Burning Out as per Clive Barker's Advice

Back in November 2009, the AHWA held an online chat for its members with Clive Barker, one of my literary heroes (The Books of Blook volumes 1-6 are amongst my prized possessions). I asked Clive what advice he could give new writers and this was his answer:

"I can certainly throw out some observation about the process of creating which may be of use. Firstly, it's the best & the worst of worlds, because the only fuel you have to make the fire blaze on the page / screen is the stuff of your own being. An artist consumes his or herself in the act of making art. I can feel that consumption even now, sitting here at my desk at the end of a working day. In order to generate the ideas that I have set on the page for the last 10 or 11 hours I have burned the fuel of my own history. This is, obviously a double-edged sword. In order to give, the artist must take from himself. That's the deal. And it's very important to me that the work I do is the best I can make it, because I know what is being burned up to create. As the villain of Sacrament says: "living & dying, we feed the fire."

So in true Barker fashion, I burned myself out last night. I had the house to myself and my shifty sideshow freak of a muse dragged me through hell in order to pull this cursed story from within me. I ended up with a little over 3000 words, most of which I still like today. The story needs work, sure, that's only to be expected, but it's the first short story I've written since October last year (Desert Blood, published in Dead Red Heart).

It felt great burning out like that, giving it my all until I was worn through and could barely make it to bed. Such a sense of satisfaction and achievement.

Dance Power!

Ever heard of piezoelectrics? No, it's not some new fandangled static-filled meat pie, but materials capable of converting pressure into electrical energy. Researchers at RMIT University in Melbourne have worked out how to use piezoelectric thin films to turn mechanical pressure into electricity. This means by typing, you could power your laptop, iPad, or iPhone. Built into shoes, each step could help charge your mobile.

A nightclub in London recently built a piezoelectric dance floor, so nightclubbers, by dancing, generate 60% of the power to run the club. What a cool idea.

I wonder if you could add piezoelectric thin films to car tyres. Then you'd have a way a charging your electric car without having to plug it in once you got home.

Piezoelectrics... look out for piezoelectric devices in a store near you soon(ish)...

Stop procrastinating Dr Young!

Back into the Saddle I Go...

Inspired by Jason Fischer's six month writing sabbatical, I think it's time I stopped procrastinating and really, seriously, got back into writing. My shifty sideshow freak muse hasn't been talking to me for a while now, so I should probably take it out for a romantic dinner, some good wine, and see what happens. I have a London-based agent waiting to read novel number 2 as soon as I've finished the edits (the deadline's September!), plus at least two anthologies I'm keen to submit to, so I have pressure!

Pressure!

And I need pressure otherwise I wander. I get lost in translation--or is that procrastination? I get lost somewhere (usually trying to get home).

As I said in a recent post, plans for The Next Big Project are coming along nicely, but something I've realized is how out of date I am now with the spec-fic scene, especially here in Australia. There's so much going on, so many good books coming out by great writers, but I feel as if I've had a blindfold over my eyes for the past 6+ months and the world has sped on without me. Wouldn't have a clue what's happening out there in Penland, and holy cowbells, Batman, where and how do I begin to catch up?? I guess it's time I reinvested myself and soaked up the vibe again. Perhaps get myself to a convention or two. Go and get nutty with writer folks and find out the gossip.

A quick note on e-books again; Copyright Agency Limited has released the results of a digital publishing trends survey, and it makes for some very interesting reading. For a bit of an in-depth discussion of the results, check out Alan Baxter's blog. Well worth a read. A very interesting comment made on Alan's Facebook page regarding this too, from an ex-music industry executive who reminded us all that the music industry went through what the book industry is now going through with the digital revolution, so don't expect those digital books to be going away anytime soon......

I've Been Kindle-d!

So I finally brought my Kindle and y'know what? I quite like it. Actually, it bloody well rocks.

I've sat outside in the sun, feet up and sunnies on, reading on it and the screen with its e-Ink technology works a treat. I've sat at the table, eating lunch and reading, and there was no need to rest my plate on the book to hold it open at the page I was on.

Sure, it's not a book, and sometimes I do feel guilty for using my Kindle instead of a paper book (I'm sure those paper books of mine sitting on my bookcases--and on the floor--in my study have started glaring at me with jealousy. I wonder what type of revenge they could impose..? Maybe tipping my bookcases down on top of me next time I'm lying on the ground beneath them...), but the Kindle is easy to read, it's extremely portable and far easier to hold than a Stephen King tome.

I'll always prefer a proper paper book but my transition to the digital world of reading hasn't been as bad or as traumatic as I'd feared.

Disturbingly Brilliant

Sometimes you read a story and even as you're reading it, you're wishing you could just put down the book and forget the words that have already seared their way into your head but you can't, you can't, you have to keep reading, following the events and the characters and the disturbingly brilliant writing to its conclusion, all the while wishing you could screw shut your eyes against those words so their vile images don't burn, burn, burn their degradation upon your world and so that in the midst of the night, when you're lying there awake instead of sleeping, those visions don't come to you again and unsettle you all over, so they don't disturb you once more and give you reason to hate the genre that is horror and yet at the same time remind you of why you love the genre so very, very much.....