Highlight
Sledge-Lit! This is the Winter version of literary festival Edge-Lit which I attended back in July. Much like its Summer cousin, I spent the day meeting fellow writers and readers, hearing from accomplished authors, and ending the day making friends over beers.
Lowlight
Crashing out of NaNoWriMo, despite having a strong idea, due to an intense few months at the office. I should have followed my own advice on how to win NaNoWriMo.
I have read...
- Blood of Assassins by RJ Barker
- The Girl with all the Gifts by M R Carey
I have blogged...
- Book To The Future 2018 - My Photo Album
- My Top 5 Tips for Sledge-Lit 2018
- My Top 5 Tips for Winning NaNoWriMo
- 18 Things I Learnt at Sledge-Lit 2018
I have written...
- A poem called The Wee Wise Weevil, which has a Julia Donaldson vibe.
- A short story called The Nuthatch, best described as a fantasy horror.
- 14,859 words towards a novella called The Maria Compass, a contemporary re-telling of A Christmas Carol. This was my NaNoWriMo project. I hope to finish this in January.
- Very busy at work!
I have submitted...
- An entry for the Birmingham Writers' Group annual winter competition. The theme was Frozen Wastes and I wrote a short story called The Nuthatch. I didn't win but the story will feature in my third short story collection.
Out and about
- I spoke about self-publishing at Book To The Future, the University of Birmingham's literary festival.
- I spoke about self-publishing to the first-year Creative Writing students at the University of Birmingham.
- I attended Sledge-Lit 2018. It was awesome.
Dates to remember
- 1 October - National Coffee Day
- 4 October - National Poetry Day
- 6 October - National Bookshop Day
- 26 October - Four-year anniversary of Breadcrumbs.
- 29 October - Three-year anniversary of The Curse of Besti Bori.
- 25 November - Four-year anniversary of Circ.
AOB
- I had a brilliant Christmas with lots of writing presents: a new Moleskine, the Emotion Thesaurus, and a set of storytelling dice!
- I was blown away by Black Mirror episode Bandersnatch. Now I want to write a Choose Your Own Adventure novel.
- Bring on 2019. I will try very hard to finish The Maria Compass, my next short story collection, and Nephos 3.
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