Thomas

A special piece of advice

Posted on June 24, 2022June 24, 2022 by Thomas

Here’s one of the many awesome five-star reviews I’ve had for my book How To Write a Novel in 6 Months:

It intrigued me; I wondered what the special piece of advice that helped this writer was. I like to think my little guide contains lots of useful information. Those who’ve read it tell me it has certainly helped them get going with their novels. And the reviews suggest it’s got some handy tips, too.

Of course, I couldn’t guess what spoke to this writer, above.

But I know what my Eureka! moment was when I was struggling with my novels. I was trying to follow what I regard as the most impractical bit of advice hurled at would-be authors:

Write every day.

I found this to be demoralising. At the beginning of the week, I would be full of enthusiasm, determined to get to my desk every day and produce a certain number of words. Like I say in the book, Monday went brilliantly: I’d hit my target, whatever it was; 1,000 or 2,000, perhaps.

I was raring to go on Tuesday.

Then Tuesday came. Life got in the way. I got busy at work (yes, I, like the vast majority of would-be writers had a full-time job). Family matters needed attending to (don’t many of us have kids, pets, husbands, wives, mums, dads?). And Tuesday went: 0 words. I had already failed.

This appeared to be the cycle. I got writing, then I got busy. I soon realised that most “gurus”, many of those who give advice on “how to write a novel”, “how to be a writer”, often haven’t finished a novel themselves; they’ve not lived in the real world of writing.

I had to get real if I wanted to be a writer.

And that’s when the Eureka! moment struck me:

Don’t write every day.

That’s right: ignore that unrealistic piece of advice.

But I still needed a target, a goal. I think this is very important if you want to finish your novel. But daily word-targets just didn’t work in the real world. However, weekly ones just might…

And that was it. I set myself a weekly word target, for my first draft, especially. I aimed for around 8,000 words a week. I found that it didn’t matter if I missed a day due to LIFE; as long as I worked hard on the days i had available to write, I could hit my goal. And I did.

And this is how I wrote two novels a year.

So that was my “special piece of advice”, if you like; the revelation.

I still don’t know what bit of advice helped the writer above. I am only glad that they found something of value in my book. That’s the whole point, after all: to help others write their novels in the real world.

If you’ve read my book, I’d be delighted to hear if you found a “special piece of advice” in it, just one thing that made you think: A-ha!

If you’ve not read it, please let me know a piece of advice that really inspired you.

Get in touch with my on Twitter, @thomasemson and share your thoughts.

Where should I start?

Posted on June 6, 2022June 6, 2022 by Thomas

I’ve had eight novels published, all of them by Snowbooks. I get asked a lot of questions about my writing—where I get my ideas from, being one, very common query.

But another I’ve been asked frequently is: “In what order should I read your books, Thomas?”

Well, here’s the order in which they were published:

Maneater
Skarlet
Prey (the sequel to Maneater)
Zombie Britannica
Krimson (the sequel to Skarlet, and the second part of the trilogy)
Pandemonium Road
Pariah
Kardinal (third in the trilogy that began with Skarlet)

You could read them in the above order, of course.

But if you do read Maneater first, you might then want to read Prey, since it continues the story of Laura Greenacre.

You might want to start with Skarlet if vampires are your thing. You’ll then, probably, want to see how the story ends by reading Krimson and Kardinal.

If the undead grab you, you could start with Zombie Britannica.

So there’s the order for you; where you begin is up to you… enjoy.

The Rules of Writing (there are two)

Posted on December 9, 2021June 6, 2022 by Thomas

I have been teaching some creative writing sessions recently. The writers in the group are great; they have some wonderful ideas. Their WIPs (works-in-progress) are varied, from reality-based domestic dramas to high fantasy. It’s great to see.

The majority of what I’m teaching comes from my book, How To Write a Novel in 6 Months. But of course, I’ve learned some new things about writing since I published the book. I think about writing a lot, because that’s what I do.

One of the things I’ve become more convinced about is that there are no RULES to writing—but there are PRINCIPLES.

However, I have U-turned slightly…

I have come to the conclusion, now, that there are TWO rules. They are axioms, I think; fixed and never-changing. Everyone who sits down to write a novel or story, play or screenplay, must stick to them.

The 2 rules are:

1. Finish it: your book, your play; get to THE END.
2. Don’t bore the reader: make them WANT to turn the page or stay in their seats.

That’s it. Your starting points when you begin writing: these 2 rules.

Do you agree? Anyone have other rules? Or maybe you don’t think these are important. Let me know. I look forward to hearing from you.

So with Christmas coming, and New Year goals looming, maybe some of you intend to write a novel. If that’s the plan, the above two rules are really the only things you need to be thinking about.

Have lots of festive fun, I hope 2022 is creative and bountiful for you all.

Read Chapter 1 of Judgment Day, the final part of The Prophet Wars

Posted on August 11, 2020 by Thomas

The fourth and final part of my Young Adult series “The Prophet Wars” will be published on KDP on September 22.

Called “Judgment Day”, it brings to a close the story of Billy Kingdom, the boy who ca see the future, and Tawny Lang, the girl who can part the waves.

I’ve been writing it over the last month, trying to hit 7,000 words a week, using the progress grid I write about in “How To Write a Novel in 6 Months” to keep track of my writing.

Here’s the grid:

It’s taken just under a month to write the first draft, and now I’m starting the revision process.

And Chapter One is ready. Click here, and you can read it. Hope you enjoy.

You can also pre-order Part 4, here.

The prophets are back…

Posted on February 22, 2020 by Thomas

Hello friends, readers, reviewers, writers, vampires, demons, ghosts…

First, I should say happy new year. We’re well into it now, but this is my first email of 2020. Hope it’s going well for you so far. And if it’s not, I hope it gets better.

Volume 3 of The Prophet Wars, my young adult dystopian thriller (it’s “gripping,” according to reviewiers) will be published on February 28. It’s titled “Battle In The Caves”. Does that suggest action to you? Well, if it does, you’d be right to think that. It’s “action-packed”. You know me. I try to make my stories as exciting as possible; page-turners, I hope.

Of course, I’m making some advanced reader copies (or ARCs, as they’re called) available.

If you’re a blogger, a reviewer, or a reader who’d like to let the world know what they think about the book, you can download a copy here at Bookfunnel.

Formats available include Epub, Mobi and PDF.

Remember, there are ARCs available on the same site for Volumes 1 & 2 as well, if you havne’t read them and would like to leave a review.

Volumes 1 & 2 are available on Amazon (here for UK; here U.S.; other territories too) and here (Smashwords) if you prefer epub or other formats. There’s also Barnes & Noble for epub versions.

Thanks again for your support, and we’ll speak soon,
Thomas

The wonderful world of werewolves

Posted on November 12, 2019November 12, 2019 by Thomas

An anthology of werewolf stories is published in January — and I’m very proud to say that one of my stories is featured. Editor and author Graeme Reynolds (High Moor) contacted me last year and asked me to contribute a tale to the collection. The criteria was that it had to be based on an already-created werewolf universe.

My horror-thriller Maneater was published by Snowbooks in 2008, and introduced Laura Greenacre – the tagline was “Meet Laura. She’ll eat you alive.” She wasn’t the troubled, sweet-natured, “I-don’t-really-want-to-hurt-people” type of werewolf that had started to plague fiction and films at the time (and that kind of werewolf still does). She was animal. And she went down well with readers. You can read more about her here.

And here’s just one review, by Sheila Merritt of Hellnotes:

“Laura is gory and gorgeous, beauty and the beast, the stuff that dreams (and nightmares) are made of. Male readers will find her extremely attractive, and women readers will admire her for her attributes and attitude.”

Couple of years later I wrote a sequel, also published by Snowbooks, called Prey. Went down well, too.

So when Graeme commissioned me, there was only one place to go — back to Laura.

My story’s called The Hunt and elaborates on an event mentioned in Maneater that took place when Laura was a teenager. The story also flashes back to Roman times, 60AD, telling the story of how the Maneater werewolves came to be, their history, their culture.

This week, I’ve just received the proof — and it looks great. That’s the cover, above. I’m really excited to be featured in this collection alongside some top horror names such as Paul Kane, Ray Garton, Jeff Strand and David Wellington.

You can pre-order Leaders Of The Pack: A Werewolf Anthology, here in the UK, here in the U.S.

The Prophet Wars continue…

Posted on October 23, 2019 by Thomas

Volume 2 of my young adult novel The Prophet Wars will be available as an ebook on October 31. Apt, eh? Halloween.

It’s going to be downloadable in multiple formats. Kindle, epub, PDF, and will be available on Amazon, Smashwords, Draft2Digital, Barnes & Noble, iBooks… I could go on.

You can pre-order your Kindle copy right now. Here if you’re in the UK. Here in the U.S.

Meantime, if you’d be happy to review it, you can download a free advanced reader copy (ARC) in various formats right here at BookFunnel.

After you’ve read it, it would be great if you could leave a review on Amazon (after publication day), Smashwords, Goodreads, YouTube, your blog, the local paper. The first volume ARC is also still available, by the way, just in case you’ve not had a look.

If you don’t want to sign-up at BookFunnel, but you want to review the book, email me at info@thomasemson.com and I’ll mail you a PDF. No bother.

Thank you, as usual, for your support. And if you’ve not already done so, you can sign-up to my newsletter here – and you’ll get a free story and an extract from How To Write A Novel In 6 Months.

Coming soon…

Posted on August 12, 2019August 14, 2019 by Thomas

I’ll be self-publishing the first volume of my dystopian/sci-fi/fantasy/YA-but-suitable-for-grown-ups novel The Prophet Wars in the next few weeks.

This book’s been through the mill. I wrote it back in 2015. We were very optimistic it would find a home. My agent liked it; lots of readers I asked to look over it liked it.

But the publishing industry is unpredictable. To quote William Goldman, the screenwriter, “Nobody knows anything.” I certainly didn’t. The Prophet Wars did not find a home. Yes, people liked it a lot, but… always a but.

Usually these days “buts” are related to uncertainty. Publishers aren’t as willing to take risks – although to be honest we didn’t think The Prophet Wars was that risky. However, here’s the pitch:

Britain 2026. Crime is rife. Unemployment soars. There is hunger, there is misery, there is devastation. Our world is on the brink of catastrophe. Earthquakes, storms, wars and plagues blight the planet.
And dark forces are gathering…
The future looks bleak. And 15-year-old Billy Kingdom can see it coming. He dreams about disasters – and days later, they happen.
Through social media, Billy learns that other kids are experiencing similar visions. Online, he grows close to a girl named Tawny Lang.
But one night Billy, Tawny, and other youngsters from across Britain with the same gifts, are kidnapped by armed men. They are taken to an underground compound called The Caves run by Ruby Bleak and her teenage nephew Robin, a child genius lacking any empathy.
Holed up in the subterranean complex, Billy and Tawny develop a bond. The Caves, however, hides a sinister secret. The kids quickly learn that they are only guinea pigs in a plot to control the future. But Billy isn’t having any of it and plots his escape.
But will his desire to see his family again tear apart the trust and friendship he has forged with Tawny and create, for himself and the world, a deadly enemy?
An action-packed story set in the near future and dealing with themes such as family, relationship, trust, and the environment, this is the first volume of Thomas Emson’s Young Adult thriller.

Volume One, which is titled Project 9:6, is available for pre-order here (UK) and here (U.S.).

If you’re a book reviewer or blogger, or just a fan of YA fiction who’d be willing to review the Prophet Wars when it’s published, you can download an ARC (advanced reader copy) on BookFunnel.

If you would like to read an extract, here are a few pages…

Zombie Britannica among Ezvid Wiki’s top choices

Posted on June 21, 2019August 1, 2019 by Thomas

Really delighted to hear from the fabulous people at Ezvid Wiki this week telling me that Zombie Britannica has been included in their recently published wiki, Books with Inventive Takes on the Zombie Genre.

You can see the list here. There are some great zombie books selected. Very proud to have been chosen.

Zombie Britannica is a very “love-it-or-hate-it” novel. What we call Marmite here in the UK. As you’ll see from the reviews, opinion is polarised. But I’m glad to say that the “positive” column has the edge.

One of the criticisms doled out was that everything happens so quickly. But you see, that’s the whole point. Partly, the idea for ZB sprang from the research cited at the beginning of the novel – and it is actually a real study.

Carried out by a group of University of Ottawa mathematics students, it says a zombie outbreak would be devastating – and rapid.

Unless we “hit hard and hit often”, the researchers say, we would be very quickly overwhelmed by the undead – and civilisation would collapse.

So really Zombie Britannica is realistic in that regard. It is backed by science.

Anyway, thanks so much Ezvid Wiki. And if you’d like to know what happens after Zombie Britannica, a sequel, in the form of the short story “Where Moth and Rust Destroy”, can be found in my collection The Trees And Other Stories.