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Look at the pretty shiny. Those are my contributor copies of Dreaming of Djinn that arrived this morning. Edited by the brilliant Liz Grzyb and published by Ticonderoga Publications, this is an anthology of stories inspired by The Thousand and One Nights. Isobelle Carmody says of the book: To open Dreaming Of Djinn is...
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Last night was Australian speculative fiction’s night of nights, with the Aurealis Awards Gala presentation. The third and final time in Sydney (next year it moves to Canberra) and what a night it was. It’s always a party, where writers, publishers, readers and more all frock up, drink too much and enjoy the presentation...
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It was Stephen King who said, “If you don’t have the time to read, you don’t have the time or the tools to write. Simple as that.” And let’s be honest, Stephen King is a frood who knows his shit when it comes to the writing caper. In all honesty, I can’t imagine anyone...
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I’ve seen a couple of things today that are complementary and very true. They are also always relevant to the writer. First, I saw this on Chuck Wendig’s blog (click the pic to make it bigger): And I saw this doing the rounds on Tumblr: “It’s a terrible thing, I think, in life to...
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I’m having trouble with the current work in progress. It’s book three of a trilogy and it’s very exciting, but I’m struggling. There are prerequisites that can not be avoided. The climax needs to outdo the ends of book one and two. There are many threads and characters that need to come together and...
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I’m running my Write The Fight Right workshop at the Writer’s Centre in Adelaide on May 12th, and as part of the lead up to that, the SA Writers’ Centre asked me for a guest post for their blog. Here’s what I wrote: You’ve heard the old adage, I’m sure. Write what you know....
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I said I would get around to a quick wrap up post for Conflux 9, the 52nd NatCon, that happened last week. It’s fast becoming history and life is barrelling on (seriously, May, calm the fuck down) and so I thought I’d better get around to it now or I never would. First and...
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I’m back from Conflux 9 and a damn fine time was had by all. Great to catch up with old friends, make some new friends and drink too much. I’ll write up a proper report soon, probably tomorrow. I’m too brain dead today and have a bunch of classes to teach, so might go...
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I got up a bit earlier than usual this morning to be a guest on the Dead Robots’ Society Podcast along with David Wood. We had a lot of fun, talked about genre fiction and horror especially. Of course, we were mostly talking up Dark Rite as that’s the new and current thing. It’s...
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It’s a funny old game, this writing business. High highs and crushing lows. Hours of toil for seemingly no return, wondering why we bother, then something happens that reminds us exactly why we bother. And I don’t know if this is the case for other writers, but my career seems to always be a...
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