Awards Eligibility and Assorted Grumblings

A hard-earned and well-deserved prize. :)

I have to admit to being pretty ambivalent about awards. I wish I could be completely indifferent to them, as some claim to be; God knows I've tried. What matters is the work: I've said that many times and I believe it. That's what counts, not the money or the tick you get from teacher for doing it well, but show me a writer who's never suffered crippling doubt or a profound sense of 'why the hell do I even bother doing this?' and I'll show you a liar or a raving egomaniac (who's quite probably a shit writer into the bargain.)

Self-doubt is a bastard that gnaws at us all. Over the past few years, I've seen many other writers get multi-book deals while my own career stayed stalled. It wasn't their success that rankled; just my lack of it. It doesn't take much to bring out that persistent little inner troll that tells you you're a fraud, a fake, an imposter, a second-division hack who's worthless compared to the other talents out there. I've had a good year in professional terms, but that doesn't kill the troll; it's a persistent, nasty little beast, and you take whatever fire you can to drive it back into the dark.

In the absence of fame or riches, an awards nomination can mean a lot. And there are many, many good writers whose work, through no fault of theirs, just isn't commercial enough; if they're not going to get the big bucks, they at least deserve a damn good shout-out.


(Hell, when you're feeling low enough, a nice review on Amazon or Goodreads can do wonders for your spirits. By the same token, a one-star review can be an almighty kick in the tadpole factories, but we won't go into that.)

The flipside of that, of course, is how the run-up to awards sees so many people feverishly self-promoting, spamming and bigging themselves up. We've all seen awards of one kind or another cheapened by it, and by the prizes going - in some cases - to the loudest mouth, rather than the best writer. The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate self-promotion and passive-aggressive Facebook posts whenever they get a bad review.

If your work's good, it should get noticed, but that doesn't always happen. I've been in more than one anthology that's sunk without trace due to poor promotion or other fuck-ups, and stories (no, not just mine) that deserved a wide readership failed to make even a blip on most readers' radar.

A degree of self-promotion is necessary, but pinpointing how much is too much is never easy. Blowing your own horn often goes against the grain, but if you don't make at least some attempt to call attention to your work, there's a good chance you'll be completely overlooked.

So, anyway, here's what I had published for the first time in 2015.

Novel:
Hell's Ditch (Snowbooks, Dec 2015.)

Short Stories:
No Room For The Weak (Mark Allan Gunnells' blog, December 2015.)
The Climb (Black Static #49, ed. Andy Cox, TTA Press, November 2015.)
Horn Of The Hunter (Second Spectral Book of Horror Stories, ed. Mark Morris, Spectral Press, September 2015.)
The Face Of The Deep (Game Over, ed. Jonathan Green, Snowbooks, August 2015.)

Ah well: when all else fails, there's always these wise words of W.H. Auden's: "Some books are undeservedly forgotten; none are undeservedly remembered."

Here Goes The Year That Was, or something like that.

So, 2010 is about to slip away. The year I completed The Song Of The Sybil (but not the year of finding a publisher for it) and generally doing a lot of work that hasn't yet paid off. Also the year that Jilly's, aka Rockworld, my favourite club since I was teenager, closed down.

Worst of all, 2010 was the year of my grandmother dying, and the year I couldn't spend Christmas with my family because of the dreaded lurgey. My gran was one hell of a lady, and I will miss her profoundly. But she was a tough, determined woman, and she'd give me the flea of all fleas in the ear if I got mopey. So, may as well acknowledge that 2010 had a few things to recommend it. A few of them were:

The World Horror Con in Brighton, where I got to meet not a few writing heroes of my misspent yoof. In particular, I got to meet the lovely Roberta Lannes, who is now a good friend to boot.

Getting to finally meet the ever-reigning Cate (not to mention living to tell the tale after looking on such awesomeness) and getting to read her first story collection.

Other friends made this year include the writer and film-maker Anna Taborska and a tough, warm-hearted Sheffield lass by the name of Vicky Morris- a tiny dynamo of energy, creativity and good humour on a mission to get young folk writing. Thanks for kicking my arse, Vic.

Christ, I even had a date this year. Miracles happen.

Seriously, there's a point to all this. Goodbye to the loved ones who've gone away; you will be remembered. To the friends and family who made this year worthwhile: thank you.

Have a great New Year's Eve tonight, however you choose to celebrate it, and may 2011 be a happier and more joyful year for all of you- and us.

And so, to play us out... if you're from my generation, this choice will make sense. Air guitar optional.

Frazzled

There really aren't enough hours in the day.

I've been wanting to get back to work on The Song Of The Sibyl for over a week now. Unfortunately, there's only limited time in days eaten up with the wretched day job to write. And I've had an interview to complete and rewrite, plus, now, the opening chapters of the next novel (provisionally entitled Hell's Ditch)

I work a shift that runs from 12 midday through to 8 at night, so I get home around 9 pm, often thoroughly vegged. My best writing time is in the mornings, so:

Up I get around 7.00 am. Scribble Morning Pages- something an American friend passed on to me, basically an automatic writing exercise in which you write continuously, keeping your hand moving till three pages of A4 are filled up.

7.30- ish, usually more like 7.45- I'm out the door for a half-hour brisk walk. It's got to be done as I've got a definite weight problem and am edging relentlessly towards the big Four Oh No. But this means when I get back around 8.15 I've got two and a half hours writing time before I need to run for the bus.

But it's not two and a half hours, is it? Breakfast and putting together a packed lunch take up another fifteen minutes... a shower and getting dressed can be relied on to swallow up another thirty minutes. An hour and a three-quarters are left. Minus a quarter-hour to check emails, Facebook etc.

So, an hour and a half a day to write in. Oh, there's still lunch breaks, of course, at work, but what I'm doing at the moment needs time spent on a computer, and I can't do that at work.

I might have to move the daily walk to my lunchtimes, I think.

Of course, I could still make the evenings more productive if I just moved my damn computer downstairs away from the internet connection. I'll have to.

It's going to take a good two months, minimum, to rework The Song Of The Sibyl into something I can send off. There's a publisher that I hope will like it, and I see other writers I know getting new deals, and the old gnawing fear returns- of being left behind, of going nowhere.

All I can do is what I've always done, what the writer always has to do. Bite the bullet, put my head down, and work my way through. As Doro Pesch once put it, it takes what it takes.

But, Jesus, sometimes it takes a lot.

On the plus side:

Tide Of Souls shows up on Dark Delicacies' Horror Bestseller List in the number 3 spot for paperback fiction, above some pretty big names in the genre. Woot! (But no squee; I promised.) Very proud of this; I never dared hope this little zombie novel would run as long or as far as it has.

So, the moral of this story is?

If you want to write, stay the hell away from the internet, for Chrissakes. Most writers are some kind of OCD to begin with, probably. Last thing you want is to give someone like that a toy like the internet when they're supposed to be working. And especially not if they've got to be their own taskmaster...

Right, that's it for now. Off to bed.