Sven Hassel and Death’s Angels
I know this is a bit late but what the hell! One of the most popular parts of this site has turned out to be the Author’s Notes for each of the stories. Somehow back in the day, I neglected to provide them for Death’s Angels. I am rectifying that omission now. If you are a British man of a certain age (OK, my age) you probably remember Sven Hassel. He was the author of a series of pulp paperbacks that were passed around under the desks of the classrooms of my youth. They featured the soldiers of a German Read more…
Elves and Imagery
Your high school English classes probably left you somewhat suspicious of all talk of imagery and I don’t blame you. I have memories of having poems and stories dissected in front of my eyes by my own teachers. Often it was like being present at a surgical operation where the patient died on the table while the surgeon pulled out his internal organs and explained their function. All of which rather misses the point. Imagery is an integral part of story and its purpose is very simple. It reminds readers in a subliminal fashion of the ideas that the writer Read more…
The Ossuary at Sedlec
At the weekend my old friend Barry was in Prague. He wanted to see the Ossuary at Sedlec so we headed out there on what was the hottest September day I can remember. It’s been a long time since I visited the Bone Church, maybe 15 years, and I had forgotten quite how strange a place it is. King Ottokar of Bohemia sent Henry, the Abbot of the Cistercian monastery in Sedlec to the Holy Land in 1278. The holy man returned with what was believed to be earth from Golgotha and sprinkled it over the abbey cemetery. This made Read more…
Writing the Tie-In Novel: Structure
So how do you go about writing a novel then? Well, I don’t know how you do it but here’s how I go about it. I start by writing a very simple synopsis. This can be anything up to 1000 words. It covers the basic flow of the action, names the main characters and settings. That’s it. There’s no description, no dialogue, no bits of business of any sort. It’s just the bare bones of the story set down in the most basic way. Once that is done, I go through this very basic outline and I start expanding upon Read more…
Living In Writer’s Time
Just like deadlines some special occasions sneak up on you. It’s Gamesday in a couple of weeks and Blood of Aenarion is going to be released there and yet somehow, while wittering on about writing and Macharius and short stories, I have forgotten to talk about it. You’re probably wondering how that is possible. I mean it is a major hardback release with the most astonishingly beautiful cover and it features some of my favourite characters ever. It’s also my first new book for Black Library in what– 8 years? (Bloody hell!) How did this escape my notice? The secret, Read more…
Revising Macharius
This is the part I always enjoy. The grunt work of writing the first draft is out of the way and I am now going through The Angel of Fire in Scrivener with an eye to improving it. I took a short break away from the book last week so I could come to it cold for the rewrite. In an ideal world this interval would be longer than a week, but even that small amount of time has given me some distance. Since it’s been several months since I wrote the earliest parts of the book, I have plenty of Read more…
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