The Write Stuff

A rag tag team of derelict ship scavengers discover a bizarre melded combination of lost ships in the middle of deep space and when they investigate it doesn't take them long to realize that nothing is what it seems..

An army major is tasked with the impossible: Prevent a base with no escape being overrun by overwhelming forces. They're out numbered, out gunned and nothing they come up with seems to work...

Dessert raiders slaughter an archaeology team in the dessert only to discover a strange survivor asleep in one of the tombs. They take him back to base and that's when the horrors begin...

New intriguing specials coming to Netflix?

Nay. All books I started writing but never got round to finishing in 2019.
Maybe 2020 will be my year?

I WROTE DOWN MY PLAN AT THE START OF THE YEAR

And it was only the slightest bit over ambitious too - at the start of my work diary in 2019 I wrote that I would finish and self publish not one, but two books 6 months apart. #loftygoals
And of course by June I'd tried to start things up more times more than my old Mazda on a cold winter morning.

They started well - the ideas would come at random times (more than usually in the shower on barely any sleep) and that afternoon/night work would be done and before I knew it there was 1000 shiny new words kicking things off.

The next goal would be 2000 words.

Then 10k.

When things got to 20k words over the next few weeks then I'd really get the indication that I was onto a winner and it was full steam ahead. Finish the book, spend some time editing, come up with a decent cover and then put it out to the world and watch the millions occasional cents roll in.

Only around the 25-30k word mark, well that's when the wheels would start to fall off. I'd lose passion in the project. I'd find it hard to stick to the original concept. Looking back at the first 15k I'd see that it really didn't match the style or flow of the other half and frustrated, I'd give up.

Well not give up, more like start another idea a week later.

One of my action shots from throughout the year.

(If they weren't all saved in pieces via modern technology like Google Drive then I would have a completely stuffed desk of completely unfinished manuscripts and would struggle to find the cat let alone both kids under all of the mess...)

RIGHT THEN, TIME FOR SOME MOTIVATION

(No I'm not going to pledge, slice my palm open and spit on it in some kind of demonic bond to keep me from breaking my promise. Perish the thought.) This year (2020) I will publish at least one more book. And I will do that sometime this year with three important things in mind: 

1. IT'S NOT THE FIRST TIME I'VE DONE THIS. No. No. No. It's not. So it's not like I can pretend I've never finished a book before and gone through the entire process from start to finish, because I have. More than once. Writing a book that sells millions? Haven't done that yet no, but it's a work in progress. (Maybe the next one?)

2. PROFESSIONAL RIVALRY. While I floundered around and bounced from one idea to the next, my creative mate Brixey got down to business and created a fantastic screenplay which he's currently polishing and getting ready to ship out to agents and the like. There's nothing like someone to compete with and I need some friendly rivalry points back on the board. 

3. WHATEVER I DO, IT CAN'T BE AS BAD AS...THIS?

Look, I'm not one to usually shit on others work (but I will here) - but apart from the author, who looks at this and thinks it's a good idea? The story sounds horrendous (and if there's a market for this kind of writing then I really don't want to meet that particular audience), the MS paint cover is truly awful, the blurb is awful, the font choice is awful...

...and yet it's out there. In the wild. Ready to be bought (not that I suspect people will but that's my opinion and I could be horrible wrong. The author could be filling up their collection of Lambo's with $100 notes for all I know, funded by readers desperate to read about boiling seme- oh FFS who am I kidding? It's just awful.)

And it's not the only truly strange title they've created, uploaded and put into the world of self publishing (no I will not link to the many others you weirdo, you can track down a copy of Erotic Night of The Bloody Scarecrow yourself..) which means I really have no excuse when it comes to my own work. Even my least confident story should be able to make the sordid tales of horny gamma monsters pale in comparison. It's not a massive yardstick to be honest but anything worse than it probably should be set on fire without a second thought..

Wish me luck!