ugly head, where doubt sets in and self-criticism bullies you. It's fine, just get back to work and forget your anxieties, because a book that isn't finished is one that will never sell or even see a glimpse of daylight. This brings me to a final point, which is to not dream too much, because -despite the hype- writing is not a get-rich-quick scheme where authors churn out book after book and rake in millions. Yes, King, Rowling, Tolkien etc. are big names in fiction that -even after death in Tolkien's case- generate massive revenues. These are exceptions to the rule, less than one percent of books published each year, which means that the only reason you should write, should be for enjoyment, to say that you have done something that few will ever do. Of those that try to, most will fail, which makes it all the greater to finish something so massive, and shows a great amount of determination and wherewithal.
If you wish for more writing advice, I would highly recommend the book How NOT to Write a Novel, that I reviewed last year. Good luck!
PART 1: READ, READ, READ
Yes, it's cliche and yes you've probably heard this from far more seasoned authors than I, but if a point's good, it's worth repeating. Being an author who doesn't read is like a musician who says that he can't stand music, or a film director who never goes to the movies. I'd like to think that those who were inspired to write a novel were inspired probably by a book that they once read, but I can attest to the idea that a great deal of my writing was not born of the inspiration from novels, but from films, games, art and music, so I can sympathise with those who gather experience from other areas of media, but if you want to get the style down, halfway there is as far as you're ever going to get without reading around your genre and in its subgenres. But don't stop there either, because the more good writing you read, the better writer you will become, which means reading non-fiction as well, especially true for those characters in possession of knowledge that you yourself do not possess, such as detectives, scientists and military types (unless of course you have experience in those fields.)
In order to test the previous point: do what you were going to do and write say a prologue or first chapter of a novel and go away, read something of that genre and go back to it. Notice how shit it was? That's because you have made a mistake and thinking those thoughts of your previous writing can only be a good thing, because it shows that you have learned something. But simply reading is the preliminary work, not the meat of the job, which is why you also need to
PART 2: PLAN, PLAN & PLAN AGAIN
This is where your novel must take shape but unlike the previous point, this is disputed. There are some authors out there who write novels as the inspiration waxes and wanes, throwing all caution to the wind as it were; then there are others who plot out absolutely every scene, every encounter and every facet of the story to test straight away if the plot will work or not. Personally I dither between the two, with a general outline planned and some pivotal scenes preconceived in my mind, but without planning exhaustively every single scene in the book; most of the other scenes are written out with freedom in attempts to keep the action fresh and off-the-cuff in order to allow for flexibility with the story just in case what I'd planned wasn't very good. This is a classic case of each to his own I guess and you should ideally do whatever works for you, but if you do take the first route, be warned, for writing with no plan whatsoever requires a great deal of mental agility in order to write your way out of potholes before they overwhelm the action, which is why unless you are absolutely certain that you can make a story work despite unexpected complications that almost certainly will rise, then I would advise that you tread the path well trodden, rather than running naked into the dark forest of uncertainty.
PART 3: IT CAN'T DO ANY HARM TO GO BACK TO SCHOOL
Before you write your novel it might do good to relearn all that grammar stuff from school, just so you know how to construct time dimensions to keep up momentum and how to place sentences together to keep the action high i.e. a good, well-executed mixture of short- and complex-sentences. You can do all of this by simply picking up a good book on English grammar, one from university presses e.g. OUP, should suffice.
PART 4: HAVE FUN!
This is by far the most important step, because writing a novel is not easy and will kick you in the balls from time to time in frustration; it's not pleasant and things almost certainly will go wrong the first time you try it, even if you follow all the precautions and plan down to the last detail, there will be times where inertia rears it's ugly head, where doubt sets in and self-criticism bullies you. It's fine, just get back to work and forget your anxieties, because a book that isn't finished is one that will never sell or even see a glimpse of daylight. This brings me to a final point, which is to not dream too much, because -despite the hype- writing is not a get-rich-quick scheme where authors churn out book after book and rake in millions. Yes, King, Rowling, Tolkien etc. are big names in fiction that -even after death in Tolkien's case- generate massive revenues. These are exceptions to the rule, less than one percent of books published each year, which means that the only reason you should write, should be for enjoyment, to say that you have done something that few will ever do. Of those that try to, most will fail, which makes it all the greater to finish something so massive, and shows a great amount of determination and wherewithal.
If you wish for more writing advice, I would highly recommend the book How NOT to Write a Novel, that I reviewed last year. Good luck!
Monday, January 6, 2014
Update: University Blog Post
Hi guys I just wanted to leave you with this link that lets you see my blog post that I wrote a couple of months ago:
http://diginnmmu.com/opinion/how-to-make-your-mark-in-the-job-market-743
I hope that you find it useful!
http://diginnmmu.com/opinion/how-to-make-your-mark-in-the-job-market-743
I hope that you find it useful!
Wednesday, January 1, 2014
Here Arrives 2014! So What's Your Resolution?
We made it! 2014 has arrived and -in my drunken stupor last night- I thought about what had happened to me over the last year:
In eight day's time for example, this blog will see a one-year anniversary. On August 15th this year (2014 if you're still adjusting!) my novel will see a three-year (WTF!?) existence ever since I wrote "PROLOGUE:" onto the screen of this very Macbook Pro in 2011, which I purchased in October of 2010. The last point's a little irrelevant, but I'm just thinking about what's happened since starting this blog, 78 posts since January 8th 2012, where I stated my intensions, current books being read, and what I'd already published. The first post looks pretty awful, littered with too large a text and uncertainties with disclosing identity, something that I am glad of becoming more relaxed about. But the end of the post does remind me of what I was reading at the time, and it is that which I believe demonstrates my growth as a reader (and therefore a writer) so with that being said, here is a list of all the books I read in 2013!
Consider Phlebas- Iain M. Banks
The Player of Games- Iain M. Banks
Use of Weapons- Iain M. Banks
The Lost Fleet: Fearless- Jack Campbell
The Lost Fleet: Courageous- Jack Campbell
The Lost Fleet: Valiant- Jack Campbell
The Dark Tower Vol. VI: Song of Susannah- Stephen King
The Dark Tower Vol. VII: The Dark Tower- Stephen King
In eight day's time for example, this blog will see a one-year anniversary. On August 15th this year (2014 if you're still adjusting!) my novel will see a three-year (WTF!?) existence ever since I wrote "PROLOGUE:" onto the screen of this very Macbook Pro in 2011, which I purchased in October of 2010. The last point's a little irrelevant, but I'm just thinking about what's happened since starting this blog, 78 posts since January 8th 2012, where I stated my intensions, current books being read, and what I'd already published. The first post looks pretty awful, littered with too large a text and uncertainties with disclosing identity, something that I am glad of becoming more relaxed about. But the end of the post does remind me of what I was reading at the time, and it is that which I believe demonstrates my growth as a reader (and therefore a writer) so with that being said, here is a list of all the books I read in 2013!
Reading Review (2013)
Consider Phlebas- Iain M. Banks
The Player of Games- Iain M. Banks
Use of Weapons- Iain M. Banks
Look to Windward- Iain M. Banks
The Lost Fleet: Dauntless- Jack CampbellThe Lost Fleet: Fearless- Jack Campbell
The Lost Fleet: Courageous- Jack Campbell
The Lost Fleet: Valiant- Jack Campbell
The Lost Fleet: Relentless- Jack Campbell
Paradisio (The Divine Comedy III)- Dante
A Strange Eventful History: Democratic Socialism in Britain- Edmund Dell
The Man in the High Castle- Philip K. Dick
Manhattan in Reverse- Peter F. Hamilton
Starship Troopers- Robert A. Heinlein
The Dark Tower Vol. V: Wolves of the Calla- Stephen KingThe Dark Tower Vol. VI: Song of Susannah- Stephen King
The Dark Tower Vol. VII: The Dark Tower- Stephen King
The Wind Through the Keyhole (A Dark Tower Novel)- Stephen King
Animal Farm- George Orwell
Toxic Sludge is Good for You- John Stauber & Sheldon Rampton
* Check out my reviews of the hyperlinked books!
It seems quite a lot really given that I had books to read for university as well, but because of that I can look back and say that I have definitely grown as a writer of primarily SF because of reading such titles. This year I plan on reading more SF and Dystopian novels both from the classic shelves like some more Wells or Orwell and certainly Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451, which has been on my reading list for about 6-7 months now; other authors that I wish to read include Jason M. Hough's The Dire Earth Cycle, which looks like a promising Military SF series, in addition to more Iain Banks to compare his non-SF work to his Culture novels; The Wasp Factory and The Bridge look particularly promising to me, so hopefully I'll be as busy this year as I was last year!
And that's about all for reading, but what about writing? This year I published many different things but just for your convenience, here is another list of what I think are the main landmarks in my writing pursuits as seen on this blog!
Offline Systems is the first part in a Military SF short story written in a similar vein to Jack Campbell's The Lost Fleet series, revolving around the destruction of a flagship and the desperate attempt by the commander to evacuate and send the crew below to an abandoned planet, planning on what to do about the enemy from the ground, his sights set on an abandoned military base equipped with an anti-orbital laser! The next part will be published some time in 2014.
The Agony (Album Review) was an obvious departure from what I usually focus on, which I enjoyed writing and like to revisit on occasion. It was enjoyable I to apply my reviewing repertoire to something different and I thought it worked rather well in the end, the post being filled with music videos too!
Finally my Iain Duncan Smith Critique was one of the most thorough essays outside of education that I have ever written, with the sources relevant, the writing sufficiently angry and the arguments well-constructed. I felt quite proud to be honest!
As well as these pieces, I was also invited to write for a university blog about digital developments thanks to my Carat Internship Journal, the essay that I wrote for them should be being published before the end of this month. I will post it here once it's gone up! But the main development for me this year is that I finished the first draft of my novel SKYSCARR, an achievement so great that I still can't believe I'm redrafting it presently, and I'm not even 20 yet! But the hard work begins here, and I've got to juggle this between trying to find another internship (paid in industry for a whole year,) which is forever worrying.
So in conclusion this year, I've seen writing, reading and a great time at university and it is in those high spirits, that I wish you all the best in this forthcoming new year.
My New Year's Resolutions:
To WRITE more often, at least FOUR TIMES A WEEK for an HOUR or more.
To READ EVERY NIGHT for at LEAST 1 HOUR.
We can do it guys!
Offline Systems is the first part in a Military SF short story written in a similar vein to Jack Campbell's The Lost Fleet series, revolving around the destruction of a flagship and the desperate attempt by the commander to evacuate and send the crew below to an abandoned planet, planning on what to do about the enemy from the ground, his sights set on an abandoned military base equipped with an anti-orbital laser! The next part will be published some time in 2014.
The Agony (Album Review) was an obvious departure from what I usually focus on, which I enjoyed writing and like to revisit on occasion. It was enjoyable I to apply my reviewing repertoire to something different and I thought it worked rather well in the end, the post being filled with music videos too!
Finally my Iain Duncan Smith Critique was one of the most thorough essays outside of education that I have ever written, with the sources relevant, the writing sufficiently angry and the arguments well-constructed. I felt quite proud to be honest!
As well as these pieces, I was also invited to write for a university blog about digital developments thanks to my Carat Internship Journal, the essay that I wrote for them should be being published before the end of this month. I will post it here once it's gone up! But the main development for me this year is that I finished the first draft of my novel SKYSCARR, an achievement so great that I still can't believe I'm redrafting it presently, and I'm not even 20 yet! But the hard work begins here, and I've got to juggle this between trying to find another internship (paid in industry for a whole year,) which is forever worrying.
So in conclusion this year, I've seen writing, reading and a great time at university and it is in those high spirits, that I wish you all the best in this forthcoming new year.
My New Year's Resolutions:
To WRITE more often, at least FOUR TIMES A WEEK for an HOUR or more.
To READ EVERY NIGHT for at LEAST 1 HOUR.
We can do it guys!
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