by Dave Freer >To quote from the article Amanda mentioned yesterday... ‘Turow began with authors' fears about piracy and lower income: 25% of net in "e" is less than a traditional 15% royalty. Newberg made her first point: "What are publishers doing to justify not giving authors 50%[*note]?" Miller countered that "terms differ from publisher... Continue Reading →
>The Inmates are Obviously Running the Asylum
>(Before I get to today's post, I want to take a moment to thank all the men and women who have given their lives in the service of their country. Tomorrow is Memorial Day here in the U.S. I tip my hat and offer my sincerest thanks and prayers to those who have served, those... Continue Reading →
>Why I Write (or not) — by Tedd Roberts
>(Let's give a big welcome to our guest blogger, Tedd Roberts. After reading his post, tell us why you write. What drives you and how do you balance it with the rest of real life? -- Amanda)I read my first SF book nearly 45 years ago. At the grand age of 6 I had a... Continue Reading →
>Beyond the End (The Other Side)
>What lies on the Other Side? Does this question conjure up creepy images of the afterlife? The shadowy realms that border graveyards? OK, ignore me, its my horror frame of mind at the moment as I contemplate a Brisbane ghost story. What I really had in mind was probably something equally horrific - well at... Continue Reading →
>Anti-Social-Networking
>Or: why I quit facebook and don't tweet.A couple of weeks back I deleted my facebook account. I don't miss it. I hardly ever used it, and each new "update" just made the web page more painful. Besides, I really don't like the "all your data are belong to us" attitude betrayed by the steadily... Continue Reading →
>Wrestling with an angel
>No, I’m not trying out titles for the latest WWF-romance (Shut up you, if Amish-romances are all the rage, you can too have WWF romances as a sub-genre) and I’m only referring to Jacob’s fight with an angel in an allegorical sort of way.What I’m talking about here is trying to “close” a novel. Oh,... Continue Reading →
>The Core of Characterisation — by Rowena Cory Daniells
>(Rowena is away from her computer, but she left this for us. Enjoy!)It always comes back to characterisation, for me. Whether it is a movie or a book, I have to care about the people, otherwise why would I keep reading/watching? If a book is really memorable, I find myself thinking about the characters for... Continue Reading →
>There’s a whole world in my reader’s mind
>Reading is a form of enchantment.Perfectly simple really. It is a kind of magic transmuting by means of little black glyphs a bland piece of paper into an entire world, a place so full and rich and with such images in it, that they are REAL (at least while the spell holds).And yet... we writers... Continue Reading →
>It’s Your Turn
>I'm a bit under the weather today, folks, so I'm going to throw open the blog. You can ask a question or post the first sentence or paragraph of a work in progress (but no more than the first paragraph, well, first two paragraphs). The floor is yours. I'll be checking back in every couple... Continue Reading →
>Getting it Done
>Laura Anne Gilman started her professional life as a book editor for a major NYC house, fitting her writing into the remaining available hours. In 2004 she switched that around, becoming a full-time writer and (in 2010) a freelance editor for Carina Press.She wrote her first original novel, Staying Dead, when everyone said that urban... Continue Reading →