Revisiting The Last Sin Eater

In November I spent a very long month researching and writing about Shropshire's last sin eater, Richard Munslow. After a couple of months' break, I've been digging out the story again to start editing it.

Aside from finding the usual plot holes, inconsistencies and things that just don't work, I've also been trying to pull out bits of the story to use in my latest assignment for my creative writing course. The current assignment is to do a piece of biography - and Richard Munslow is a fascinating subject for that.

Now I've just got to condense the month's worth of research and writing into something a couple of thousand words long!

Write for Japan now on sale!

The Write For Japan book has gone on sale this week to raise money for the Red Cross's relief work in Japan. The book has 34 short stories by 34 different authors from all over the world, including my sci-fi story Generation Three.

I'm really glad the book has gone on sale and that I could contribute to it. The disaster in Japan is one of those things you feel helpless about - you want to help and you don't know how. Without wishing to sound clichéd, it was a privilege to be able to join in with the project and do something that will hopefully raise a decent amount of money which can be used to help the people who have been caught up in the devastation in Japan.

If you like short stories and you would like to help support the relief work in Japan, please buy the book:
• Lulu - £6.99
• Smashwords - $3.99
• Kindle - £2.86
• Createspace - coming soon...

Write for Japan - Generation Three

Here's a short preview of the story, Generation Three, that I've written for the Write for Japan anthology.

Zen is a teenager living on a generation ship which is travelling to a new star system where humans will create a new home.

Zen looked at the picture of herself and her family. Her dad looked out of place, his blond hair and blue eyes standing out among the Japanese features of the women in his life. For the first time Zen caught herself wondering what her life would have been like if her grandparents hadn’t decided to be part of the generation ship mission.

She went over to her bunk as the deceleration warning sounded. As she strapped herself in she noticed something white sticking out between the bunk above hers and the wall. She reached up and tugged at it, then frowned as she looked at the object in her hands. It was about the size of a small display unit, but it was made of thin pieces of... Zen hesitated for a moment, trying to remember the word from her history lessons. Of course, it was paper, and the item was a book.

Carefully, she opened the front page. It was covered in writing; some in English and some in Japanese kanji characters.

‘Oh!’ the exclamation was entirely involuntary as she recognised the name at the bottom of the page. The book was a diary, and it had belonged to her grandmother.

Writing to a time limit

Writing is so much easier when you have a deadline to write towards. Take naNoWriMo, for example. I've managed to complete the challenge - 50,000 words in 30 days - for the last four years, but trying to keep up that amount of writing at other times seems to be pretty much impossible for me.

This week I had good motivation though - I had to complete and edit my submission for Write for Japan and send it in by Sunday 27th. Knowing that there was an end date, and that after that there would be publication (the writer's Holy Grail), and that it was all for a good cause did wonders for my motivation.

The sad thing is, now that the story is done I'm feeling unmotivated again. Must find another deadline to work towards...

Write for Japan & poetry

The Write for Japan project is well and truly off the ground now. To find out more visit www.writeforjapan.com, and please, please, please do consider donating.

All the authors are writing stories on the subject of destruction and/or hope. I don't know exactly what form the stories will take, but I'm looking forward to finding out. My story - Generation Three - is a sci-fi one set on board a generation ship, taking the human race to find another world after the Earth became uninhabitable.

And changing the subject completely, my poem Jazz Night has been accepted by Every Day Poets!

Poetry and charity books

Not much to say today. I didn't think poetry was my 'thing' but I seem to have done alright in the poetry part of the creative writing course, and one of my poems is now being considered for publication at Every Day Poets!

In other news... I'm getting involved in a project called (provisionally) Write for Japan, which is hoping to produce a book of short stories to sell for charity to help with the aid and rebuilding work for victims of the Japan earthquake. I'll keep you posted...

#FridayReads

I think I've said it before, but I do think one of the best ways of improving your writing is to read a lot. And then read more. And then go to the library and read some more.

One of the things I like to do is check out the #FridayReads hashtag on Twitter*. You get a huge variety of ideas from other people's suggestions. A lot of them might be things you don't fancy, but every now and then something will catch your eye that proves to be a real gem.

So what am I reading at the moment? Well I just finished a Star Trek YA book called The Edge (good read, nice plot, and easy to settle down with), I'm in the middle of an intriguing historical mystery Death of a Dancer by Caro Peacock (great descriptions of Victorian London and good characterisations), and my pile of books to read includes a fantasy, a Christian romance, local history and a diary-style how-to guide.

* On Twitter you can flag up certain subjects, talking points, ideas, etc, by using the #. Every Friday lots of people will pick a book and tweet about it, adding #FridayReads to their message. Other people can then search for the list of messages with book recommendations by searching for #FridayReads.