This summer I’m simultaneously writing a new novel – currently up to 28k words – while finishing final edits on my latest novel MS, both of which inspired my latest video. The inflatable silliness of riding a rodeo bull, as well as partaking in an inflatable horse race, sums up the beginning and end of the writing journey quite well, I think.
How it feels to start a new novel
Starting a new novel is much like riding a rodeo bull. You take the bull by the horns, feeling confident to get stuck in with a chapter plan, only to get bucked off when the writer’s block hits.
How it feels to finish a novel
At the opposite end of the manuscript, you once more feel confident upon seeing the finishing line in sight: in my case, straight ahead in an inflatable horse race (um, lol), before spotting a consistency error to break your editing flow and maybe the odd typo here and there. Having an editor and proofreader is always a must for any serious writer.
Anyway, silly fun aside, I do have serious writing goals this summer, which I’m hoping to make progress with. I’ll no doubt be posting more on this soon. But for now, enjoy this tomfoolery:
Gripe alert! Grab a cup of tea and lend me your ear so that I can have a grumble. Lately, not one but two acquaintances have asked me for free writing advice on behalf of their friends. Now, I’m a generous person with my time and I’m happy to help others with their writing, but not if I’m not supported in turn. Let me explain. You see, both of my acquaintances had never even asked how my writing was going, let alone bought any of my books, yet were happy to email me to ask for free writing advice on behalf of their friends when it suited them.
Personally, I would never have the gall to call in a free favour from an acquaintance with a particular skill set if I had never supported their business prior to such a request. Imagine the audacity of that! I would, at the very least, offer to pay for their knowledge and time; and so this is exactly what I did to my acquaintances who took it upon themselves to ask me for free writing advice on their terms. In the latter case, I explained that I was happy to offer advice to their friend, provided they were happy to buy one of my books as a gesture of goodwill. Which they did.
We’re a generous bunch in the writing community, and as an author who also teaches creative writing part-time, as well as publishes fellow authors and poets in Bindweed Anthologies, I’m accustomed to helping others with their writing. But, I expect people to give a little bit back to me in turn.
This week I’ve been away on a family adventure to Drogheda, Ireland for sightseeing and a hiking trip around the Boyne Valley for a good dose of history and archaeology. This meant no writing or reading time at all, though I always find inspiration in historical and prehistoric sites, so I’ll probably get round to using some of what I learned in a story at a later point.
Lady Julia Coddington as our Victorian tour guide of Oldbridge House
We were lucky to get ourselves booked on a Victorian tour of Oldbridge House, a Georgian manor house that sits on the site of the battle of the Boyne. The tour, presented by a guide in full Victorian dress and period acting, only happens twice a year so we were very lucky to arrive on one of those two days without prior knowledge; what are the odds. She hosted the tour as Lady Julia Coddington, who was wife of the owner in the 1890s, and spoke about the house, stables and gardens in present tense, telling us that our horses would be cared for by their stable boys while we attended a garden party for her orphaned niece’s birthday. The experience was so immersive that the children in the group fully believed we would be catching otters in the River Boyne and playing croquet.
Off to a Victorian garden party at Oldbridge House
After our tour we hiked for miles along the path beside the River Boyne towards the bend at Oldbridge, where the Williamites, led by Protestant King William of Orange faced the Jacobites, led by Catholic King James the 2nd. At such a tranquil place, with dragonflies slimming low over the river, it was poignant to imagine 17th century soldiers carrying their equipment over their heads while crossing the river, able to identify friend or foe by either the green sprig (Williamites) or white paper (Jacobites) on their hats. After all, Oldbridge didn’t exist back then – the men had to cross up to their necks in the River Boyne.
Don’t forget your Halloweeny bikini if you’re a horror lover on holiday this summer, and why not pack some ghost stories for your trip too. Here are a few of my spooky books to keep you cool for July and August…
School’s out for summer, hurray. If, like me, you work in secondary education then you might well be off too. Here in the North of Ireland, we get all of July off, and most of August. Seven or so weeks of holiday is more than enough time for me to squeeze in some literary time in addition to a planned family holiday.
Speaking of which, are you going away somewhere for your summer horrordays or having a spooky staycation? Remember, horror books aren’t just for winter. You can pack some nightmare fuel in your bag to give you a chill on those hot summer evenings.
Here are a few of mine that readers have been snapping up over the past month. Since 80% of my book sales last month were my ghost horror books and 20% my psychological fiction, that means I’m in good company with lots of fellow horror lovers out there.
How do you get fit when you work in a library? Bookworm bicep curls with a bag of books, of course! Now that school is out for the summer, it’s time for this bibliophile to get in shape, and not make any more pen-pushing excuses…
Lol. My video might be a tad glib, but I’m actually serious about the fitness part. This summer, I’m focusing on strength building. For the past few weeks, I’ve been sticking to a new exercise routine of boxing and weight training for 5 out of 7 days. We already have a punch bag and other boxing equipment at home, as well as 100kg of dumbbell weight plates. Today I just ordered a weight-training bench, which should be delivered this week. Pretty serious, huh?
When I was in my twenties, I did yoga, weights, Thai boxing and JKD (Bruce Lee’s martial art) and I cycled everywhere. Fast forward to middle-age and until recently, walking was about all the exercise I was getting. Well, there’s no time like the present to get into a new fitness routine, eh? Plus, unlike the punch bag, which is outside and therefore only in use at the whims of the Northern Irish weather, the weight-training equipment is all indoors.
Have you heard the expression “May you live in interesting times?” It’s apparently a translation from a Chinese curse. As a horror author, I certainly find such an expression ‘interesting’ and hope that we don’t indeed live in interesting times.
Happy summer solstice! It’s time to say goodbye to the darkness and embrace the light.
Today’s post was inspired by a conversation with a friend, who lamented about a colleague trauma-dumping on her out of the blue. The person was someone she knew from the office, but wasn’t close enough to even call an acquaintance. She offered him a lift home last week, during the rioting across Belfast when Translink had suspended all bus and train services after a Glider bus had been set on fire, and he proceeded to tell her all his personal woes during the twenty minute journey, leaving her reeling in horror. Since it’s the summer solstice, here’s my advice on shedding the darkness.
Don’t trauma dump, write horror instead.
Such a thing has been a staple of many a horror author, for many a decade.
Got internal pain to process? Don’t worry.
You can get it all out on the page. Hey, it’s free, unlike therapy, lol.
Have some psychological ‘demons’ to exorcise? It’ll be ok.
Write some dark poems, or turn those monsters into a great scary story.
Writing horror fiction makes art out of fear.
And make sure you do it the old-fashioned way, writing it yourself. It doesn’t count if you use AI. That’s just stealing from the work of the authors who have done it the hard way, and their copyrighted work was stolen to train those AI programmes.
Anyway, Happy Solstice… and don’t have nightmares!
Conflict, identity and immigration have been issues in Northern Ireland for over 700 years. Listen as I read on BBC Radio Ulster from book 3 in my Belfast Ghosts trilogy, Matthew’s Twin, of a working class man who begins having flashbacks to a past life as a soldier in Ulster during the Scottish conquest of Ireland in 1315AD.
Last month marked 711 years since Edward Bruce’s conquest of Ireland, beginning in May 1315. Scottish garrisons arrived at Latharna, now modern day Larne in Northern Ireland. From there, they moved to Carraig Fearghas (Carrickfergus) and surrounded the Norman Castle positioned on the ‘Rock of Fergus’.
My novel involved a huge amount of historical research, as it is over two decades since I finished working as a field archaeologist. For those reading my blog who don’t know, I studied archaeology and palaeoecology from Queen’s University Belfast. Although I no longer work as an archaeologist (I changed career to teach English in Japan more than two decades ago, and have pretty much been in secondary education ever since) I am an advocate of lifelong learning and like to keep any research I do for my books as accurate as I can.
This week saw the worst of Belfast, but today saw the best of Belfast. Thousands were in Belfast city centre (and I was one of them!) for an anti-racism rally at 1pm today on Saturday 13 June 2026. Belfast made headlines across the world for all the wrong reasons at the start of the week, but this was an end to the week that shows the true Belfast, and the Northern Irish spirit, where the majority of people stand against racism, fascism and bigotry. We are Belfast.
For those not in the know, a brutal knife crime by a Sudanese man against a local man from North Belfast on Monday 8 June sparked racist riots across Belfast on Tuesday 9 and Wednesday 10 June. I saw the knifing video on social media before it got removed and I must say, it was so barbaric that I had to look away. I really hope the victim is okay; currently he is still in ICU and has lost his left eye.
Nevertheless, what followed on Tuesday was also brutal and barbaric, as innocent families were burned out of their homes as a result, purely because of the colour of their skin. I woke up and cried on Wednesday morning when I saw videos of Belfast burning in the news, including Roma families hurrying out of their burning homes into police vans and Ugandan nurses having to be rescued by their Northern Irish church pastor from their flaming houses. The racist rioting happened in working class areas of East Belfast and the Shankill. Although I now live in a different area of Belfast, I grew up close to some of the areas affected.
The sad fact of the matter is that, despite fears about immigration and asylum seekers, in Northern Ireland they make up only 3.4% of the population. No threat there, unless you’re a racist.
Link to article if you click the photo
I admit to feeling some level of despair around mid-week, realising that this is now the third year in a row of summer race riots in Northern Ireland, though each year grows more sinister: a ‘hitlist’ of homes to be targeted by rioters showed a sinister level of organisation that really made my blood run cold. Not only that, but nurses going to work being chased by masked men and asked to show ID at roadblocks staged by masked men near Belfast hospitals, which didn’t happen in previous years. But, it was something my sweet innocent son said on Thursday morning that spurred me into action by attending the anti-racism rally. He said simply this:
“There were 12 of my friends missing from class today.”
Twelve wee kids who were afraid to come to school because of their skin colour, or religion, or both. Children deserve to go to school and receive their education in safety. Adults deserve to go to work in safety without masked men chasing them away. And families deserve to live in safety in their homes without fear of being burned out.
Getting back to the original issue of the crazed knifeman who sparked the riots this week. Back in 2023, he flew from Sudan to Paris, Paris to Dublin, then took a bus to Belfast and claimed Asylum, which was ‘fast-tracked’ by the Tories/Home office under Suella Braverman at the time. My question is, why was a clearly deranged mentally ill person allowed to complete a simple questionnaire and then be released onto the streets of Belfast to commit a horrendous crime against a neighbour in his block of flats, a man who only wanted to help him settle into his new home. As for who was in charge of that, well, Suella Braverman is, of course, now with Reform. Yet, none of the rioters flew over to England to riot either in front of the Home office, or at Nigel Farage’s front door.
Leilanie Stewart 