Exciting news! There’s a whole load of new stuff to explore on this site – recently arrived from my neglected (and soon to be comatose) other blogs. More on the details in a moment, but first, some context: Regular visitors to this site will have noticed that I recently upgraded to get rid of the… Continue reading New Stuff has Come to 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?
A blurb can sometimes mean a short review quoted on a book cover, but in this post we’re going to look at the other kind of blurb: the book description. The blurb is your sales pitch, printed on the back of your book or quoted on its sales page online. It’s the second most important… Continue reading How to Blurb: Writing a book description that sells
It should go without saying but: I’m not a graphic designer or an artist. I’ve taught myself how to design book covers and this post distils what I’ve learned from people wiser than me online. The most important piece of advice is: Don’t design your own covers unless you know what you’re doing and have… Continue reading A Blagger’s Guide to Book Cover Design
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
