The Shining Ones · Writing

Fantasy Fiction: a genre distinction too far

I wrote a Fantasy novel by accident. That’s not an easy accident to have; not like tripping over your own feet or walking into a glass door. It’s not that I was trying to write something else and it turned into Fantasy. I wasn’t aiming for any genre in particular – I just wrote the… Continue reading Fantasy Fiction: a genre distinction too far

The Shining Ones · Writing

The Shining Ones: first chapter extract

As promised, here’s an extract from the first chapter of my novel about human angels, The Shining Ones. It’s set in the near future in a slowly disintegrating but familiar world which has been devastated after a solar storm. The storm triggered a mutation in a small number of people, called Deviants by the ARK… Continue reading The Shining Ones: first chapter extract

Publishing · The Shining Ones

Slush Pile Woes: the first rejection cuts the deepest

The rejections for my latest novel The Shining Ones are starting to roll in. The first came from Gollancz and I wasn’t that surprised, so the title of this post is a bit misleading. As writers we’re supposed to be cut up by rejections, but I couldn’t muster the energy to care. Perhaps I’ve got… Continue reading Slush Pile Woes: the first rejection cuts the deepest

The Shining Ones · Writing

How a bad writing exercise seeded The Shining Ones

Ideas for novels often spring from unexpected places. The seed that became the sprout that grew into my latest novel arrived in the form of a disappointingly bad writing exercise. The exercise itself wasn’t the problem. You just had to take the opening line of a novel and then continue to write for half an… Continue reading How a bad writing exercise seeded The Shining Ones

Spirituality · The Shining Ones

Gobekli Tepe: the temple rewriting history

The stone age temples dug into a hill near Sanliurfa in Turkey are causing a storm. It’s not often we find something that overturns everything we know, but Gobekli Tepe is a genuine mystery. Archaeology and history are being rewritten. Not that you’d know about it. The discoveries haven’t been suppressed, they’re just not being reported… Continue reading Gobekli Tepe: the temple rewriting history