I can remember the exact moment when I got the idea for Sky Pirates. I was reading one of Edgar Rice Burroughs Martian books, The Gods Of Mars. I came across his descriptions of the savage green men and, of course, I thought of orcs. For some reason, from then on the idea of Burroughs Green Men and orcs became conjoined in my mind. My brain was filled with the idea of orcish hordes rampaging across the desiccated landscapes of a dying world not unlike Barsoom. Thuvia, Maid of Mars is one of the very first SF novels I can remember reading as a small kid. I can still picture the cover (by Bruce Pennington I think) in my mind. It had a very scantily clad Thuvia and a Thark on it. It made a lasting impression on me. There's something very … [Read more...]
Order Out of Chaos
So the end of the month is sneaking closer and I am still working away. As I mentioned at the start of the month, I planned on writing 2K of new fiction every working day this year as well as revising work for publication. I also mentioned that I was having trouble settling down into a routine. (New babies and lack of sleep tend to have that effect!) Of late, I have been plagued by the flu and persecuted by the Machine God as well. However, in spite of all this, I have started to get the feeling that my goals for this year are at least possible. I am settling down into a new method of working, which is just as well, because I need to. I begin each day by revising what I wrote the work day before. (Obviously this means that on Monday I … [Read more...]
SOPA Strike
No post today. Like many other people I am protesting against SOPA which I believe is not a good thing. But Bill, I hear you say, this is a post. Fair enough but you know what I mean! … [Read more...]
The Hundredth Post
Back in the 80s my brother sold insurance. He occasionally attended sales conferences and sometimes came back with motivational books. One day, bored, with nothing better to do, I read one. It started a life-long habit of reading books about selling and the life of a salesman. In case you are wondering what possible relevance any of those could have to the life of a writer, let me just point out that writers and salesmen have more in common than you might think. Both writers and salesmen need to be self-starters. There is usually no one else around to motivate you. Both live in worlds where the possibility of rejection arises daily, and both need to be able to keep going in the face of that rejection. Both have jobs where they are entirely … [Read more...]
The E-Book Experiment: 6 Month Report
When I started my e-book experiment I decided I would wait six months before passing any judgements. That would be a long enough period to collect some data and see how the whole thing worked for me. You hear all sorts of contradictory reports about e-publishing but I’ve always liked to collect empirical evidence for myself, rather than listen to who shouts loudest on the internet. I decided I was just going to release the backlist I had and work on projects that interested me in the gaps between my work for Black Library. Well, six months have passed so now I am going to assess how it went with particular reference to my Terrarch series. I am going to discuss actual numbers and amounts of money earned so if you are the sort of person … [Read more...]
Changing Habits
I am a creature of habit. I like to do the same things in the same ways. I don’t think habits are of necessity bad things. They can be either good or bad, depending on the habit and the circumstances. The habit of smoking 60 cigarettes a day I once had was undoubtedly a bad one. The habit of writing 2000 words a day has done my life and my career no harm at all as far as I can tell and it has provided a number of positive benefits. Scientists think we have habits for a reason. They save having to make complex decisions for parts of our life where it is easier to automate things. I am in the habit of going to Mama’s Coffee House in Prague most days to get my daily (now decaff) Americano. For health reasons I had to give up the … [Read more...]
David Gemmell Legend Award
Somehow, in all the baby-related excitement I managed to forget to mention the fact that Blood of Aenarion is on the Long List for the David Gemmell Legend Award this year. At any other time in my life this would have been huge news but with the arrival of young Will, it just kind of flickered across my awareness and got lost at the back of my sleep-deprived brain. I had an email from the good people at Black Library reminding me about the Award yesterday so I thought I would mention it today. For the two of you who don’t know, the late, great David Gemmell was one of the most successful British Fantasy writers of his generation, and probably the most successful author of heroic fantasy of recent years. I’ve been reading his books … [Read more...]
Coming Up In 2012
I hope you all had a pleasant New Year and find yourself in fine fettle today. In Chez King we saw in New Year playing Ivanhoe while the City of Prague laid on a fine fireworks display outside our window and baby William lay asleep in his cot. Now the holidays are over and it’s time to settle down to getting some work done in 2012. There a few exciting things coming up this year. This month I will be releasing Sky Pirates. This is my Edgar Rice Burroughs inspired, Dying Earth fantasy novel, featuring, you guessed it, sky pirates. In this book former pirate captain Ulrik, sentenced to death in the arena for his crimes, finds his release from the fighting pits engineered by the sinister wizard Valerius who requires his services to hunt … [Read more...]
