Every writer has been there: you’re working on a story, maybe you’ve come to a bit of a plateau and you’re stuck. But what’s that in the distance? A new idea? It’s so shiny! You have to work on that one right away before it flies away never to be seen again. You start working on the new idea, forgetting about the old one, and inevitably hit a plateau again. But wait, what’s that in the distance again? Another new idea? ...Well, you get the picture.
So I’ve been a bit quiet on the blog lately and it’s been for a couple of reasons. Nothing too exciting, I’m afraid, it’s mostly because I’ve just moved house and packing and unpacking is a complete bitch that takes up all of the time in the universe (can you tell I’m so done with it?).
Okay, so I know this is a 'books and writing' blog, but I do actually have other hobbies, believe it or not, and watching films is one of them. So I thought why not combine two of my loves and come up with a list of films that will resonate with the writers among us.
So it's that time of year again. November seems to come around quicker every year, and since it's only a week away we need to start talking NaNo.
I'm taking a slight deviation from my normal writing-centric blog posts today because I want to tell you about something that changed my life: my bullet journal.
Bullet Journals are all the rage right now and I can see you rolling your eyes and thinking 'whatever, it's just a fancy diary, don't get so overdramatic about it.' But it's so much more than that, and it's definitely worth all the hype.
I'm a pro at procrastinating (a pro-crastinator, if you will). If there's a way to put off doing something I will absolutely find it and take the longest route possible to get there. I have tried numerous ways to sort my life out, to-do lists, internet blockers, putting my phone in a different room, but all to no avail. I'm still number one at doing everything except the thing that needs to be done
I have a guest blog post for you lovely readers today, courtesy of Stuart Gibbon, a former police officer turned writing consultant. Stuart has advised on amazing books such as CL Taylor's 'The Missing'. When Stuart contacted me I was intrigued to find out more about how writers use help from the police when researching. So I'll hand it over to Stuart to tell us about his work.
So we're halfway though January and I'm feeling quite proud of how 2016 is going so far. I've been catching up on my 'to-read' list (which I will admit became significantly longer after Amazon's 12 Days of Christmas Kindle deals) and I've been writing some book reviews for an online magazine based in Dublin (Pure M, check it out). So I decided to come up with some new years resolutions to make sure that this productive state isn't just a fluke for the cold months when I'm locked inside where it's warm with nothing else to do but read
I recently wrote a short story in which the protagonist had to face off to another character who she knew was going to kill her. The protagonist, a policewoman who has been working with a major criminal to get some money for her family, has double-crossed the criminal and kept the money she was supposed to pass onto him. He has told her that if she doesn’t come to him then he will kill her husband and children.
Well, it was a long month but I did it. 50,225 words later and NaNoWriMo 2015 is over. I won't lie and say that it's a novel worth reading, or that it's readable at all. To be honest I haven't actually read over it all myself yet. I'm a little bit scared to as I am aware just how bad it is.
Stuck in a Good Book 