It’s great to have CM Taylor back on the blog on publication day for his new novel, Staying On. I was lucky enough to read an advance copy of this and I stayed up half the night to find out what would happen. It’s a funny and very moving (I cried!) story of a family that needs to face [...]
Creating complex characters: Esther in Frozen Music Frozen Music by Marika Cobbold stars Esther, and I liked her a lot. She is a prime example of the 3 Cs of Character, which is one of the characterisation tools I use in my teaching and is a good way to get to know the people who take root in our [...]
Creating complex characters: Dolores in She’s Come Undone This week it’s Dolores Price’s turn in the complex characters spotlight. Dolores is the star of Wally Lamb’s debut novel, She’s Come Undone. She’s a character that I use often in the workshops and [...]
Flash fiction writing tips from Kathy Fish Delighted to welcome Kathy Fish to the blog for the first time today. Kathy is judging the 2018 RW Flash Fiction Prize and I got to ask her all about what she loves about flashing. Kathy, thanks for coming. As an award-winning flash fiction writer [...]
The third in this blog series, which is looking at memorable narrators and how we as writers can create them, is Cassie in As Far As You Can Go by Lesley Glaister. Everything about this novel is memorable even though how the plot would eventually play out was quite predictable. The oppressive and [...]