Book Readings at the Melbourne Writers Festival
At the recent Melbourne Writers Festival, Max Barry asked why do audiences sit around and listen to authors reading from their books at writer’s festivals? Shouldn’t they instead be watching authors write? A few years ago, he attempted to put that thought into action. He set himself up in the concourse at the Melbourne […]
The Future of the Novel.
Recently I attended the Melboure Writers Festival. I went to a panel called The Future of the Novel. Most people would expect a panel with that title to be a discussion about the demise of book reading in the near future. Refreshingly, that was not what this panel was about. Instead the panellists were concerned […]
Melbourne Writers Festival
I went to the Melbourne Writers Festival last weekend. I wanted to revel in writing and books. I wanted to learn more about writing and publishing, and I wanted to be reassured that I was on the right track with my writing. I also went to two sessions specifically to use them as sources […]
My Writing Careers?
Last week I had an interview for a copy writing position. The job basically involved writing 30 minute commercials based on briefs of information received from sales reps. I won’t tell you where, until I start. They have offered me a couple of weeks unpaid trial. I figure I can use that time to learn […]
How Much Klout do You Have?
A couple of months ago I saw a message somewhere that said that employers were now taking the Klout scores of potential employees into account before employing them. Klout score? WTF? The message – probably written by a Klout employee – went on to say that companies were refusing to hire people with Klout scores […]
Book Buying Habits
I read an interesting article this week, on a Random House website, about the book purchasing habits of Americans. The information came from Bowker Market Research and their 2013 U.S. Book Consumer Demographics & Buying Behaviour Annual Review. Taking myself as a typical Aussie consumer of books, I decided to compare my own book buying […]
Review of K.A. Bedford’s Paradox Resolution
Paradox Resolution is K.A Bedford’s eagerly awaited sequel to his 2008 Aurealis winning novel Time Machines Repaired While U Wait. The novel continues the adventures of time machine repairer Spider Webb in a near future where time machines are the new luxury car. Spider is an ex-policeman, a man who quit the force after blowing […]
An Image Problem.
Last week I wrote a blog post which concluded that many self-publishers would probably burn out from the estimated twelve hour days needed to write and successfully promote their books. To illustrate the blog post I used a picture of a crazed Jack Nicholson from The Shining. For those who have not seen it, in […]
Chronic Self-Publishing Syndrome.
My post this week relies on a year-old article in the Guardian about self-publishing authors. The article refers to a survey that was conducted by the Taleist website. One thousand self-published authors responded to an invitation to fill in the survey. So it is not a random survey of self-publishers, and therefore, its validity is […]
Aliens have not visited Earth.
To my knowledge, I have not been abducted by aliens, although if I had, that might explain a few things. For example, maybe one of their alien probes caused my Ulcerative Colitis. I have seen many UFO’s, but I quickly realised those unidentified flying objects were hot air balloons or shooting stars, and not alien […]