Why does the English language…

… have no word for mot juste?** In her thought-provoking and highly entertaining journal, Canadian author Holly Phillips has been talking this week about the frustration of having to choose when to employ the extent of your vocabulary. Whether it’s in fiction or conversation, the fact is that there are occasions when using exactly the […]

Book Learning

So, after a somewhat intense last few weeks, I finally finished the rewrite of TMK. It’s been a long and much-interrupted process, and one which I’ve found massively frustrating, but from the point of view at least of professional development, it’s been pretty useful. Actually, scratch that: it’s been kinda fucking necessary on account of […]

Endings and Beginnings

So, we’ve slipped seamlessly from the end of 2008 to 2009. On Hogmanay, filling in the End Of The Year Club catharsis sheet, it struck me with some force how frickin frustrating last year was for me. On many levels, but mostly creatively. When I got to the section which asked about resolutions (which I […]

Done, and Done

I don’t really talk about the writing and such very often on here, but sometimes it’s worth noting certain milestones. So, I finished the novel. And I think…cautiously…that it’s okay. The interesting thing is the routine I managed to settle into in order to get the last of it done. I’d wake up, get out […]

Out!

So, maybe it’s the weather or maybe it’s the clocks going forward or maybe just because it’s May, but all of a sudden good people are putting on good things to go and see. In the last two weeks we’ve seen a shitload of good music, for very little outlay.It all started two Saturdays ago […]

Monkey Music

Things that have pleased me no end this week. 1/ The Littlest Album launch at the 13th Note. A very eclectic collection of musicians marshalled and organised by Adam from The Plimptons. Some great music, most especially from Only Joe Kane, and we got to play a loud set including a new song. So we […]

Pirate Memory Games

Warning: this post contains half-baked and undigested ideas. Feel free to argue with or ignore as you will. So, it seems the whole world is writing Pirate stories. I know of at least five GSFWC members who claim to have signed up for passage (Mr Duncan has of course already completed his, plus landed a […]

Painting!

Weekends are the bane of my life, so they are. It’s that yawning, inviting gap of blank space that smiles so invitingly at you all week long. You make grand plans for filling it – in my case with The End Of The Novel – and then it’s gone in a frittering of interruptions and […]