Welcome, friend, to Death Of 1000 Cuts – making you an awesome writer, one cut at a time. Remember, I need first pages for In The Barber’s Chair, where I lay into the opening of an aspiring writer’s novel or short story with the scissors, in the hope of sharpening all our editing chops. If … Read more

In case you don’t know, Mark Grist, MC Mixy and I are setting off on a pilgrimage round the graves of some the UK’s most famous poets. We’re going to be learning about the lives and work of the wordsmiths who came before us, and writing new pieces inspired by them, our experiences on the … Read more

Welcome to Death Of 1000 Cuts – making you an awesome writer, one cut at a time. This week, it’s Sally’s turn In The Barber’s Chair. If you fancy having the first page of your novel or short story edit-bombed, send it to me (250 words max) via the ‘Contact Me’ link on the right. … Read more

Tonight is our monthly literary cabaret night, Homework. Each month we produce and perform new material around a set theme: like homework, geddit? This month’s theme is ‘Monologues’. I thought this would be much easier, you guys. We’re getting in some actors to deliver some of the pieces, and the rest we’re performing ourselves. I … Read more

It’s been a long road since we started our history of beat em ups way back in May, but I think we might just about be hitting the halfway mark. Cor! Over the coming weeks, we’ll be looking at all the major 3D sidescrollers before moving onto player v player beat em ups. That means … Read more

Merry Mondaymas, everyone. Welcome to another Death Of 1000 Cuts – making you an awesome writer, one cut at a time. Today we’re continuing our sweet run of editing chats – you can read the previous ones here – by talking to an actual editor – Francesca Main, of Picador. Whether you’re an author or … Read more

Hey chums. I’m in a funny place right now. Not a bad place, by any means. Certainly a busy place. But not one that lends itself to explicating in an entertaining or inherently satisfying way. When an actor or screenwriter says they’ve ‘had a lot of meetings this month’ it’s basically shorthand for ‘I am … Read more

Welcome to Death Of 1000 Cuts – making you an awesome writer, one cut at a time. It’s Thursday, which means it’s time for another In The Barber’s Chair. As always, read the extract, gather your thoughts, then read my suggestions in ‘The Cuts’. If you have the first page of a novel or short … Read more

You must know by now that I am embarking on a pilgrimage round poets’ graves in October, right? With Mark Grist and MC Mixy? And that we’re going to learn about the lives and work of the poets we visit, and write new poems, and ponder death and eternity and the meaning of it all? … Read more

Release date: 1990 Systems: Arcade, SNES, Virtual Console O Combatribes! Renegade‘s poor forgotten scion! There are a lot of beat em ups neither you nor I remember, and most of them deserve their indefinite detention in the dank oubliette of abandonware obscurity. Because they are f’awful. But Combatribes dares to ascend to the vertiginous heights … Read more

Bonjour. *tips hat* Welcome to Death Of 1000 Cuts – making you an awesome writer, one cut at a time. Today we have the second in our series of interviews, Talking Chop. Here’s Clare’s First Law: the quality of puns in a title and the standard of content are inversely proportional. Meaning, of course, that … Read more

Unless you have some species of rich and meaningful life occupying your waking hours, you can’t have failed to notice that, next month, from Sunday 6th October til (probably) Friday 18th, I am embarking on a pilgrimage around the final resting places of our nation’s most celebrated poets. I’ll be joining Mark Grist and MC … Read more

Welcome to Death Of 1000 Cuts – making you an awesome writer, one cut at a time. I’m here every Monday and Thursday with posts full of writing tips, apopleptic rants, interviews and links to things I think you’ll love. At the moment, Thursday is Barber’s Chair day, where I take a budding author’s first … Read more

About a month ago I visited Chester to do some poetry projects with Chester Performs. On the Saturday, I sat in the Roman amphitheatre in the middle of Chester, chatting to members of the public about their earliest memories. I wrote each memory on a big A2 sheet of paper, and we hung them up … Read more

Release date: 1991 Systems: Arcade Released in Asia as Crime Fighters 2, Vendetta was Konami’s follow-up to crappy 1989 title Crime Fighters, a sub-par version of Final Fight with one of my coin-op pet hates – a numerical energy meter that decreases over time, regardless of whether you take damage. It’s a cheap way of … Read more

As you may have seen, on Friday I announced a tour/pilgrimage that I’ll be undertaking (weak pun intended) in October with Mark Grist and MC Mixy. The idea is to visit as many famous poets’ graves as we can, across the UK. We start in Bristol, on Sunday October 6th, and we end sometime after … Read more

Welcome to Death Of 1000 Cuts – making you an awesome writer, one cut at a time. As promised, here’s the first of our interviews with authors, editors and agents about the tricky art of rewriting, desucking and trimming fiction. I’ve decided to call this tentative new section ‘Talking Chop’, partly because it’s an awful … Read more

Part of me can’t believe I’m announcing this. It’s probably the most foolhardy project I’ve embarked on. By writing this down, I’m committing to it. I have no idea if it will triumph, or dissolve into an embarrassing fiasco. To be honest, it could do both. The thing is, friends – I need your help. … Read more

So you remember I said I’d sometimes use Friday’s Cone O’ Tragedy blogs for introducing you to awesome new stuff? Okay, so you definitely don’t, but still. I said that. And now I’m about to make good on that idle offer in the most spectacular of ways. My wife is so cool. You’d like her, … Read more

Welcome to another Death Of 1000 Cuts – making you an awesome writer, one cut at a time. Friends – this is an urgent appeal. Hit up your writing websites, post on your blogs, FB message your writing buddies, tweet out to the masses. I need more first pages to critique. Without them, the surly … Read more

The last of the pubs we visited on our poetry pub crawl around Chester was the Marlbororough Arms. My research material said: ‘Though it is relatively new to the list of pubs within Chester, that does not mean it is not haunted’, which is technically true. Its age is not the reason it’s not haunted. … Read more

Release date: 1987 Systems: Arcade Over the last few months, in our ongoing history of video games beat em ups, we’ve been looking at the 2D sidescroller: a game where the player character walks along a single plane – usually left to right – punching and kicking waves of marauding goons. It’s a genre that … Read more

Welcome to the first of the new Monday editions of Death Of 1000 Cuts – making you an awesome writer, one cut at a time. In case you didn’t hear the announcement, this month, we’re going to try a little experiment. Death Of 1000 Cuts is going to go twice-weekly. Thursdays will be kept exclusively … Read more