Monthly Archives: August 2013

Book Review: The Memory Plot by D.W. Carver

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So here is my second commission from theindieview.com and what an interesting one it was! Having not read any of the others in the series I will judge this purely on the merits of one book. So if anything doesn’t make sense, an insight is erroneous or something I write sounds confusing, it is my error and not a fault of the writer.

Mental health worker Jill Garvin lost her family two years ago and the memories are being just starting to resurface – which is to the detriment of the interests of certain people who need her to forget those events for good. Along the way she has Creel, her bodyguard, and Sarah her niece. Continue reading →

Book Review: Perdido Street Station by China Miéville

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Random thoughts for a random book. I know he is the master of weird-fi but I never expected this much weirdness. My previous dabbling with Miéville is the novelette Tis the Season (which I will read again and review closer to Christmas) so I had an idea of what to expect.

The weirdness and the fact that it throws you in at the deep end from very early on is very reminiscent of Paulo Bacigalupi’s The Windup Girl. However, unlike that book, the writing style is very easy on the eye – much easier than you might have expected after reading the first couple of chapters. Continue reading →

Wrong Word Wednesday #13

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Every week I will demonstrate an example of poor English where a different word is used from the one intended. Sometimes this creates a grammatically incorrect sentence. Unfortunately, the mistake is usually so pervasive that we all do it and such errors are usually made by those who should know better – journalists working for national or global media outlets such as newspapers and television
Continue reading →

More Rewriting – Competition Editing

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Though not on my novel this time. Conscious of the fact that I have five months (which might seem a long time but I’m sure it will just fly by) before The James White Award closes for another year, this Bank Holiday weekend I’ve really got cracking on with this story that has been bouncing around my head for a couple of years.

I’ve got several ideas for where it is going and I intend to try out a few ideas to see which works best. Unfortunately, one of them might require some Quantum Mechanics 101 which is not really considered an easy read! I may drop that idea totally and if it turns out more to be a fantasy than sci fi then I’ll drop it as a potential entry for James White which is a sci fi award. But all that is in the near future.

Continue reading →

The Finer Points of Re-writing

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When you a significant change to a story, even something as seemingly innocuous as the back story, it is important to think about the knock on effects for the wider story. As I have said before, my novel is a medieval world in the future – a situation that has come about because of the philosophy of an anti-technology Christian church the grew up in the shadow of a devastating nuclear war between Uncle Sam the the Russian Bear. Continue reading →

Book Review: Running with the Pack by Mark Rowlands

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Despite that I found his book The Philosopher and The Wolf a mix of profound, intriguing and disappointingly self-righteous with misanthropic tendencies, I eagerly got this on special offer from Kindle. I took up running just over a year ago and hadn’t yet read any books on the subject. As somebody who does a lot of his thinking while running (particularly about his next writing project), I was drawn to the fusing of marathon running and philosophy – right up my street considering this new found passion for a form of exercise I used to loath. Continue reading →

Wrong Word Wednesday #12

Wrong Word Wednesday, , , , , , , , ,

Every week I will demonstrate an example of poor English where a different word is used from the one intended. Sometimes this creates a grammatically incorrect sentence. Unfortunately, the mistake is usually so pervasive that we all do it and such errors are usually made by those who should know better – journalists working for national or global media outlets such as newspapers and television
Continue reading →

Book Review: Privatizing Freedom by Daniel Brownell

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This is my first commission from theindieview.com, so begins my career as a serious book blogger for budding writers like me to promote their self-published work.

The primary character, a homage to James Bond who goes by the name of Sherman Safel, is past his sell-by date but like any good MI6 agent is married to the job and will never retire while he can still chase international terrorists. Except this isn’t the world we know. World governments have gone all Thatcherite and privatised everything. Continue reading →

How Important is a Back Story, Really?

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My novel – which I am currently editing – has gone through so many changes. It is about a medieval society in our future, one where technology has been demonised and outlawed, declared “heresy” by a new church. I began it eleven years ago very much with 9/11 in mind. I predicted as a reaction against militant Islam, that Christians would become far more strident and demanding. Initially, it was to be resurgent Catholic church, seizing power after a nuclear war some time in the early 21st century.

I soon abandoned this idea of a militant Catholicism and invent a new church. I could invent a whole new Testament and a figurehead around whom it would be written without concerns about criticisms from modern Catholics saying “doctrine would never be changed to say that.” Continue reading →

Reflections on “Les Revenants” (The Returned) Season 1

Fantasy, Horror, , , , , ,

This is the French drama that is taking the world by storm. Based on a 2004 French film by the name of They Came Back (which has a pretty average rating at IMDB), somebody somewhere clearly thought this would make an intriguing series with all the flexibility that television permits but feature films do not. I haven’t seen the film and I doubt I will until the series finishes in however many years that takes. Continue reading →