Guest post by Zena Shapter Let’s say you’ve been working on a novel for a while – maybe a year or two, fitting it inbetween work, life and kids. Now you’re approaching its end… you’re past the novel’s climax and you’re starting to wind everything up… You should feel elated. Yay [...]
It’s been quite a while since we’ve updated our member news. Here’s a probably-incomplete roundup of the action since July: Novels Donna Maree Hanson’s Dragon Wine duology has launched from Momentum books: Shatterwing and Skywatcher Alan Baxter’s Alex Caine series is now out from Harper Collins in Australian and New [...]
Guest post by Ian McHugh KILL THEM! Obviously. There’s a short story that I love called “A Dry , Quiet War” by Tony Daniel, which is basically a space-western that recounts a conflict between superhuman veterans of a war at the end of time. At the climax, the hero goes on [...]
Guest post by Zena Shapter Getting a manuscript ready for submission to agents or publishers is much like cleaning your home or car. Since I’m no mechanic, and we all have homes, I’m going to go with the home analogy for now. But why, do you ask, is preparing your [...]
Issue 3 is out now, with new fiction from Cat Sparks, Rob Hood and Steve Cameron. Download it here in epub or mobi formats.
by Ian McHugh With the (then) impending release of her new novel Shatterwing, part one of Dragon Wine, I interviewed Donna Hanson about her long-time passion project. Because I’m a slacker, Shatterwing is now out in the world and the sequel, Skywatcher, is on its way on October 9. The [...]
Guest post by Ian McHugh One major challenge of stepping up from short stories to novels is managing a larger ensemble of characters. In my impetuousness, I exacerbated this problem for myself by starting from real historical events. Reality is way less tidy than fiction. In real life, people bob up [...]
Guest post by Zena Shapter I didn’t mean to become one, but over the last few years I’ve become a social media consultant. Writers started asking me how to use social media and, after a while, I thought – why not? Since I know about social media … why not [...]
by Ian McHugh With the forthcoming release of his first fiction anthology, Suspended in Dusk, I interviewed editor Simon Dewar about chutzpah, the importance of having no concept of level of difficulty, the horror of caesarian sections and the inspirational value of Mariah Carey and prog metal. Oh, and some [...]
Guest post by Ian McHugh Something writers are often exhorted to do is “write what you know”. This doesn’t necessarily mean that your stories should reflect the literal truth of your lived experience, although they can. My first published story, “The Alchemical Automaton Blues” was basically a recounting of a real [...]