Aaaand here’s today’s episode, with a new 10-minute exercise to help you flex your writing muscles. Enjoy!
fiction
Our 8 week fiction writing course continues. In this episode I talk about the creative writing secrets of amateur online trance mediums.
Week 3 Day 1 of my 8 week fiction writing course is here – daily 10 minute exercises to get you feeling better about your writing and discovering all the skills you forgot you had. If you’re new around here, please start at Week 1 Day 1. It would be lovely to have you onboard. … Read more
And here’s today’s episode of the writing boot camp. Check out the beginning of this season if you want to join in, and start from Week 1 Day 1.
Our second week of the fiction boot camp continues with a late night session, and I talk (a little loosely, if I’m honest) about writing at different times of day and learning to surprise your unconscious.
Here’s the third installment of Week 2 of our 8 week writing course to get you back in the saddle with your fiction, confident and energised and happy to be writing. This week is all about letting go, and training yourself to switch off the inner critic to let your creative energies flow at full … Read more
It’s the second week of our 8 week writing boot camp and today I decided I would take you on a little journey, to help expand your mind for this exercise. Hope you like it! If you’d like to join in with the writing course, go back and start at Week 1 Day 1.
It’s the start of Week 2. Whoop. Go back and listen to Week 1 Day 1 (and have a pen or laptop ready!) if you haven’t done so already. Otherwise you already know ‘the score’ (how this podcast series is constructed). I hope you’re enjoying it thus far. This is where things start to ramp … Read more
No exercises today, but I recorded a little off-the-cuff episode just to reflect on the course so far and what I think about starting to write. So it’s some miscellaneous advice that I didn’t want to bog down each episode with. You don’t have to have started the 8 week course to listen to this … Read more
And here it is, the last day of Week 1 of our 8 week writing boot camp. I’ve designed it with 6 days a week rather than 7 so it’s got a bit of a built-in shock absorber for the inevitable real-life responsibilities that will mean, with the best will in the world, you’ll miss … Read more
It’s Week 1, Day 5 of my 8 week writing boot camp. Just 10 minutes a day to get yourself prepped and hyped to finish that novel! If you’re new here, go start at the beginning. If you’re still pushing forward and this is your fifth day, thank you for your faith in yourself, me … Read more
This is the second part of my 8-week podcast course for getting you ready to finish your next novel. You’ll probably want to begin at the beginning. Do drop me a line via the ‘Contact Me’ link on the right if you have any questions, or you just want to let me know how you’re … Read more
Today we’re starting the Death Of 1000 Cuts Couch to 80k writing course. If NaNoWriMo seems a bit much for you, this is an 8 week boot camp for getting prepped to write a novel, with only 10 minutes a day. Each day I’ll give you a little exercise to do, and talk a bit … Read more
Just because I can here’s another episode of the new season. This time it’s me talking to my friend, the talented author Alexander Gordon Smith. Go buy his books! Seriously, if you find some of what he says useful, you can learn so much more by seeing how he’s put those principles into action. I … Read more
Hello everyone – sorry it’s been such a long time since I last touched base. Life, eh? Mine has been very busy and very filled with a certain sweet baby (and also with finishing my latest novel, which – oof – was a real marathon) but I’ve cleared a little space and done a bit … Read more
Hi everyone. Long-time no blog! I’ve been writing and dadding – all is explained in the mini-sode (ugh what an horrendous portmanteau) of Death Of 1000 Cuts below. If you’d like to submit, get in touch via the ‘contact me’ link to the right.
Hey writing pals. Here’s the new episode of Death Of 1000 Cuts. If you’d like to submit a piece of writing for a future episode, please check out our submission guidelines for details. If you’d like to read my work, why not read my novel, The Honours? Here’s the extract we look at this episode: … Read more
Hey writing pals. Here’s the latest episode of Death Of 1000 Cuts – me, chatting about editing fiction every Friday. If you’d like to submit the first page of your novel for a future episode (please do!) then click this link to read our submission guidelines. Here’s the extract I look at this episode. Hey, … Read more
On this absolutely frigging awful pig of a week, here’s another episode of my ridiculous creative writing advice podcast. I hope you’re all right and I hope you enjoy the show. It has me doing possibly the worst dialogue read ever recorded. Audible, you have my email address. Start bidding for my services whenever you … Read more
Happy Christmas and welcome to Death Of 1000 Cuts – making you an awesome writer, one cut at a time. I hope you’re having/have had a pleasant yuletide replete with small, discrete, flavour-rich events which you can observe and later exploit in your fiction. Reviewers will quote these specific, idiosyncratic moments with approval, and you … Read more
I hate ‘books of the year’ lists. Collectively, they read as a flurry of smug nepotism and glib, superficial blurb-swapping – an easy way to fill column space while Britain’s few remaining arts journalists wind down for the Christmas break. I don’t think that, individually, any of the authors polled are being deliberately back-slappy or … Read more
About an hour ago, I finished. As those of you who follow me on Twitter are probably only-too-aware, I’ve spent the last two years working on a novel. Given that I’d promised myself that I would never attempt a novel again, this came as a bit of a shock to me. My previous attempts had … Read more