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- XX or XY? Do readers care about gender of author? June 17, 2013
- Guest Author – Susan Elliot Wright on Writing a Dual Narrative June 10, 2013
- Let’s all talk about GONE GIRL June 4, 2013
- This Itch of Writing
- Guardian Book Blog
- The best books on Egypt: start your reading here | Pushpinder Khaneka June 19, 2013 Pushpinder Khaneka
- A note on Neil Gaiman's politics June 18, 2013 Paul Owen
- Neil Gaiman in conversation June 17, 2013 Paul Owen
- The Forest for the Trees — Betsy Lerner
- I Love You Just the Way You Are June 16, 2013
- I’m Trying To Beat Life Cause I Can’t Cheat Death June 3, 2013
- Could It Be That It Was All So Simple Then May 30, 2013
- Kathy Greethurst’s Blog
- Untitled January 10, 2013 Kathy Greethurst
- Bloody Flies by Andrew J Keir - Review by Helena Frith Powell June 7, 2012 Kathy Greethurst
- A wonderful afternoon in Avebury February 22, 2012 Kathy Greethurst
- How Publishing Really Works
- Does The Self-Publishing Review Fall For Robert Duperre? March 29, 2012
- The Self-Publishing Review Goes In Search Of The Menopause Ranch March 22, 2012
- Travelling To The Self-Published Review March 15, 2012
- Female PTSD — A Blog By A Brave Female Victim of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder
- Help I Need A Publisher
- I'm still here... December 31, 2012
- All my advice about publishing and writing September 4, 2012
- Two last questions for DEAR CRABBIT September 3, 2012
- The Elephant in the Writing Room
- Sunshine and Showers June 15, 2013
- Not a lot of writing but a whole load of reading... June 5, 2013
- Jon and the Pacemakers May 31, 2013
- Bren Gosling’s Blog (ex-City Novel coursemate)
- Short listed for the Harry Bowling Prize ! January 30, 2012 Bren Gosling
- About - Sweeping up the Village- by Bren Gosling January 16, 2012 Bren Gosling
- A taster... December 22, 2011 Bren Gosling
- Charlotte Haigh MacNeil’s Blog (ex-City Novel Coursemate and Journalist)
- The real reason insomniacs can’t sleep June 7, 2013
- The myth of delayed motherhood May 18, 2013
- The extreme female brain February 21, 2013
- Michael Braga Writes (ex-City Novel coursemate)
- THE SIGNS -A short story by Michael Braga Oct 2010 October 10, 2010
- Friday thoughts on a Monday afternoon September 6, 2010
- The pursuit of sadness August 25, 2010
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- Partisan writing April 11, 2013
- Brain error? April 7, 2013
- Longing April 4, 2013
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Tag Archives: character
Anne Tyler at the Oxford Literary Festival
Along with 850 other fans, I was lucky enough to have a ticket to this morning’s Oxford Literary Festival interview with Anne Tyler at the Sheldonian Theatre. It was an absorbing event – the first public appearance of its type, … Continue reading
Posted in Influences
Tagged Anne Tyler, Breathing Lessons, character, craft of writing, dialogue, narrative, Oxford Literary Festival, planning, subconscious
10 Comments
A Dickens of a Pub Crawl
As anyone who’d watched TV or picked up a newspaper since Christmas will know, 2012 is the bicentennial anniversary of the birth of arguably Britain’s greatest novelist. If you’re a person with more modern tastes in literature you may believe … Continue reading
Posted in General Life, Research
Tagged Armando Iannucci, character, Charles Dickens, Clerkenwell, Farringdon, Holborn, London, Nabokov, pubs, setting
1 Comment
Infinite Universes
I watched an edition of Horizon on BBC2 a few weeks ago which attempted to discuss the utterly bizarre nature of what we perceive as reality once it’s considered by physicists — quantum, astro- and various other varieties. (It’s available … Continue reading
One Day
‘One Day’ by David Nicholls won the Sainsbury’s Popular Fiction prize at the Galaxy National Book Awards last week. I’ve mentioned this book in passing a couple of times on this blog since I read it in the summer. I’ve … Continue reading
Posted in character, Fictional Genres, Plot, Publishing, Structure
Tagged adverbs, Amazon reviews, book covers, character, cinematic novels, Creative Writing Classes, David Nicholls, dialogue, Galaxy National Book Awards, genre, marketing, One Day, pop music, Publishing, Structure, the Smiths, workshops, writing from opposite gender POV
2 Comments
Lip Service
A fascinating aspect of reading fiction is that, sometimes despite the best efforts of the author, every reader must have a different mental image of each character — most likely a synthesis of their own experience and from triggers picked … Continue reading
Posted in character, Influences
Tagged actors, adaptations, BBC, character, character appearance, Cold Feet, Kim, Lip Service, Ruta Gedmintas, sex
1 Comment
Character Names
It always seems to me to be more difficult to think of names for my characters than virtually any other of their attributes. If you look online for any inspiration there are a large number of baby naming websites which … Continue reading
Strictly No Sex Please in the British Literary Novel?
After the Facebook campaign that led Tony Blair’s ‘A Journey’ to be involuntarily moved within bookshops to the war or crime sections, there’s much excitement that a passage from the book has been urged for short-listing in the Literary Review’s … Continue reading
Posted in character, Influences, Writing Process
Tagged 'On Chesil Beach', Andrew Motion, Auberon Waugh, character, dancing, eroticism, experience of reading, Hilary Mantel, Ian McEwan, language, Man Booker Prize, Martin Amis, point of view, psychology, readings, sex, Strictly Come Dancing, subconscious, Susanna Rustin, tango
2 Comments
Time on Franzen
Jonathan Franzen’s new novel ‘Freedom’ has been causing a stir among reviewers — one Guardian Books blogger is already calling it the novel of the century. Time magazine a couple of weeks ago gave Franzen the honour of being on … Continue reading
Posted in Publishing
Tagged accessibility, character, Great American Novelists, Jonathan Franzen, literary fiction, Plot, theme, Time magazine
2 Comments
Reviewing the Literature
There are two reasons why the blog has been a little quieter than usual recently. One is that an element of my ‘other life’ intruded – hopefully the side that will continue to pay the bills in future. I had … Continue reading
Posted in General Life
Tagged ambition, character, day job, Enterprise Architecture, IT industry, James, James' career, MSc, software development, time management, work, writers' income
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Zipping Up Kim
It’s a paradox that characters in fiction tend, naturally, to be figments of the author’s imagination but also have to be real and credible enough for the reader to maintain the suspension of their disbelief. Of course authors piece together … Continue reading
Posted in character
Tagged Action Company Challenge, Aerial Adventure, Center Parcs, character, character exterior, Elveden, Kim, Research, zip wire
1 Comment
Addressing Deficiencies
Getting back to ideas for The Angel, I think I may have plugged a bit of a hole in the plot and balanced out the characters a bit by considering introducing a male admirer of Kim when she moves to … Continue reading
Posted in character, Plot, The Angel
Tagged character, Emma, James, Kim, motivation, new character, planning, Plot, sex
3 Comments
‘Is It Any Good?’
I would guess anyone who doesn’t ask themselves this during the course of writing a novel is not going to produce a very good one. What’s probably not such a good idea is to include this angst in comments accompanying … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized, Writing Process
Tagged character, Creative Writing Classes, feedback, Structure, tutorials
4 Comments
Everything But The Bar Sink…
…but I did get the dishwasher in! Bearing in mind Judith Murray’s comment that ‘in some sense all novels are historical’, I decided to load my last reading with as many contemporary cultural references as I could think of. ‘Decided’ … Continue reading
Posted in General Life, Writing Process
Tagged 'The Flood', Britain's Got Talent, character, cultural references, deadlines, emotional involvement, energy, intensity, Katie Melua, Plot, readings, setting, sex, sex scene, style
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‘I Agree With Nick’
Seems to the new catchphrase of the moment — and very apposite as both Cameron and Brown desperately try to convince Clegg that they do agree with him just enough to get him to drop his core demands and prop … Continue reading
Top Bombing
A friend of mine sent me a YouTube link to the new John Smiths’ Peter Kay advert. His observation in sending it was that it picks up a subtle difference between the sexes in that often women try to guess … Continue reading
Posted in character
Tagged character, evolutionary psychology, James, John Smiths, log lines, Peter Kay, psychology, relationships, sex
1 Comment
Sneaker Pimps
More odd musical/novelistic connections: one song I belatedly discovered is by a little known band called The Sneaker Pimps. Even though I only heard it properly on a compilation last year it dates back to 1996. Given my recurring themes … Continue reading
Posted in Writing Process
Tagged character, Plot, pop music, readings, sneaker pimps, Village Underground
2 Comments
Kim
In The Angel my main female character is called Kim. She was called that before I decided to make her a German and I’ve not changed the name yet and I’m not inclined to at the moment. It’s quite an … Continue reading
Posted in character, Research
Tagged character, Chequers, Cymbeline, Germany, Kim, Kim Basinger, Kim Cattrall, Kimble, Lord Kimberley, names, Ridgeway, South Africa, Swan at Great Kimble
4 Comments
Looking for Inspiration
I wrote quite a bit in a short time up until the last Saturday workshop — around 7,000 words of the beginning of ‘The Angel — two sizeable chapters or perhaps three or four shorter ones. I tend to like … Continue reading
Strengths and Weaknesses
For our commentary we need to list the strengths and weaknesses in our writing. I won’t list what I plan to write are my strengths but I came up with a rather long list of weaknesses, although some are the … Continue reading →