One rainy evening somewhere at the early end of 1997, I found myself hepped up on adrenaline while zigzagging through a dungeon. Even though I was being hunted through mazelike hallways by grappling-hook-flinging assailants, I still somehow managed to maintain my grasp on a large red flag and ebony nail gun. …and thus was my… Read more »
It’s a little tricky trying to recall just how ‘The Kills‘ developed. The books were pitched as a series of inter-related novels, and in the first discussion with publisher Paul Baggaley and editor Kris Doyle, it became obvious that Picador, if they took on the project, would want to do more than publish the novel… Read more »
Someone suggests a theme – perhaps the way a person’s tone shifts when talking about a loved one – and Daljit Nagra instantly writes a poem, keystroke by keystroke. the warmth o- f a blush on his eve- r so lightly altered voice The words appear on two large projector screens in the Royal Festival… Read more »
Germany is the second largest market in Europe after the UK for books in English. Barbara Thiele, Chief Product Officer at Berlin-based print and ebook publishing platform, epubli, gives us the lowdown on the German market and offers her top tips for writers hoping to crack it. 5 things to know about German readers and the German… Read more »
The publishing industry has undergone many changes over the last few years, many of which can be attributed to the disruptions brought about by digital technologies. Alongside the rise of self-/ indie- publishing we are also seeing new types of publisher emerge, publishers who are turning traditional models and methods on their head and finding… Read more »
In 2001 I read an article in the Guardian newspaper that told the story of a body landing in a supermarket car park in southwest London. Two investigative journalists tracked down the identity of the dead man; he was a young Pakistani who had bought – actually paid money to someone – into the myth… Read more »
The avenues through which communities and community organisations raise awareness about the issues they face and how they agitate for change have developed rapidly in the past ten years; and digital technology has provided community activists with the means to quickly create and widely disseminate stories. Perhaps the most influential and wide reaching of recent… Read more »
“Writing, at its best, is a lonely life,” said Ernest Hemingway, whose idea of a great social life involved a remote cabin, dead animals, and the bottom of a brandy glass. “Organizations for writers palliate the writer’s loneliness but I doubt if they improve his writing.” Isaac Asimov – a self-confessed claustrophile whose greatest childhood wish, according to his autobiography,… Read more »
An email exchange between Stevie Ronnie and Liam Owen reflecting on the making of Four Years from Now, Walking with My Daughter. An animation by Liam Owen inspired by Stevie Ronnie’s poem of the same name. SR: So Liam, you’re not a big reader of poetry. What made you think about making an animation from my poem?… Read more »
I was stuck in a rut. My blogging was sluggish and I’d been working on a novel for two years with no end in sight. I was moaning to my brother over Skype about the slow path my career was taking, when he said: “So write a novel on Wattpad.” He told me his girlfriend was reading a… Read more »