So many books, so little time…and even less bookmarks. My house is overflowing with books. There are old favourites that I need to re-read, under piles of library books, spilling over onto stacks of my recent book-spree buys. With all the recent additions to my TBR pile, I have resorted to using receipts and sticky-notes as bookmarks since I only have so many actual bookmarks (magnetic, fabric, tasseled, etc).
Of my actual bookmarks, magnetic work best as they obviously don’t slip out and lose my place, and of my makeshift bookmarks, I rather favour sticky-notes as I can jot down thoughts – handy for writing quick reviews afterwards – something I like to do as it helps books and supports authors. But my new favourite is this one, made from my son’s baby hair, which I saved from his first haircut at age two, and his second haircut at four, just before starting school. Aww.
I kicked off the two week school Easter holiday today with a bit of silly seasonal fun: an Easter book stack challenge. I recently got this tank top showing Ostara holding a spring hare and an egg to celebrate rebirth, and thought I’d recreate the scene with my 11 published books in a stack, alongside a chocolate egg. Why not?
No chocolate eggs or books were hurt in the making of this video, lol.
Work has been busy so it’s good to have downtime at last. The past week I’ve been editing the short stories that my creative writing sixth formers have been working on for a forthcoming published anthology of their work. It’ll be a nice memento of their hard work in the group since October last year, and their contributor copies should make a nice gift as they go on study leave ahead of their AS-level exams.
Even though it seems the gorgeous weather of the past two weeks has finally changed to rain today (sod’s law), I’m looking forward to some active family adventures over the next fortnight. I’ll be buying some hiking boots ready for mountain adventures coming up soon. Let’s see if I’m fit enough.
I might not be online as much as normal, though I’ll try to intermittently post updates about all things bookish, as and when I can.
Reading time is me time. Hands up who agrees? After a busy week at work (I had a new member of staff shadowing me in class last week. Having to be continually upbeat takes effort) I set aside some recharge time in the form of my favourite introverted pastime… reading.
Spring has finally arrived in Northern Ireland. Since last week, temperatures have been up to around 16°C, which has granted a much-needed opportunity for me to get some Vitamin D while getting in a few more hundred thousand words. Not writing, mind you, just reading. During sunny spells I tend to leave my laptop at home and take a few paperbacks out to the park in my bag.
In one of my previous posts about reading preferences, eBooks vs paperbacks: which is best for reading, I mentioned how I tend to read more eBooks overall because of the accessibility. Lately, it has been the opposite. I normally read my Kindle books in bed, but due to health issues this past month I’ve been going to bed pretty much at the same time my son has been sleeping; in other words, sleeping as much as a child of single digits. Not normally necessary for a middle-aged mum, but health dictates everything. Usually I read my paperbacks in the morning over breakfast or in the afternoon. I find it hard to read from a screen on sunny days as it pretty much turns into a mirror, so my paperbacks have been much handier while out and about in the sun.
Since I haven’t been reading as many eBooks lately, it also made sense for me to cancel my Kindle Unlimited subscription. This doesn’t mean I’ll be reading less books overall, though. It simply means that my paperback TBR pile will be whittling down much quicker than anticipated.
Of course, this can mean only one thing… You guessed it. Another excuse for a book shopping trip soon. Hurray!
What is a stereotypical horror author? My inspiration for today’s blog post came from a chat with someone recently about my writing. The person asked what genre I write and after I mentioned that I write ghost and psychological horror, they looked taken aback and said, “You don’t look like a horror writer.” I reacted with amusement; this simple comment got me thinking, what are horror writers like?
Stereotype 2 = Horror authors are psychos. Some folks might assume that if a writer has a dark imagination, they might actually act on those impulses in real life. In actual fact, horror is an innocent way to explore the nastier side of life in a speculative sense, making horror authors quite mentally-balanced folks, rather than deranged! Check out this article, Why horror makes us good people for more.
Stereotype 3 = Horror authors all believe in the supernatural. Not all. A belief in ghosts or the afterlife is not a prerequisite for becoming a horror author, any more so than an author must have a creative writing degree to write. Nope, a good imagination is all you need. Want to know which authors believe in the supernatural? Check out this article, 9 authors who believed in ghosts.
Happy Mother’s Day if you are from, or live in, the UK. My lovely literary lad made me this hand-painted book bag. Aww! Here’s my unboxing video, if you want to check it out.
I love my hand-made book bag. My son is very thoughtful. The shops are full of cut flowers and chocolates at the moment, all geared at Mother’s Day. I personally hate cut flowers. Why would I want something dead that takes a lot of work (getting a vase, changing the water, putting in the sachet of chemicals to keep them fresh, etc) and will turn mushy and brown within 5 days? Likewise, who needs junk food? Chocolates as a gift are so bland. They don’t require thought. Give me a hand-made gift any day over a generic, bland present. Same goes the other way: I never give flowers, chocolates or gift cards. I always give something individual and tailored when I choose a present.
Anyway, whew! That was a tad negative, was it not? I didn’t realise I could rant in writing, lol. At least I wasn’t doing it right in your ear, eh? It could’ve been a lot worse.
In actual fact, I had a lovely day. We all went for lunch, and then to see a nature art exhibit at the Ulster Museum. Afterwards, we read the messages left by viewers. My son pointed out that there were “too many S’s on ‘owls'” on one of the comments. Ah, how persnickety kids can be, lol.
As an author who uses KDP myself, I know how straightforward it is to upload a Word document or PDF, making it simple for anyone who wants to publish a draft to become an author. It’s cheap too if you do the work yourself and avail of Amazon’s free ISBN option.
It’s easy to think, then, that the quality of self-published books flooding the marketplace would be of a lower standard; but I disagree. I’m not talking about ‘low content’ books here, such as notebooks or diaries, nor AI produced books, which are easy to spot once you get reading a few pages. I’m talking about novels, fiction and poetry collections.
Aside from books that I have been reading for the curriculum at work (GCSE and A-level English), the majority of books I have been buying on Kindle and paperback are self-published, for the simple reason that they are far more original and risk-taking than the often formulaic big-publisher books being released. On many an occasion, I have found myself putting big-publisher books back on the display in brick and mortar stores after reading the first couple of pages, mainly because I find the content safe and unoriginal. Safe and unoriginal gets monotonous after a while.
I suppose that if the market really is flooded by books, and if the majority of those are self-published, then that’s a good thing as they provide something different and unconventional. Without needing to honour a contract with a publisher, they can write what they want, and see how their books will be received by readers. A few of my favourite psychological fiction authors started out as indie published and on the basis of their books going viral, were picked up by big publishers; I have found that their recent books have more predictable and safer ‘money churning’ plots than they wrote when they were self-published.
Regarding quality, there is often no difference between self-published/print on demand and mass produced, as indie authors tend to hire editors and graphic designers, or learn how to do it professionally themselves. Another reason why I’ve been choosing to read more indie books lately.
I think what it comes down to is, since millions of books are published every year in an oversaturated market, the best way to try and stand out is to do something different, and most of all to stay true to your craft. The majority of us as authors will never make a living from it – the reality is that very few books go viral on social media – so we have to do what we can to make our books catch the eyes of readers.
And, on that note: readers! Please do review or even simply rate the books you read. It takes one second to click a star rating at the end of a Kindle, and you’ll be helping authors to match their books with other like-minded readers.
It’s finally spring, my second favourite season of the year. To celebrate the spring equinox yesterday and World Poetry Day today, here’s a spring-themed poem from my collection, The Redundancy of Tautology, published by Cyberwit in 2021.
I’ve been reading more poetry lately, and not just because of World Poetry Day. Working in a library, where I’m surrounded by so many books (and not enough hours in the day to read everything!) has expanded my reading – tastes and the amount of books read. The last two books I reviewed on my Goodreads author page were poetry books.
As for writing more poetry? I tend to work on a project when inspiration strikes, and at the moment it’s all fiction, so I haven’t got any new poetry collection ideas lined up for now. If something comes to mind, I might just churn out a new poetry book, if the inspiration strikes.
Happy St Patrick’s Day! To celebrate, my collection of Irish horror novels, the Belfast Ghosts trilogy, is available for only £1.98. The Blue Man is free, while The Fairy Lights and Matthew’s Twin are 99p each. Grab yourself some freebies this week only… and please do leave a rating or review. They really boost books and help authors to reach readers.
Today’s blog post is really just an update about my writer’s block, which I wrote about last month. Since then, I’ve decided to prioritise one manuscript over the other – and it’s working. Any guesses which one I decided to go ahead with, between the ghost novel manuscript and the psychological fiction sequel?
Maybe you guessed that, as a horror fan, I’d prioritise the ghost novel I’ve been chipping away on? Or maybe, since I mentioned that I’m writing the sequel to The Buddha’s Bone because of reader requests, I’d go ahead with that?
Did you guess right?
Yep, my readers matter. They keep me motivated, after all. I’ve decided to keep going with the sequel to the psychological literary fiction story set in Japan that I published in 2021. Focusing on the final third of this story without the distraction of the other novel wip has allowed the ideas to flow. No more writer’s block, hurray.
Hopefully I’ll get the draft finished soon and have something more substantial to say about the manuscript than progress updates. In the meantime, it’s business as usual.
March seems to have a lot going on in terms of calendar events, doesn’t it? Let me do a quick summary, just to make sure I’m getting them all correct:
March 4th = Pancake Tuesday
March 6th = World Book Day
March 8th = International Women’s Day
March 17th = St. Patrick’s Day
March 20th = Spring equinox. Hurray!
Since only three of the above dates have passed, I can only share the ones I have already celebrated. My last post focused on keto pancake Tuesday, so here’s my celebration of World Book Day and International Women’s Day:
World Book Day – Thursday 6th March
Cat in the Hat carrying a rainbow book stack
My author bookstack is getting rather heavy these days. It’s now a test of my balancing ability to see if I can manage carrying it in one hand while trying to take photos, or record videos. Did I get arm cramps doing several takes? Yes, incidentally I did; though I think that’s a testament to my lack of fitness rather than the weight of my books. Want to see my efforts, for morbid curiosity? Here ya go:
International Women’s Day – Saturday 8 March
I spend so much time promoting my own books on social media, and aside from writing, I’m also an avid reader. To celebrate some of the many 5* reads by my favourite female authors, I made this promotional video to share their books on International Women’s Day.
What else?
Well, I’m a sucker for celebrations, especially if the recent warm weather keeps up (a balmy 13°c in Northern Ireland…when the sun is out, so are the shorts!) This weekend, I did some gardening with the little dude. We planted wildflowers and some perennial bulbs, and then I sat out on the grass to get some much-needed Vitamin D. Next weekend there will be festivities aplenty for St.Patrick’s Day, so that will give me an excuse not to do laundry or repaint the kitchen (he he). The joys of middle-age!
Leilanie Stewart 