Been a bit of back-and-forth about these strange and elusive creatures, recently, so let’s start out with the core and unavoidable fact:

You need one.

No-one can edit their own work. We’re too emotionally close to it, and when we finally hand that MS in, we’ve read it so many damn times that we can’t as much as see it, any more. Your editor is an all-important, second pair of eyes, picking up the stuff that you don’t. They’re your most constructive critic, your catch-all and your friend. It’s their job to take your story (novel/poem/barfed up word.doc of utter drivel) and to see and bring out the best in it. To make it as good as it can possibly be, to find the themes and threads and images that you didn’t quite paint clearly enough, and to bring them to the fore.

To identify those sadly-doomed darlings.

This isn’t say that you can consciously turn in crap, by the way. Let’s not make the poor buggers’ jobs any harder than they need to be.

Your editor has an eye that you don’t. Yes, they have direct market experience, of course, and if you’re writing IP fiction, then they’re also there to guard the License, its lore and tone of voice. As much as any of that, though, your editor knows, understands and puts into place the difference between ‘objective’ – ‘that doesn’t work, change it’ – and subjective – ‘I don’t/like that’. It’s a critical standpoint, and not something we can ever do for ourselves.

Your editor will also tell you how to fix things. A well as pointing out the stuff that doesn’t work, they can tell you how to sort it. If you’ve mired yourself/your characters in some horrible Chapter of Doom, conninving some ghastly piece of wrangling to get them out again (come on, we’ve all done it), your editor is there to untangle you. They’ll suggest alternative methods to fix the issue, up to and including how to back right up and not put the characters in the hole in the first place. This may you mean rewriting scenes, sometimes quite a lot of scenes, but hey, that’s just a part of the process.

Please note that your editor won’t write those scenes for you, and not should they. They’re there to nudge, and to help you write them for yourself.

Most editors will also pay you compliments, pointing out where something does work and/or where they’ve liked what you’ve written. They’re good like that, spreading little treats, like breadcrumbs through the labyrinth.

Despite those tasty, tasty rewards, though, being edited can sometimes hurt. It can be frustrating, and it can make you a wee bit grumpy. You go to do one fix, and a dozen other things pull straight out of shape. You may have to chase a single theme, all the way through your narrative, constantly picking back up. Or maybe you really, really want to keep that particular scene or paragraph, that one, there, the one you’re so proud of.

So, can you? If you really like the thing?

In answer: no, you don’t have to agree with everything your editor says, but do think about what you’re doing. Think about their reasons for suggesting the change, and about yours for not wanting it. An editor is not there for a confrontation, and they’re not doing things, just to be difficult. Your work is done together, and it’s not a space for pouting, or for pushing back, just because you’re stubborn. If you want to keep a thing, then do you have a solid and reasonable argument? Is it in keeping with its (possibly changed) context? Is there a genuine cause for this particularly phrase or scene? Open a discussion if necessary, and between you, you can sort the thing.

More than anything, though, if you do have a disagreement with an editor, for the love of every dog, don’t take the to the fucking Socials to moan about it.

Reading: Virgina Woolf’s Orlando, illustrated by Varvara Alay. A somewhat off-piste for me, but am thoroughly enjoying the love-cadence of its language and reading something that’s so absolutely different to anything I would usually pick up.

Watching: Isaac’s and my Marvel watch-through has reached Loki, which I really didn’t get, the first time round. Am enjoying it much more on a rewatch, though, with its viciously sharp, very clearly plotted script, its side-swipes at Narcissism, and Hiddleston’s charm and elegance being so wonderfully out of place. Loving the fractal imagery and theme, the Apocalypse backdrops, and the sterling performances from Owen Wilson and Sophia di Martino both.

Playing: Just downloading the new HALO, and celebrating a-all that Aliens goodness.

Space soldiers, dude, they’re a tale that never gets old.

Sometimes, life has a way of ganging right the fuck up on you, and over the last six to eight weeks, it’s been having a huge amount of fun, letting me just get back to my feet and then kicking them out from under me again, school bully-style. My Lease Extension, thank every God of Monies you can name, is finally over, but its last throes were the usual hissing nest of red tape, and a panicked lot of paperwork and running around. I lost my best friend from my teenage years, passed away to a stroke, poor love (she was only in her fifties, and that’s far, far too young), and then there was a lot of Teeth Trouble, which left me in the grip of the Cenobites (no pun) for wa-ay too long.

Woe is me, etc. All of it does, however, bring me neatly to the point:

I’ve not been writing much (one short story, more news about that later). I’ve been trying, but I just haven’t had the spoons, and (somewhat inevitably) it’s been like dragging myself over broken glass. Every creative knows that this stuff happens sometimes: you sit and stare at your screen, and you end up writing ‘All work and no play’, over pages and pages and pages, before freezing to death in the snow. We’ve not had the snow, but my output’s definitely been more Shining than shiny and I am a <very> grumpy beast when I can’t actually write anything decent.

However, in the ‘motivational poster’ corner, this stuff can be a learning experience. Every attempt you make teaches you what that scene is not. It teaches you that the characters are in the wrong place, or saying the wrong things, or not pushing the plot in the right direction. It tells you that you’re struggling because you’re trying to build your furniture all wrong, and here you are, turning the instructions upside-down, while wondering if you’ve put screw A into hole B, rather than the other way round. And you don’t want to start gain, because what you’ve written might actually be okay in places…

Yeah, and that’s the time to break the whole thing down. To realise that it’s broken and to stop trying to hammer it together when it’s already fucked. It’s time to play the music, it’s time to light the lights, it’s time to get things started, and to do the whole damn chapter again.

If I can’t write something, it’s because I don’t have a clear image in my head. We all know the iceberg adage - 90% of your research is below the surface, etc - but you still need that unseen content. It fuels your confidence and everything you do, your ability to construct the scene. If you don’t have it, then you’re drifting loose, fumbling for inspiration and direction, and making no headway. And that’s exactly how you end up flailing.

When those things are clear – when you have the framework, the images and voices in your head - them the words will flow much faster. You won’t be groping for the descriptions or the conversations, because they’ll already be there.

And that, of course, is where the writing it wrong comes in. In finding out what it’s not, you can understand more clearly what it is, hone your focus and make sure you can surge forwards, with everything clearly defined.

Reading: Have just finished Frank Miller’s autobiography, Push The Wall, which was absolutely stunning. It’s very stream-of-consciousness – long sentences and paragraphs – and it reads kind of helter-skelter, but it’s a fascinating look at, not only the craft (relevant to authors as well as comics creators, and very much about the passion invovled, and how we should break boundaries), but the very early days of comics culture, in NY in the fifties and sixties, seeing how it was born, and who shaped it, and the changes through which it went. Weirdly, it felt almost personal as Frank references FP (the one in NY, rather than the one on London, but still) and a lot of people that I’ve worked with, over the years. If you have interest in where all of this really came from, I can highly recommend the read.

Watching: with suitable serendipity, the Defenders saga, so various series of Daredevil, Jessica Jones and then the Defenders themselves. It’s somewhat let down by Finn Jones as Iron Fist, who may be an awesome stuntman, but can’t act to save his life. Watching it felt a little surreal, while reading Frank’s book about Daredevil and Hells’ Kitchen, a juxtaposition of humble beginnings, and of what those stories have become.

Playing: both our D&D games have taken to the ocean, and we’re sailing away, on the thin waters of a new day. Lots of fun outfitting ourselves and our ships, and will we meet beasties, while we all pretend to be Cap’n Jack?

Yeah, you’d better believe it.

Because you asked. Yes, you!

As of this morning, Lugan: Vision Quest is available in paperback, from Amazon.

It’s a very weird feeling, holding a physical book that’s been a mental/creative one for so long (tho’ that doesn’t ever change, in fairness, however that book may be published), and I have to say a huge than you to Tom, as ever, for his absolutely gorgeous artwork, and to Catie, bless her socks, for being a formatting powerhouse.

Wouldn’t have been able to do this, etc.

Self-publishing Lugan has been quite the fascinating journey, with a completely new set of parameters. It’s been a serious learning incline, from how to format the MS in the first place, to sourcing suitable art, to understanding what you’ll need to be able navigate the upload form, and then to the itty bitty shitty nitty gritty of taking all the pieces and fitting them into that form, to make them work.

There are various guides on-line, and mostly, it really is quite straightforward. I’m not going to write one myself, as they’re everywhere, and this is one of the best, taking you through it, step-by-step. As long as you’re careful, you follow each point and you get all your measurements right, it should go smoothly. Hopefully.

(Rookie mistake, btw, when the KDP form asks you for the page count, do remember that it’s NOT the page count of the word.doc, it’s the page count of the uploaded MS. Making a note of that one, for if and when I do this again!)

It also interesting to note that Amazon will ask you if the book involves AI. They don’t show the tick box result on the product landing page (which they should do), and I’d love to see the data they collect. 

Needless to say, Lugan does not involve AI (other than the one in the book). I’d rather chew off my own legs.

So, here we are: one new paperback, sorted and ready to go! Do grab your copy, please leave a review, and I hope you enjoy the journey!

(Cheeky footnote and I may do more about this later, but Lugan has a mood-board on Pinterest, and a playlist on Spotify. Do go and have a rummage!)

So, all this discourse about authors and book events.

After running hundreds of book events, more, and attending whole lists, as author, as publicist, and as fan, I’m going to push the boat (book) out here, and say one thing: book events are <hard>.

From an author perspective, writing is a solitary undertaking. We spend a one hell of a lot of time, in our own heads, playing with our imaginary friends and the worlds they inhabit. That isn’t to say we’re anti-social – when we get together, we can be quite the opposite – but sometimes, if we’ve been a long time wrapped in our own thoughts, being suddenly around a lot of people can be very overwhelming. It isn’t that we don’t love you, or don't want to be there, it’s that the noise levels can be a bit high, or a bit sudden.

From an organiser’s perspective, authors – particularly the big names – work their arses off at public events. I’ve seen SFF authors-of-note work for four and five hours straight, greeting very fan, one after another, with a handshake and a smile, a signature and a dedication, and a stand for a photo. They’ve answered questions, accepted gifts with grace and gratitude, talked about a fan’s favourite character or paragraph or scene, often many times in succession, and always with genuine enthusiasm. Sometimes, if they’re tired, an author’s subconscious can take over and they'll sign a book, ‘Dave Would You Like A Biscuit', but please understand, this is purely from weariness.

Authors don’t show it – they’re professionals – but this stuff is exhausting. A really big book signing can have a queue of hundreds, and every fan, every reader, will be greeted the same.

Also – from a personal perspective anyway – speaking in public is really daunting. I’m quite happy, reading or talking on or modding panels, but I find standing up and speaking cold to be utterly terrifying. I’ve done it, it’s a part of the game, but dear Gods it’s not easy.

And lastly, if you are a popular author, around at a Con or an open format event, that can be hard, too. A lot of people may want to talk to you. Everything is busy and whirling and moving really fast, and you can mishear people, or not quite catch their names. Authors do their absolute best, but sometimes, the whole thing really will turn into a big ol’ wave of sensory overload.

So, please, this is a little message, bubbled up from more than twenty years and from every side of the business:

Be kind.

Reading: As a little holiday break, I’m re-reading The Hobbit (after watching the Jackson movies, and dear Gods). The last time I read the book, it was to Isaac when he was tiny, and I had forgotten the simplicity and charm and magic of the text and its riddles and rhymes. It underlines how vastly too big all these licenses have become, now. We don’t need another LOTR story. We don’t need more sodding Star Wars.

Please, for the love of every dog, make something new. Something little, and find that charm once more.

Watching: True Blood, which I haven’t watched in years (used to have a bottle of it, on my desk at FP, a very long time ago, left over from some promo or tother). I’d forgotten how smutty it is, but, in terms of ‘older vampire becomes smitten with hot blonde’ it’s surprisingly convincing and both Paquin and Moyer turn in startlingly good performances.

And who doesn’t love Lafayette?

Playing: After a very, very long break, I’ve gone back to playing NeverWinter, something I was obsessed with, over lockdown. It’s much more of a ‘pick up and put down’ online RPG, something that you can dip and in and out of, and hence leave alone (as it’s not an ongoing story, like Baldur’s Gate). It is kind of mesmeric, tho’, and I call to mind a comment made by one of D&D buddies, a couple of weeks ago, about putting a post-it on the TV, saying ‘Are you still enjoying this?’

Because if you are, great. But if you’re not, then you’re teetering on the edge of a dopamine problem (more about that here), and it’s time to touch some grass.

Been a lot of talk about prologues, recently, and how readers often skip them because they ‘don’t add anything.’

Prologues matter. As a big believer in their ability to foreshadow, I’m wading in, boots on, to throw my weight behind their defence.

A prologue, we all know, is a shorter block of text that precedes the first chapter of a book (and not the same thing as a preface or foreword). It’s a single scene, invariably very concise, that catches the reader’s attention, leaves them curious, and that (hopefully) flows naturally into the first chapter.

A prologue is there to set a tone. Sometimes, this can be the tone for the whole story, and sometimes this can be a tone in and of itself, which may get picked up again, or reflected, later in the book. A prologue can be told from a single PoV, and can be there to set up a person, item, or occurrence. A prologue can be hard action, or high tension. It can be a ‘film trailer’, throwing the reader right in at the deep end and grabbing their attention from the start. Sometimes, a prologue can take the form of a letter, or journal entry, providing the reader with not only the PoV of the journal’s creator, but also of the person reading it, and hence of their unfolding relationship.

In short, it’s a glimpse.

Prologues come with many tips and tricks and types, but every one gives the reader a critical fragment of background, something that they can keep on file, and in the back of their mind. It’s the laying of a thread, of a theme, and can sometimes be picked up in similar, related scenes, as the narrative goes on. Whatever form it takes, however, it’s a critical hint of the later ‘reveal’ and if the reader skips it, they can miss out on a book's real emotional impact, and on something critically important.

As an aside: Many years ago, my Agent asked me specifically to add a prologue to Children of Artifice. It was a framing device, there to set up the whole of the rest of the story. In later years, many readers came back to me, as the story circled back to that opening scene, and they realised what the prologue meant and why it was there.

I remember one reader saying it gave them' goosebumps’.

So, please, don’t dismiss it. Don’t ‘not be bothered, as it doesn’t add anything’. Authors, agents and editors spend a very long time, building with words, paragraphs and scenes, and if someone mises a chunk, it's like whole wall has come down, because it’s foundations are suddenly not there anymore.

Prologues are there for a reason. They're part of the building. Please don’t skip them, or you'll miss out!

Reading: The Mercies, by Kiran Millwood Hargrave. Her first adult novel, and absolutely compelling, telling the tale of a group of Nordic women, bereft of their menfolk when the men all die in a storm. They struggle, finding their strength and independence, only to have the Church arrive, be suitably appalled by their heresy, and try to take that strength away again. I’m halfway through it and it’s very powerful and very evocative (and yes, it has a prologue).

Watching: A re-watch of LOTR (still sensational) and then onto The Hobbit, which suffers very much from not being the child’s charming riddle-book that the blessed Prof had written. It has moments, where the book still comes through, but they’re interspersed with Jackson going Off On One, and it all getting very tedious. And, much as I like the combatant woman thing (duh), you can take Tauriel and drop somewhere very dark indeed.

Playing: Our Al-Qadim adventure has quested out to sea, heading for somewhere that may or may not be the Great Library of Alexandria. We didn’t do too well with the water-hag (she made rather a mess of the party), but, in a weird moment of meta-gaming, there’s still a bundle of characters, left over from a very old White Wolf campaign (played back in Norwich and thirty years ago), occupying  the same space and time.

But no, I’m not going to write another mash-up book.

At least, not right now.

Somehow, I’ve managed to get myself inveigled onto a panel at the London Book Fair, next week.

I’m no stranger to panels, having talked on subjects ranging from the correct uses of Social Media (that was a few years ago!) to fandoms and sales and marketing, all the way up to how to write combat in SFF. This time, though, the subject matter is quite new, and is something I’m really looking forward to. The panel is ‘Manga is Mainstream: Why Japanese Comics Connect With Global Readers’.

Since lockdown, we’ve watched Manga go from a little thing, a small curio tucked away in a random bookshop corner, to a truly colossal force. In a time where less and less people are reading for pleasure, its growth has been huge, expanding dramatically outwards and bringing in entire new demographics of readers. Thanks to my change in job, I’ve very much found myself caught up in this, carried forwards by its momentum. In many ways, it’s been a fascinating combination of my old role and my new one, and of how they’ve crossed over, as I bring the skills and knowledge from one into the arena of the other.

The panel is at 2:30pm, Tuesday 10^th March, in The Salon. Nigel Twumasi, founder of mayamada, is moderating, and my fellow panelists are Karrie Fransman of the CCIC, and creators Cat Aquino and Mina Ikemoto Ghosh.

In Nigel’s words, ‘Each person is bringing unique perspective on the craft of making comics, the audience that reads it, and its cultural impact. My hope is that we can help the audience move beyond seeing manga as a trend or "genre" and look at what we can learn from its authentic storytelling, genre breadth, and emotional depth that is engaging readers right now!’

This is the first time I’ve done a panel for the London Book Fair, and I'm very much looking forward to it, and to discovering what my fellow panelists have to say!

Reading: Have just picked up There Is No Anti Memetic Division by qntm, having had it recommended by umpteen colleagues (and many, many people wanting to buy it). It looks amazing!

Watching: Isaac and I are re-watching the LOTR trilogy for the first time in many years (which is still incredible). I was telling him the story of Andy Serkis, at the launch of the London Megastore in ‘03, and how incredibly hard the man worked, doing a five hour (or something) signing, and greeting very eager child, holding up their plastic replica of The One Ring, by coming up and over the counter and hissing 'My Preciousssssss' at them, Gollum-style. His energy and tirelessness were really quite something. I do wonder if any of those kids now remember, twenty-plus years later, how delightfully scared they were.

Playing: Not much of an update to this one, sadly. Further to my anhedonia post, I’m still on PlayStation break, tho’ looking forward to our D&D tomorrow. We’re on the track of a killer and trying to unravel a whole suite of clues, to the extent where we’ve even got a murder board, covered in sticky notes. But can we solve the case?

Only dice will tell.

With the public unveiling of certain Files, a couple of weeks ago, I (yes) crashed and burned. We know everything’s vile, and we know we’ve been the slowly boiling frog for ten years and more, but that crossed a threshold, and I just couldn’t deal with it. Not with the constant onslaught of horrors and hopelessness, every morning, not with the knowledge of what was revealed, and what it all meant, and not with the resulting… not even depression, just numbness.

Anhedonia. Fucking Raistlin vision.

So, I decided to make some very long overdue changes. Fix my fucking dopamine receptors. Find some light. And it goes a little somethin' like this:

One: stopping with the ‘instant hit happy’. Mindless apps and/or (doom)scrolling. Brain-switch-off crap that just destroys my attention span. Enough.

Two: practicing mindfulness. Putting that motherfucking phone down and taking the moment to focus on, and enjoy, what I’m actually doing, be that reading, going for a walk, or drinking my coffee in the morning. Looking at the thing, touching it, feeling it, tasting it. Being <there>.

Three: reminding myself what I love. The reading, the writing, the creating, the gaming, the listening to music. The painting, the photography. The going out and finding new places. Doing these things, and doing them <now>, rather than putting them off because ‘meh, I don’t really feel like it’. Plugging my brain back in.

Four: cardio. I jacked in my gym membership, a couple of years ago, partly because of my back and partly because my job was/is very physical and was just making me too tired. But, while the job is very active, it’s not raising my heart-rate. So, back to the machines we go.

Five: tyrosine. My diet is pretty good (no booze, no gluten, no sugar, lots of green tea), but tyrosine helps your body process dopamine, and it comes only in protein-rich foods. (I’ve also, completely randomly, discovered that Quorn, while it claims to be gluten-free, really isn’t, and stopping eating it has really helped the fog. Who knew?)

Six: sleep. I do a lot of the good stuff already (go outside every day, keep active, not too much caffeine, blah blah), but it also talked about reading before bed and not staring at screens. We all know this one, but it’s high time I got round to it, so it’s something I’ve been trying.

All of this is pretty basic, CBT/common sense stuff, and it’s proving to be perfectly achievable. I’m already happier, consciously putting my phone somewhere else and watching Invincible with my whole brain.

I’m feeling rushes of genuine, positive pleasure, when looking at my bookcases (just for example), remembering why they bring me joy. I’ve re-organised my noticeboards (job I’ve been putting off for ever), to put up all my new book covers. I’ve started the second Lugan novel (as well as making really good progress with the one I’m actually supposed to be writing), and I’ve bought a new rug for the front room.

Just as a treat.

It all boils down to something from Stephen’ King’s On Writing (and something I’ve been saying to myself for years), and that’s clubbing that bastard Muse. If I want the things – the joy, the creativity, the writing, whatever they are – I have to go and fucking get them, not sit on my arse, gawping at all the world’s horrors, waiting for the good things to come to me.

Am I burying my head? Well maybe, but I’ve got to keep the horrors to within manageable proportions. We need to stay aware, of course we do, but sometimes, that mental health thing really has to come first.

Reading: following on from lots of Warhammer, I’ve just started Heated Rivalry, much to my colleagues’ amusement. Don’t judge me.

Watching: Finishing Invincible, ready for the new season, and wow I’d forgotten just how gory it is (lots of head-squashing). Amazing stuff, though, so many stories that wind in, around and through the main narrative, and all of them expertly handled. And fabulously morally ambiguous characters, like Cecil, who dance the line between good and bad guys, and remind us that nothing is simple or clear-cut.

Playing: our somewhat feckless Al-Qadim adventuring band continue to roll nothing but ones, make all the wrong decisions (when we can make decisions at all) and cock absolutely everything up, at absolutely every turn. Dice jails full to overflowing, again.

Anyone would think that the dice have it in for us...

Delighted to announce that my character novel Aestred Thurga: Pyre of Faith is up for pre-order, and I’m really looking forward to seeing it loosed upon the world!

It’s a very special book, not only because of Aestred herself and the Auto-Tapestry, a character and a relic that I had a huge amount of fun exploring, but because of the world that this tale is set upon. I can’t give too much away, because spoilers, but it was a concept that I’d been waiting to explore for many years, and gave me the opportunity to make a character from the planet itself. I always enjoy world-building and this one had so many layers, so much history and nuance, that it’s perhaps one of the creations that I’m genuinely most proud of.

While researching, and then writing, I did a lot of digging (not literally) into the history of London, from Roman times up to the very modern, specifically on the layers of death that lie beneath our streets (little clue, there), their histories and the tales (and indeed cults) that have sprung up around them. I went to Highgate and to the North London Cemetery, to St Dunstan, and to find the city’s lost rivers, the Fleet and the Tyburn.

And, as with any story, it’s those threads of truth that give its fabric credibility, and  how you weave one through the other. They’re just like the Auto-Tapestry, the layers of tales it caried upon it, and why they are there. A reflection of character in background and background in character isn’t new, but can be quintessential to really making a narrative work, giving it that resounding echo that makes it last.

So, it’s a huge thank you to the BL for letting me play with this one, and (seriously) the book is just so pretty. I can’t wait for you guys to get your hands on it!

Reading: Rob Rath’s The infinite and the Divine, giving fleshless robots all the love they deserve. It’s a genuinely gorgeous book, incredibly visual, and would make a fabulous animation.

Watching: Invincible, in anticipation of the new season. And wow, I’d forgotten just how fantastically brutal is really is. It’s also interesting seeing the difference between the TV series and the original comics, and they seem to mark how Kirkman has grown as a writer – stuff like Amber being dark of skin and very much person in her own right, rather than just Mark’s GF. And yes, I’m all for it.

Playing: Our hapless D&D crew are in the mist of detective scenario, desperately trying to piece together the clues to capture a killer, and to unravel the plots and politics that surround them. I hear rumours of post-its, so I think this going to be a doozy…

Lots of talk about the AI bubble finally bursting, and about the desperation of its supporters to ram their failing product down our necks. ‘Consumers don’t understand it’, they cry, like we’re too dim, or too traditional, or too scared of new technology or horizons. I’m not ranting about how much I despise generative AI and the damage it does, on multiple levels (and how much I’m looking forwards to its fall), because I’m pretty sure everyone knows that already.

Instead, I’m going to talk about why they can’t sell it and, a fundamental human need that their little sociopath brains just can’t seem to grasp:

Community.

Whatever your chosen hobby, art or medium, it’s about sharing. Books and music, comics, arts, crafts, you want to share them. It’s why the early days of Social Media, before the Lords of Algorithm came storming in, were so utterly magical. Blogger, Twitter, LiveJournal, sharing links on Technorati or StumbleUpon – so many sites that don’t exist any more, or that’ve since sold their souls – were about building community. We celebrated things, we made and shared them, we talked about them. Everything was ideas, creativity and interaction. We made new friends, all over the world, and we met up in person. And while the lay of the internet’s land may have changed, the need for community remains. Be you a BookTok girlie sharing your favourite romantasy, or a TTRPG gamer exploring and expressing around a (virtual or physical) table, it hasn’t gone away.

As an author, the same is true. Writing may be a solitary profession, but its energy comes from its people. From panels and events and WhatsApp chats, from meeting in the bar and hanging out at the Con. From supporting and helping each other, in whatever small (or large) ways we can.

And, of course, the same is also true of marketing. Good PR, too, is about people. It’s about your passion for what you’re doing, and communicating that passion to those around you. Yes, you can post pictures and videos and press releases, tick all the tidy boxes, but for those to have impact, you have to talk to, and understand, your audience. You can’t just throw this stuff them on stony ground. You need to establish, not only the numbers, but proper contacts and (dare I say it) even friends. An LLM might barf endless emails, but it can’t respond to beeds. It can’t learn from anything, only what it steals.

And that, of course, is where it’s all gone wrong. As more and more companies go, 'Hey cool', and then realise they've shot themselves in the foot, the truth is coming to light. In cutting human contact out of interaction, they're failing to listen, to 'read the room', to learn and understand. They've forgotten that it’s not about ‘producing content’, it’s about who reads/watches/uses it, and what they really want to see.

I don’t know about the rest of you, but I, for one, wait on that bursting bubble with baited breath.

Reading: Lots of Warhammer, and a shout-out for Nate Crowley’s Severed, part of the second run of novellas, published in 2019. It’s a tough call, making soulless robots all touching and emotional, their hearts filled with love, but Nate manages in absolutely beautiful style. I deft you not to fall for this book, and never look at Necrons in the same way, ever again.

Watching: Starfleet Academy. Seeing mixed reviews for this one, but am genuinely enjoying it. Extra points for Lura Thok, the half-Klingon, half-Jem’Hadar RSM, who’s guaranteed to scare the shit out of anything, and who isn’t happy to see Oded Fehr, back on our screens at last. Not sure about the floating ship nacelles, but Robert Picardo knocks it out of the opera house, as ever, and it’s interesting to see a central character that doesn’t necessary does what he’s told, never mind a senior officer who wanders round with bare feet. Not 100% convinced yet, but curious to see where this does.

Playing: Still on my PlayStation break, and our TTRPG sessions have been a bit sporadic, over Christmas. I did do some painting, though, and remain embarrassingly awful. Seriously, I’ve no idea how you lot manage to paint things so fucking tiny, when I can barely see them.

And yes, I have just bought myself a better magnifier. Never give up, never surrender.

In early 2004, when I was four months pregnant, I ran an FP event for Pegg and Frost, who spent much of their time trying to name my unborn child ‘Simon Nick’ or ‘Nick Simon’. Twenty-plus years later, with Isaac now working for FP himself (and turning into Tim Bisley, as does tend to happen), I remind him of this story and he chuckles.

But rewatching Spaced recently, I was stuck by how wonderfully innocent it is.

Scene: the late nineties. Story: friends and family, no internet, no smartphones, no Social Media. Landlines, and letters coming the post. A typewriter, a physical portfolio. Days when you could get a job by going into a temp agency, could sign on without fear (unless you took the piss), or find a flat by reading the paper (never mind how much one cost). Days when the world wasn’t on fire, when we weren’t saturated by (mis)information, and algorithms, and AI, and advertising, and endless bloody spam. Days when everything was so much smaller and easier to handle. Days when our biggest worry was the axe-robot in the garage, or who’d said what to whom, in the little local comic shop.

Days when we had a little local comic shop.

To me, Spaced still feels contemporary. I remember watching both series (they were a handful of years ago, surely?), falling in love with the characters, and recognising every one of them. We’ve all met (or been) both Tim and Daisy, we’ve known a Brian, and a Tyres, and a Marsha, and more than one Mike. We’ve had friends who are family, and sooner or later, we’ve gone down to Thresher for the weekly shop.

And we’ve all had those epic crossroads, like the day when Marsha was knocked off her bike (one of my favourite scenes), or when Mike fell out of the tree. We’ve wondered what our lives would have gone, had we zigged and not zagged.   

Watching it again, realising with a shock how old it really is and how much things have changed, I thought back to a phrase used by Natasha Pulley in Watchmaker (read this!), the one about the pennies on your chest. It’s the same as the boiling frog: you know you’re too hot, that those pennies are too heavy, but it’s been so gradual. Where did those years go? How has everything changed so much? It’s only when you look back that you understand how much time has passed, and that these things aren’t contemporary, not any more. They’re snapshots of a world gone.

And yet.

Leaving aside the issue of some actors really not covering themselves in glory (cough), Spaced still occupies a special place in our hearts. It’s all those memories – of pubbing with our mates, of getting munted in nightclubs or tangled in relationship issues. It’s conversations while high as a kite, the friends we love and miss and the times that went with them. It’s silent gunfights (not just for the boys, thank you), and memes before memes existed, quoting endless one-liners at each other, then falling around.

Isaac observed, very astutely, that the whole script is made up of these. Everything’s either the set-up or the gag, and he’s not wrong.

Sure as every odd-numbered Star Trek movie is shit.

Life may have changed, but that just makes the little things matter even more. And some stories remain contemporary, just because of the echoes that they leave, footprints across our hearts.

Reading: Just finished the audiobook of Orbital, by Samantha Harvey, and honestly, I wasn’t sure. It feels like a Marmite book, you either love it or hate it, and I could absolutely see why people would do both or either. Yes, it’s gentle and dreamlike and beautiful, and yes, it’s tedious and shapeless and actually quite annoying. Five stars and one, and probably not one to read again.

Watching: As well as Spaced, Robin of Sherwood, which is another series that comes with a very powerful set of memories. While it was on the box in the early Eighties, it still feels like our years on the Vike, particularly with the smaller, indie groups who weren’t as hot on their authenticity and just wanted to run around in the woods and have fun.

Playing: not much, because Christmas and I’m still off the PlayStation. But we returned to our Al-Qadim yesterday, complete with new dice gaol.

And, no it didn't make them behave!

This year, my son turned twenty-one. I know I should list the books here, the things I’ve achieved and read and written and learned and seen, but this year, my son turned twenty-one. He’s not had an easy time of it, but this was the year when he finally started working (after eighteen months in Job Search hell) and you can now find him at the Forbidden Planet in Croydon.

And if going back to the shop floor was a shock for me, four years ago, it’s been fascinating to see FP from the front lines, as opposed to from Head Office (or from the Megastore). Isaac’s loving his job, he really enjoys it, an I’m so happy to see him so happy.

In other news, this was the year that we lost our little Pixie cat, our stubborn and very opinionated tuxedo. She was getting very old, fell ill in the summer, and she faded away before our eyes, poor little one. We did everything for her that we could, medications and painkillers and endless visits to the vet, but the day came when she’d absolutely had enough, and we had to make that last farewell. She was at home, with us here by her, and our hearts are still broken.

The arrival of Binx, a week ago, can in no way replace her or Coco, in the same way that Pixie and Coco, fourteen years ago, couldn’t replace Lilith or Ayesha (or the two big ol’ boys, Oscar and Spam). Every kitty is different, they all touch us in their own way, and we miss Pixie still, even as Binx is sniffing his way round the flat.

In horribly mundane terrors, I’m still fighting my way through a Lease extension (nasty thing, an outmoded – and very expensive – corner of UK law that should’ve been abolished many, many years ago). It seems very much a first world problem, when set against the backdrop of ever-rising darkness that rears over us like a building tsunami, but sometimes, dealing with the small things can make us feel capable again, as the big ones are so far outside our control.

I’m not going into it here, but the despair can be real. We know this.

And so, we come around to the books. First year in a long time I’ve not had a novel out, though there was a cheeky short in the Black Shuck Books antho, Something Peculiar, which was my love letter to junk shops, to Loose’s on Magdalen Street in Norwich, and to Snooper’s Paradise in Brighton. It was one of those tales that’d been nibbling at me for years (always said I’d write it, Jon) and I was delighted to get it out of my head and on paper.

This year’s big achievement though (other than the giant child), was finally seeing Lugan Vision Quest released on the world. This was a project I started in the Summer of 2017, just as something for me: the story that followed on from the ECKO series, and that had never quite manage to leave me alone.

When I set out, I had no boundaries, no daily wordcounts, no target in mind, other just exploring the ideas, and then came Mercy, and Bigger Than Biggs, and The Bloodied Rose, and my professional writing took a new and different angle.

But I came back to Lugan, year after year, almost as a comfort-thing, a story between stories, slowly fleshing it out as I explored the world and its changes. It was something I fell in love with, and (tooting my own for a second), I was really pleased with how it came out. I’ never really thought I’d finish it, but hey, here we are.

Moving into 2026 (and that number seems utterly surreal), I have three new novels completed, all very different, and can’t wait to be able to share them. And I have a couple of resolutions, the first one to pay attention to my (appalling) painting (eyeroll), the second to continue to go places and do/see stuff, which has got much harder since Covid, for some reason. Maybe it’s a momentum thing, and maybe because it’s that much more difficult to do stuff by yourself, but (as with so many things), the more you do it, the easier it gets (the painting too, I suspect).

I also need to keep writing these, and a little more regularly :)

Reading: last book of the year was I’m Glad My Mom Died by Jennette McCrudy, and wow was that a journey. A gentle and thoroughly insightful look at (insidiously, in this case) controlling/manipulative parenting, at abusive relationships, and at the damage these things can do. It’s a surprisingly easy and accessible read, and there’s a lesson here for all of us. Namely: the importance of learning boundaries.

Watching: Isaac and I are just finishing Torchwood, which I’ve never watched before. With Doctor Who nose-diving into the sun, it’s a reminder that Russell T can really write the good shit. And Eve Myles is amazing.

Playing: I’m on extended PlayStation break, but our Al-Qadim continues to be absolutely hilarious, as our low level party manage to fumble every dice roll and fuck up everything they do. It should be frustrating, but honestly, it’s just funny. The best games involve drama and pacing and people hung upon every click-clack of those damned maths rocks, and this has been edge of the seat stuff. Will we actually mange to finish the adventure?

Only time will tell!

Many years ago, I had someone tell me I’d never be published because ‘everything I read was crap’. Every time they saw me with a fantasy book, or with something happy and simple, they’d tell me that it wasn’t good enough, and that I should read something ‘better’.

I’ve never forgotten this. Twenty years and multiple published novels later, the echoes are still with me. So first, let me give them the double-middle-finger they deserve. And second, let me add: you can’t encourage anyone, no matter what their age, to read, if you don’t let them read something they’ll love. All you do is strip their joy away, and stop them reading completely.

Which brings us to comics.

In my working life, people frequently ask me, ‘How do I get little Bobbi reading?’ And in answer, the modern rise of kidkit comics has become a go-to recommendation. It’s easy to understand that, because screens are so much a part of our lives, kids may identify far more easily with a comic’s illustrative flow. Comics are accessible, conjuring their imaginations. They can give kids a gateway, a magical portal, not only to other realms and to their own imagination, but the joys of the printed page. The monstrous popularity of Bunny vs. Money, or Looshkin, or Mega Robo Bros, stands testimony to how much kids love this stuff, and how it can bring them into reading.

And the meteoric rise of manga is exactly the same. A recent article on IGN talked about how half of Netflix’s viewers are now Anime fans (meaning ever-more Anime, and around it goes). The conversion rate from Anime to Manga is colossal; kids love it, not only reading it, but its sheer collectability, its popularity, and how much they can share it with their mates.

How d’you get your kids reading? Just give them something they love.

I might do a longer newsletter on this, at some point, but for little ones, start with The Phoenix, Captain Underpants, or Cat Kid Comic Club. For older ones, Sisters, Lumberjanes (regular recommendation and a personal fave), or Wings of Fire. Plus there are loads of novel adaptations, everything from Erin Hunter’s Warriors to Artemis Fowl.

If manga’s more the thing, younger ones would like DragonBall, One Piece, or Chi’s Sweet Home; older ones are probably reading Demon Slayer already, but might also enjoy Naruto, or Blue Lock.

In short, let your kids decide. Guide them, of course, but remember that comics are reading, manga is reading, old genre books are reading, audiobooks are reading. So if your kid (or anyone else) wants to read the thing, just let them. Don’t get on your high horse about how they have to read ‘literature’, they have the read the things that <you> like. That may come, in its own time. Teach them joy, teach them to find wonder, and let them forge their own way.

Hell, maybe you could even share it with them.

Reading: Have just finished (with perfect timing) a run of old McCaffrey titles: the Crystal Singer series, which I loved in my teens/twenties. They do creak a bit, now, and while McCaffrey’s world-building is still stunning, I found them windy and very dry. I will say, though, that she was doing a) fantasy/SF romance and b) queer characters, all those years ago. And fucking bless her!

Watching: Predator Badlands, and what a flawlessly executed movie that was. Every plot-point, in its proper place, perfectly positioned and used. For every denotation of Chekov’s well-loved sidearm, we could see where it’d come from. Loved the critter, loved the nods to the previous movies and Aliens/Predator franchise, loved our pred having genuine depth and our legless (not like that), physically cripped female lead. Plus: power-loader. And who doesn’t love one of these?

Gaming: Thinned out a bit recently, as people have stuff to do, but very much looking forward to DragonCon at the end of the month. Haven’t been before, so am only going to vibe, and must be very, <very> careful to not spend all my Christmas monies!

Farewell, Pixie

Farewell, little tuxedo friend, with your mad white whiskers that caught our attention on Facebook, and that brought you to your new home. We were kitty-less and there you were, you and Coco, in need of a new family. How could we resist?

Farewell to your willful streak that made you box your way out of the (locked) catflap, not two days later, and lose yourself in the Grove Avenue gardens (in the middle of a howling April monsoon). It took ten days and a bag of used cat litter, but you found your way back at last. You woke me with a start – one o’clock in the morning – and there you were, in the kitchen, skinny and wild-eyed, but happy to be back in the warm.

Perhaps these new people weren’t so bad, after all.

Farewell to your occasional grumps, moods that you made you grouch at Coco when he tried to wash your ears, or swipe at (a much younger) Isaac when he showed his affection by teasing you a little too much. Yes, I taught him not to, but you administered your own discipline.

Farewell to the happy, lap-curling creature with the quiet purr, the sun-worshipping fur-beast, and the wily predator that used to sit under the neighbour’s hedge and watch the world go by. And farewell (thankfully) to the occasional gift you brought us, mice and birds (that we would invariably rescue).

You loved us so much that one night, that you brought in the same mouse three times.

Saying these farewells is heart-breaking, leaving a vacuum where our friend is not. Is the mornings, demanding food. In the afternoons, sitting on our beds. In the evenings, sitting bucketed in the living room chair, or stretching sprawly in the heat of the fire.

There are never any words to frame the loss. Only to hope that we did the right thing, by your age, and pain, and fading heath. To hope that you didn’t suffer, and that you can rest now.

You can cross the Rainbow Bridge and find Coco, and bite his ears some more.

Absolutely fantastic time at World Fantasy Con on Saturday, set against the backdrop of a perfect, sunlit Brighton (always glorious in the Winter, and we lucked out, as it was a particularly fabulous day).

Since Covid, my Con-going has been pretty sparse, partly because of the change in job (don’t go to trade any more and work a lot of weekends) and partly just due to the shifting of the Con landscape. I did see a great many wonderful people, though, in the Dealers’ Room (including my old trading neighbours, Genki Gear), in the bar, and across the hotel. Caught up with some excellent panels, firstly the Write for the Fight panel, featuring Juliet McKenna, Steve McHugh, Miles Cameron, C J Clark (have had the Ambessa book on face-out for the last couple of months, so it was great to put a face to the name), expertly modded by Anna Smith Spark (whose Judge Anderson novel is next on my TBR). It’s the one I’m usually on, hence always of high interest, and it provided some excellent insights. Definitely worth another newsletter, hopefully next week.

The Wizard’s Tower launch was excellent (was able to grab a copy of Ruthanna Emrys’/Andrew Knighton’s Wiz Duo novellas), as was the panel on older people in fiction, later in the day, featuring Jenny Hannaford, Jacqui Greaves, Juliet Mariller and Ramsey Campbell, equally expertly modded by Sara Townsend (who shares the D&D game). The age thing is another subject very dear to my heart (Augusta being in her forties, Lugan in his fifties, etc), and the whole Con brought me round to a bit of a realisation:

At work, the fantasy book demographic is quite clear cut. It’s mostly younger women, in their twenties, buying endless TikTok-featured romantasy. The same books, the same titles, the same tropes, over and over again. And it’s a self-fulfilling prophecy, as we know. That’s what sells, so that’s what the publishers produce, likewise over and over again (and how many Limited Editions can we get out of the same title?)

At the Con, the people were older (almost no younger faces at all), with very little interest in the fantasy publishing super-trend. Indeed, many comments and eyerolls were made, hearkening back to marketing budgets, the reluctance of publishers to produce anything that wasn’t immediately hitting the big sales, and hence the death of both originality and our trusty mid-list. The subject isn’t new, but seeing the difference in the two types of fantasy readers – and in the industry - was quite sobering.

It makes small presses like Wizard’s Tower absolutely critical to the future of genre fiction, as that’s where the ideas are. I’m a big believer in ‘no snobbery’ (read what you like, read what makes you happy), but the slow homogenisation of popular culture does make my teeth ache.

In better news, though, the event was great. I still feel faintly rootless, going to a Con and not trading, but everyone was as welcoming as ever. People are inclusive, included and welcome, and it still feels like family. I was only there for the day, which meant I didn’t quite manage to see everyone that I wanted to see, and those I did see, I didn’t manage to see for as long as I wanted to see them (if you catch my meaning), but just the reminder that it’s all still there, and as warm as ever, was a truly lovely thing.

Reading: Somewhere Beyond the Sea. Not quite as good as the first one (though not far off), but a warm and wonderful story of love and inclusion, and standing up for your family. Deliberately politically relevant (love Klune describing himself as the anti-JKR), and packs a sharp but necessary punch in a warmly comforting velvet glove. Definitely worth the read.

Watching: the end of Attack on Titan, and hoooo boy. I started watching the DVDs ten years ago, and finally seeing the end of the story is absolutely riveting. It’s not the same as the end of the Manga (unlike most adaptations, which usually remains true to the source material), but it’s massive and incredibly powerful. I did talk about a bit in my previous newsletter, but the death scene of <redacted> when they go up against <redacted> had both Isaac and I in tears.

Playing: In anticipation of the Legacy of Kain GN (backed on Kickstarter), I returned to the game on the PS5. Twenty-five-something years ago, when it was first released, it absolutely blew me away (and the GN still looks awesome, tbf), but it was a sad reminder that sometimes, you can’t go back.

And that it’s better to leave some memories where they were, rather than try and recapture the moment.

Ten years ago, prompted by random images online (not like that, smutty) I blundered across a strange phenomenon called Attack on Titan (Shingeki no Kyojin, lit. 'The Advancing Giant'). I’d never watched Anime (other than Akira and GITS, back in our CyberPunk days), and was absolutely gob-smacked, chain-gunning the entire first season (more than once) with my jaw hanging open, wondering what the hell I’d just found. It led me to buying my very first Manga, and into discovering FullMetal Alchemist, NGE and many more.

And so, it began.

A decade later (and up to my ears in Manga almost constantly), the final season is out on DVD (the only thing I still buy in solid state) and I’ve been watching the whole thing, right from the beginning, and getting blown away all over again. The shock-violence and body horror are utterly stunning, and only something that you watch in an animation (me anyway, don’t know about the rest of you), but it’s more than just the ‘wow’ factor. How has Isayama’s story become so hypnotic and important?

In March 2022, the final season episode Two Brothers was listed on IMDB as one of the top ten rated episodes ever. There’s been a lot more Anime since, but still, the sheer fist-in-the-face, emotional detonation of AoT is a hard thing to match.

The series, apart from its immediate fan-culture appeal (will come back to this is a tick) offers powerful, dynamic world-building, right from the start, setting up humanity in its tiny, threatened cage. We’re thrown straight into the story, with the arrival of the Colossal and the death of Eren’s mother and, from that point, we skid this way and that, with dramatic twists and turns, all underlain by a consistent narrative that seeds from the beginning (returning to the first couple of seasons has really brought this home, seeing those early hints and realising what they mean).

It also deals with some seriously complex issues, exploring warfare, morality and freedom (no spoilers). Erwin Smith, a favourite character, occupies an horrendous grey area somewhere between hero, psychopath and obsessively driven nutjob, and the named Titans reflect the monsters within us all.

Multiple perspectives help us have sympathy across the board, with the Titans themselves, and with the most murderous or difficult characters. This – along with the time-jump-flashbacks, threading plot lines back into the weave – is a really difficult thing to do well, but AoT has it nailed.

And it's suitably progressive, with strong, non-sexual women (though Mikasa would really have benefited from motivation that wasn’t just Eren-Eren-Eren). Zoe Hange, another favourite character, has no specific pronouns and is intended to be gender ambiguous. In Japanese terms, they use masculine first person pronoun ‘boku’, something common in Anime, though less so in Japanese culture.

More than anything, the crater of AoT’s impact exploded right across fandom, partially thanks to its massive international distribution, and partially thanks to its huge LGBT appeal and its endless ships, creating more collectibles/fanfic than you can shake your ODM gear at.

I don’t need a Levi body-pillow myself, you understand, but the series is still stunning.

And I did dig these fellows out of hiding :)

Reading: Anne McCaffrey’s Crystal Singer series, which haven’t quite stood the test of time, sadly. The concept is incredible, and the world-building is appropriately stunning, but the books are very dry, and the intervening years have given me much less patience with Killashandra’s arrogance. Having said that, though, I am still enjoying the re-read.

Playing: Another session of Al-Qadim where our luckless team (see previous newsletter) tried to get back out of the cave in the cliff face, and made nearly as much of a mess of it. We have now reached the dizzy heights of level two, though, so hopefully we’ll do a little better next session…

Years ago, when I watched Doctor Strange for the first time, it gave me a case of the grumps. Not because of Marvel exhaustion  – we hadn’t got that far, at the time – but because the ‘broken hands’ narrative was exactly the same as that of my protag in Artifice. In Caph’s case, he’s a muso, and his hands were broken by an ex-lover, but the loss of his vocation was exactly the same.

Watching it, I found myself wanting to tell people, almost like I was at school and had been accused of cribbing someone’s homework, ‘I didn’t copy it, honest!’

Many years later, the Lugan project features an entire culture based on the concept of semi-daemonic bargaining. How one must offer something of personal value, physical or otherwise, in exchange for what one needs or wants. How such bargains must be worded carefully, to avoid loopholes and manipulation. How cultural leaders, called ‘Sayers’ came to the fore to speak these bargains, and how it all (inevitably) backfired. And, of course, just as I was publishing the book… along came a little thing called Baldur’s Gate, where Ketheric trades his soul for his daughter, Ethel keeps her menagerie, and various devils have fun playing games.

However!

Bless Baldur’s Gate for bringing an understanding: there’s no such thing as a truly original idea. There are lists of characters with broken or missing hands (a certain Luke Skywalker, for one), and the culture of bargains, and how they can go wrong, can be traced to a multitude of origins. The Monkey’s Paw, written by W W Jacobs in 1902. The earliest record of a ‘demon’, believed to be 11,000 years old and pre-dating the discovery of farming. And the concept of ‘three wishes’, which is an oral tradition, originating probably in Persia.   

So all this means: no idea is truly original. Indeed, popular literary belief tells us that there are only seven basic plots. What’s original is you, what you do with them. It’s your vibe, your riff and interpretation, your take and emotional reaction. Your memories, your loves, the pictures in your head. All of these things are unique to you, affecting your settings and relationships and how you communicate what’s important. This is the part of your soul that you give to your readers, and its why no other person can speak in your voice.

And, if you do find that ‘your’ idea turns up in something else, don’t just walk away from it, or assume that people will think the worst. Every idea is something that someone’s had before, but stay with it, and make the effort to make it yours.

Because that’s what makes you human, and creative.

Reading: Wonderful privilege of reading a proof in order to provide a cover quote, something that’s always such a lovely request. No spoilers, but loving the vibe, and I think you really will, as well!

Watching: Finishing our run of Gotham at the end of season three, and finally catching up with Peacemaker. Which is absolutely glorious. John Cena is the man that we should aspire to be, if you see what I mean.

Playing: Our last Al-Qadim game saw so many fumbles that the table-top dice jail contained, at one point, no less than seven disgraced d20s. All we were trying to do was scale down a cliff to find a cave mouth, concealed by an illusion, and the problems started when the rope was too short, and then there were seagulls, and then one person fell into the water and couldn’t swim, and then someone else went to rescue them, and they couldn’t swim either, and another one, and on and on the disasters went.

It was one of those fabulous sessions that was completely spontaneous (we were supposed to start the adventure in the cave) but went every kind of wrong, leaving all of us hanging on every last dice roll, waiting for the next hilarious disaster as character after character stuffed up in spectacular style, and wound up almost dying. No-one can prepare (for) sessions like these, they’re down to the dice, to the dynamic and to the group, and they’re always some of the best!

Not one but two forthcoming anthologies, both with fantastic line-ups and that I’m very proud to be included within!

Darkness Eternal from the Black Library, with a choice selection of the very best WarHammer stories:  

One Million Years by Nate Crowley

Altar of Maws by Peter Fehevari

The Light of the Emperor by Darius Hinks

The Devouring Void by Danie Ware

Own Worst Enemy by Denny Flowers

Arcady Pride by Justin D Hill

Nightsider Imperialis by Victoria Hayward

A Forbidden Meal by Carrie Harris

Eradicant by R S Wilt

The Convocation by Tamy Nicholls

Stealing Orpheon by Richard Ford

Lessons of Rophax by Callum Davis

Devilhunter by Nicholas Wolf

Cover by Thomas Elliott

And Something Peculiar from Black Shuck Books, which contains my very first (formal anyway) horror story, telling the tale of an all-time favourite eerie place. No spoilers, but five points if you know where I mean!

 Forest by Holly Blades

Cemetery Black by Alexander Milner

Under the Similitude of a Dream by Timonthy J Jarvis

Urchin Barren by Tim Major

The Way Through the Woods by Marian Womack

Acolytes of the Famished Giant by John Langan

Hollow by Guy Adams

Web by Sarah Brooks

Seven Encounters with Peculiar Hawkins by Emma J Gibbon

The Recollection by Danie Ware

Confetti by Mark Morris

Edited by Steve J Shaw

Cover by Odilon Redon, from his 1883 work The Origins.

Reading: A break for some wonderful kidlit, with SF Said’s Varjak Paw, which is every bit as charming as his novel Tyger. Beautifully illustrated by Dave McKean, it’s a kitten-to-hero story, where brave little void Varjak must understand privilege, learn to live on the streets, to fight, to face up to bullies, and finally rescue his own family from the bad guys.

It may also be where local #notmycat Holly got her name. I need to ask my neighbour!

Watching: Isaac and I have returned to Gotham, which gets steadily more bonkers as the series go on. They’ve got some fabulous casting, and while I have my doubts about Ben Mckenzie personally, his Jim Gordon is a growly-voiced Batman-without-the-cowl, while the young David Mazouz does an absolutely wonderful job of showing more and more batlike traits. Sean Pertwee is the very best version of Alfred, ever, and Erin Richards is a suitably demented Barbara (and would make an excellent Joker, if she ever had the chance to play the role).

If you’re not following his fan-edits on YouTube, there’s a Gotham one here.

Playing: Earliest steps into our Al-Qadim campaign, which is very a new vibe, after seven years on the Sword Coast. I’ve played Al-Qadim before, but it was thirty-something years ago, and I’m really enjoying re-finding the memories, and the sand in my character’s shoes. What lies ahead, across the sea of dunes? Djinni, perhaps? Wicked merchants and evil viziers? Fantastical monsters, which my mind instantly pictures in Harryhausen stop-motion?

We can only see!

Yes, you can find me on Ghost :)

When Children of Artifice was out on submission, in 2017, I spent a nail-biting few months waiting for responses from editors. And, slowly but surely, they filtered back in, one ‘no’ after another.

It’s a difficult thing, when you’ve poured blood and heart and soul into a story, but it’s critical to remember is that it’s purely professional.

It’s not you. It’s not even them. It’s just the industry.

If you’re submitting to trad pub, then we should be past the basics (the manuscript is finished, the spelling and grammar are as immaculate as they can be, and you’re familiar with standard industry formatting and the relevant agent’s/publisher’s guidelines), So, there may have been another reason.

To start with, a book is often just too different.

Trends are powerful things, with publishers are looking for manuscripts that will capture the right/relevant market (and the sales to go with), which usually means more of the same. If you’ve written The Throne of Snot of Bollocks, then tight now, you may be a shoe-in, but if you’re trying to pitch a leftfield adventure fantasy, when the publishers are looking for romance, then you may well be out of luck.

The same rules can apply to a book that’s a little too niche, or trying to be too clever. Maybe it’s doing something that falls between the cracks of different genres, or target audiences. If the publisher or agent doesn’t know where they’re going to sell your book, then sadly, they’re not likely to be buying it.

And sometimes (just to be contrary) your book could be too much the same.

We know there are only so many plots and so many ideas, and that (particularly) genre can be very derivative. But, while you need to spot and know the trends, you also need to display your own take on them. More than anything, you need to be confident. Your plot, characters and your tone of voice must all be strong. If these things don’t come across, or they aren’t well-enough defined, then your book may be too lacklustre.

Navigating between these two points is challenging, steering close enough to one to secure a readership, and close enough to the other to be loud about being yourself. However you steer, though, and whatever the result, do remember that publishing is a business. An agent accepting submissions (just for eg) can look at one to two thousand individual samples in the course of a single week, and, if you don’t leap out grab the first one, then please don’t worry.

And please keep trying.

There are lists of top authors who faced multiple rejections. Stephen King’s Carrie was famously turned down thirty times. Dr. Suess’s first book was turned down twenty-seven times. Twilight hit fourteen, and F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby was called ‘an absurd story’, with one publisher suggesting that he’d ‘have a decent book if [he’d] get rid of that Gatsby character’.

Children of Artifice did find its publisher, in the end. And there’s no reason to quit, when you’ve put in that much work.

Playing: finishing Sniper Elite, and starting the new Oblivion game, which is staggeringly pretty, but seems quite buggy. Gorgeous backdrops, and some classic RPG gear, classes and level-ups, though the ‘interaction’ wheel does throw me a bit.

Reading: the ‘Covenant’ (not that one) series of WebToon GNs by Lysandra Vuong. Artwork is wonderful, and the story covers religious trauma and queer awakenings, both with excellent sensitivity. Much as I steer away from romance stuff, these re really lovely.

Watching: starting season three of Picard, which has a very different vibe (and intro) to the other two, must faster and much higher stakes. We always cheer at seeing the TNG cast, and Jeri’s return as Seven is superb. Looking forward to seeing where it goes!

First up, we have a Pokémon day over half term! Join us on Tuesday 27^th May from 11am to 6pm to catch ‘em all, and enjoy:

· Games and card swaps

· Quizzes and activities

· Find the hidden Pokémon trail

· Sweeties, freebies and giveaways

This event is open to kids and adults, so do bring your cards and enjoy!

All Pokémon and people were born because they have a part in the world - Ash Ketchum

And second, I’m delighted to say that Paul Cornell and Rachael Smith are coming in, on Saturday 20^th September from 1 – 2pm, to sign Who Killed Nessie?

Paul is the award-winning writer of such graphic novels as I Walk With Monsters, Saucer Country and The Witches of World War 2. He's also written for Doctor Who and co-hosts the podcast Telefantasy Time Jump.

Rachael is an award-winning illustrator and writer best known for making comics that deal with mental health issues with warm, relatable humour, such as Wired Up Wrong, Quarantine Comix, and NAP COMIX. She has created work for The New Yorker, Image, Titan, and Mad Cave, among others.

And, after a huge crowdfunding success, Who Killed Nessie? is a comedy cryptozoological whodunnit about finding confidence through rationality and accepting a world of mysteries… by solving one.

It’s Lindsay Grockle’s first day as the manager of the Lakeview Hotel. Her boss has handed her the keys and departed for vacation. And then the convention attendees start showing up, each more peculiar than the last.

Lindsay’s a confirmed sceptic, and the Convention guests are cryptids from all round the world. Not only that, but one of them has murdered the Loch Ness Monster. And it’s up to Lindsay to solve the case!

Do come along and say hello, grab your copy of the book. please note, though, that if you have a lot of stuff, we may ask you to get two items signed, and then wait until the end. That way, everyone gets a chance to meet Paul and Rachael!

Neither event needs a ticket, and both are free to attend.

Reading: I’m on holiday, so have returned to one of the favourite places of my youth, to the Forgotten Realms Underdark. Returning twenty-plus years later to Menzobarranzan (both within the narrative and without) is proving genuinely enjoyable, something of a blanket against the current darkness (no pun). The titles aren’t going to win the Booker any time soon, but they’re easy to read and good, rompy D&D fun.

Watching: the first series of Picard, which I didn’t really get, the previous time I watched it. This time, though, I’m appreciating its slower pace and the fantastic, magnetic horror of the Borg Reclamation Project. Good to see old faces reappearing (particularly Hugh), and loving the step away from Star Fleet protocol.

Playing: Sniper Elite, and having some fun with Karl Fairburne. Very much ‘generic hard arse first person shooter dude’ but also starting to think he’s not quite right in the head.

All that growling to himself and too long alone, y’know?