A fantasy thriller of the Visionary Fiction persuasion…
The Shining Ones starts in an abandoned church in the centre of Newcastle. I could have invented a location, but reality provided the perfect candidate in All Saints. It’s a beautiful old building – a dilapidated 18th century elliptical church. I chose All Saints because of its shape: the ellipse is aligned more or less… Continue reading Research Notes: Location – All Saints, Newcastle
Previous: Prologue Mist clung to the city like a security blanket, the river a dark gash through a haze of light. Thousands of glowing beads hung in the air as if defying the darkness of space. Behind one of those lights, Ana moved between benches administering first aid. She was at the shelter where she… Continue reading The Shining Ones: Chapter 1 – welcome to the future you never asked for…
I thought this day would never come, but it’s finally here – The Shining Ones has arrived! The story is about a group of friends who hold the key to the awakening of humanity, but they have no idea who they are. It was inspired by the myths that prophesy an awakening at this time… Continue reading The Shining Ones: Prologue – a lost secret returns to the light…
Creating images of the characters that feature in your novel is a great way to help you visualise your cast. You can do the usual checklists and build psychological profiles. You can list their hair colour and height, what they like to eat, how they talk, and so on. But nothing beats an actual image.… Continue reading Creating Character Portraits: Meet the cast of The Shining Ones
Last time we looked at the art of morphing the reality of real locations to suit your story. Sometimes reality gets in the way and it’s easier to make stuff up. Creating fictional locations means you can ignore the facts and get on with the business of telling the story – which is the whole… Continue reading Tweaking Reality: Should you rename locations in your novel?
Describing reality in words is a tricky business at the best of times, and in fiction especially so. Part of The Shining Ones is set in and around Newcastle where I live so I should have no excuse for getting the locations wrong. But it’s not that simple. Some of the locations weren’t quite right… Continue reading Tweaking Reality: How accurate should locations be in your novel?
This week we’re counting down to the publication of The Shining Ones – exciting and nerve wracking all at the same time! And we start, appropriately enough, with its origins. Sometimes it’s hard to pinpoint where an idea for a story comes from. But others arrive with an obvious genealogy, even if the story eventually… Continue reading Plagiarising Dracula in my sleep
Designing a book cover is lots of fun and a welcome change from word wrangling and beating your novel into shape. But it can also be a frustrating experience. I scheduled two days to work on the cover for The Shining Ones, but in the end, it took a week – and it still needs… Continue reading The Shining Ones Cover Considerations
I’m up to my red eyeballs with editing and proofing The Shining Ones – putting commas in and taking them out again – so here’s a short post about things I’ve never done. (And my eyes really are red! The heating is back on and they’re not happy about it, and staring at a computer… Continue reading Write What You Know: Things I’ve Written that I Don’t Know
They always say you should never give up on your dreams, but what if your dream isn’t worth fighting for? What if it turns out to be a nightmare? I’ve been writing and sending my work out for years, trying to get the publishing industry interested in what I’m doing. But the publishing industry has… Continue reading Why I Gave Up the Dream of Getting Published
The title of this post sounds like a bad thriller, but anyway…last time I promised to tell the story of how the tax credit office almost killed my novel, The Shining Ones, but first, some context: A few years ago I was made redundant in the Tory public sector cuts and, what with one thing… Continue reading The Tax Credit Office and the Sword of Damocles
I’m amazed to announce The Shining Ones is finished – well, apart from a final polish edit and proof. No matter how many times I tried to kill this book, it wouldn’t die, which is appropriate because it features characters who are reborn from long ago – but that’s a spoiler so forget I said… Continue reading The book that wouldn’t die: A History of The Shining Ones
Jessica Davidson 