I have just got back from a holiday in the Canaries. Holidays are a great time to take in the sunshine, relax and yes - read a little. Reading is a wonderful way of relaxing and this time I read three books - two fiction and one factual. I love a good story and Lee …
Continue reading Story telling – a time to think and reflect
This month I want to look at some of the ideas in Lisa Cron's book, Story Genius. In one of the quotes from the book, she says: At its most basic, a story is about how someone grapples with a problem they can't avoid, and how they change in the process... Maybe that's a little …
In the previous blog I discussed some of the important lessons I learnt from editors in the field of business publications many years ago. In this blog I want to look at how I needed to adapt to the world of fiction. As we shall see, it's not just about spellchecking and grammar checking. Fiction …
Continue reading Editing — How fiction differs from other forms of writing
I love to read science fiction. When I’m not writing myself I can usually be found reading — a sci-fi novel, or if not sci-fi, a book about the craft of writing. Recently, I realised I needed to take a break from writing my new novel. I had reached a point where I needed to …
After spending so much of my business career writing reports, books and letters in a plain style of English, writing fiction for the first time was quite a challenge for me. If you’re contemplating writing your own novel for the first time, you might be struggling with the same kind of issues. Below I’ve set …
Writers tend to read a lot, and recently I ’ve been reading more than I’ve been writing. Apart from the joy of reading a good novel, it’s also an opportunity to study the styles of successful authors outside my genre, and learn from them. One of the books I finished recently is Stephenie Meyer’s Host. …
JMJ Williamson 