So, once more, and with feeling, here's a recap of the real-time view of what it was like writing a damned novel. (Sneak preview: this was, gobsmackingly unexpectedly, the best writing experience of my life.)...   (read more)

I had a pretty clear vision for what I wanted to achieve with this story. And I executed it. And it was pretty damned hard. Now, a year later, I'm kind of curious how I pulled that off, so I'm going back to have a look at what the process was like. You can, too, below, if by some freakish chance you're actually interested in that....   (read more)

So, as noted, erm, tomorrow, a year after somehow pulling off this prequel spin-off series, I was interested to go back and look at my real-time notes from the process, with a view to understanding how that happened. (Maybe this will be of the tiniest interest to readers or, better yet, help some exhausted, isolated, struggling artist somewhere down the line.)...   (read more)

So, as noted, erm, two days hence, a year after finishing I was interested to go back and try to understand how that all happened. Also a fair little pit of pandemic/lockdown "nostalgia" in this one....   (read more)

This is, perhaps, the final entry in my series of dispatches about "How to Keep Doing It" as an artist....   (read more)

Herewith aftermatter from my new book Black Squadron....   (read more)

And so in my ongoing (and increasingly coherent, and maybe even successful) attempts to figure out HOW TO KEEP DOING IT (i.e. be a working artist, over time, without utterly destroying myself in the process), I came across another book seemingly written personally for me, at the exact moment I needed it....   (read more)

And so in my continuing efforts to try to rebuild and find my way back, I had a strong sense I should next turn to this book, again. I was first turned onto it by my friend Marianne, who had just heard Gilbert speak; and while I would probably sooner eat my own face than actually read Eat, Pray, Love, I dug this book enormously, finding it a wonderful and genuine chronicle of the journey of a committed artist. She's the real deal....   (read more)

This is a book that has been on my radar for a while, mainly because Pressfield swears by it - mostly, he loves the bit where, after multiple #1 singles and Grammys, Cash had a dream where Art calls her a dilettante, and so she sends herself back to school, getting a new voice coach, reading books on songwriting, going deeper, paying attention, changing the way she sang, worked, and lived, all in humility, getting out of comfort zones, "awakened into the life of an artist."...   (read more)

After spending two weeks just taking longer and longer walks out the Thames Path, watching the light fade and trying to remember how to breathe, I've been going back to all the foundational texts (Pressfield, Holiday, McKee) trying to find some way back, some way to rebuild. Unfortunately, while there's tons of great stuff in there about how to get yourself going, there's precious little about what to do when you've been battling for many years, had some artistic and commercial success, and then blow up spectacularly and don't think you can get back in the fight anymore. Here's some....   (read more)

"There's two kinds of despair that a writer can feel, one of which is: I will never make something good... But the second is: nobody could ever make something good. And that's a real despair. And every writer and artist I know has experienced both kinds." - Jonathan Safran Foer...   (read more)

"The haunting Demon never leaves you, the knowledge of your own terrible limitations, your hopeless inadequacy, the impossibility of ever getting it right."...   (read more)

'Note from the Author' for ARISEN : Odyssey...   (read more)

Brain Pickings's Maria Popova has recently published an anthology of virtually everything she's ever written and collected on writing ("Timeless Advice on Writing: The Collected Wisdom of Great Writers"), all 116 entries, and I couldn't make myself not spend a little time on it; plus copy out the most priceless bits....   (read more)

Check out ME on the OMG Books Podcast with the very lovely William Oday. Some rather deeper (and more personal) stuff about me and the writing process, including from the grim early days of my writing odyssey. Also, actually, this was my very first podcast interview....   (read more)

"I seen a million writers with talent. It means nothing. It's work, you gotta work, do the f*&^ing work."...   (read more)

It is done. Yes, after six months of intensive story-design work - really, after six years, 14 books, and 1.5 million words building up to this - I sat down and wrote nearly 1/3 of a million words, in about 100 days. (Because I am a moron, and a masochist. But I guess we knew that.) The climax and conclusion of the entire ARISEN epic....   (read more)