Tag: writing

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A Fully-Booked Weekend

This weekend just gone, I made a point of going to the Dundee Book Festival.

It would have been easy to take in a lot of events. The festival ran from Friday to Sunday, inclusive, and its three venues were all close together. The Steps Theatre acted as the base location, with a few events at the adjoining Central Library, and a few more at the nearby McManus Galleries.

I was selective about my attendance, however, as I’ve previously found it’s easy to be carried away and tie up the whole day. I settled on four events, even if I ended up only seeing three. There was a misprint on the new writing showcase that the end time was 10:30am. This led me to miss the 10:30am start to the next event, about how to submit to My Weekly magazine. However, I’m pleased to report I saw the other two unhindered.

This particular festival is relatively new. It was first organised by Leisure & Culture Dundee in 2025. It also serves as the spiritual successor to the Dundee Literary Festival, which ran from 2006 to 2017 and was an initiative of the University of Dundee.

The literary festival enjoyed a close affiliation with the now-defunct Dundee International Book Prize, which was awarded from 2000 to 2016. As it stands, the university is in no financial position to bring back either the festival nor the prize.

It remains to be seen whether this book festival will match the longevity of its predecessor. However, I can see a lot of potential, so I look forward to its return next year.

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A Good Day for Goals

In honour of our team reaching the World Cup for the first time in 28 years, Monday 15 June was designated as a public holiday across Scotland. In practice, it wasn’t mandatory, although my employer observed it.

The holiday was motivated in part by the timing of their first match against Haiti. Kick-off was at 9pm in Boston on Saturday 13 June, which equated to 2am on Sunday morning in the UK. I don’t care much for football, and I’ve long been opposed to public holidays, but even I must grudgingly admit it was a nice gesture.

I decided early on to use the day for catching up with my writing, dividing my time three ways: editing existing text, writing further narrative, and worldbuilding. By the evening, the project was on firmer ground than in the morning.

As I explored on the blog three years ago, I’ve tried many times to write outdoors and it rarely works out well. So despite the brilliant weather on Monday, most of the day was spent inside at the computer, except for a couple of walks with the official Taskmaster podcast.

Although I’m a fan of the TV show, this companion piece had somehow bypassed me. So every time I go for a long enough walk, I catch up with one more past episode, which has helped me to make a decent dent in the archive.

In my experience, consistent and steady sessions are the key to making progress on a large project.

For around a decade, I’ve owned a copy of War & Peace by Leo Tolstoy. I’ve been going back to it intermittently during this time, and I’d reached page 767 of 1296 pages by October 2024 – although much of the latter section is given over to endnotes and other explanatory details. Despite its length, most of the chapters can be read in ten minutes; there are simply a lot of them.

On 22 May 2026, I set some time aside to read one chapter before bed and another after waking up. While I don’t always manage, I’m now rapidly approaching 900 pages, so I’m on track to finish by the end of summer.

The public holiday was a massive boon for that writing project, but without also tackling it on a regular basis, it could take a long time to finish what is expected to be a series of nine stories. At least the groundwork is firmly in place, and when I find that regular time to work on it, I’ll have a stronger idea of its future direction.

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Back In the Room

A number of factors came together yesterweek, including scheduling problems and technical problems, which meant I couldn’t bring you a full entry. In the short explanatory note, I mentioned there were three possible topics I could cover. During the intervening period, however, I’ve added another one to this list, and it’s that I’m covering today.

The horror film Backrooms was released into cinemas at the tail end of May, and I had a chance to see it on Wednesday of last week. The director Kane Parsons didn’t come up with the central idea, but used the existing concept from popular culture. He’s previously expanded upon it with a series of short films available on YouTube.

In short, the eponymous backrooms are an endless maze of empty rooms and partitions that resemble an office or storage space, often illuminated by harsh lighting and decorated in shades of yellow. The architecture is largely stable, so any character who goes through an entrance can typically return to the previous room, and objects can be carried in and out.

The limitability of the place also frequently reminds people of a real-life place they’ve been before. In my case, my dad used to have a hair salon in the basement of a bank, which was accessed by a long staircase. Fluorescent lighting was a necessity, since there wasn’t so much as a window at street level. I also remember an unfinished section that looked onto bare rock; I called it the dungeon.

But I’m going off the point somewhat, as this blog is about writing, not art. In the film, the setting is front and centre of the whole narrative, so I was interested to see how it was described in the script. I expected there would be a leaked copy of the screenplay going about. Instead, I can only find a minimalist rendering that strips out everything but the dialogue, making it no help at all.

Nonetheless, I liked that the sets are varied, but there are no contrived traps for the characters. They’re often free to leave at any time, provided they know which corner to turn and if they can outrun anything that’s chasing them. It also steers clear of parodying films with similar characteristics, such as The Shining, The Blair Witch Project or Being John Malkovich.

Considering the practical sets built for the occasion, it’s remarkable this was delivered with a budget of $10 million, which is low-budget in Hollywood terms. Yet there is one other film around at the moment with even tighter purse-strings.

If $10 million is low-budget, then the $750,000 to shoot Obsession is practically pocket change. There are some parallels: this is also a horror, and its writer-and-director Curry Barker also started on YouTube. From here, however, it travels in its own direction, following a more conventional path with storytelling and gore at its centre.

It may be a coincidence that these two directors have come from a similar background to release low-budget horror films in the same month.

Equally, it might also be the beginnings of a trend where we see ideas transfer more readily from the computer screen to the cinema screen. If so, we must also brace ourselves for a hundred photocopies of Backrooms, or narratives just different enough not to tread on the toes of Obsession.

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It’s Not Happening This Week

My schedule and my technology has been against me for the last few days. It’s frustrating because I have three possible topics I could cover, but I’m unable to explore any of them.

Instead, I’ll be back next week with a full entry.

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Back to Basics with Spell‑Checking

I’ve been using the free tier of Grammarly since 2017, but I’d disabled the extension in Firefox.

This was primarily because my old computer didn’t have enough RAM and couldn’t easily handle the extra work. Even once I invested in upgrading the memory, I simply didn’t think to turn it on again.

So for a long time now, I’ve been writing these entries without the aid of a spell-checker, and that’s led to a few errors that weren’t picked up manually.

Last week, I decided to switch it back on, and I was quickly reminded of the other reasons I’d disabled it.

When a suggestion box appeared underneath the text, like correcting suggesiton to suggestion, I found this useful.

But Grammarly also constantly pushed its Pro membership level through these boxes. The software was set up to reveal only a few advanced suggestions per day before blanking them out and telling the user to upgrade.

I found those few advanced suggestions would amount to little more than a find-and-replace with a thesaurus; found might be changed to discovered, or stay to remain. There appeared to be no way to switch these off or even to snooze them for a fixed period

I’ve been writing long enough to know I need a strong spell-checker but a low-level grammar checker that only looks for obvious errors like should of rather than should have.

Grammarly was already beginning to bloat with features even in 2017 and this has only continued to grow. It must be stated, however, that’s far from exclusive to this software, and there are writers who will benefit from that Pro level subscription. I’m simply not one of them.

After closing my account, it was time to take advantage of the spell-checker built into Firefox. By adding a third-party dictionary to ensure all words belonged in British English, I’ve been able to catch the majority of errors without the need for further suggestions.

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Digging into the Edinburgh Spoken-Word Scene

Continuing a recent trend, I’ve been going to more spoken-word events. This hasn’t been a conscious decision, but instead a combination of wanting to see my poetry pals in action and simply being available on the night.

My schedule worked out in such a way that I was able to visit the Athletic Arms in Edinburgh, known locally as The Diggers, for the two-monthly Graveyard Shift event. It’s further afield than I could normally manage.

One of the headline acts, Ross McCleary, brought this to my attention. I’d originally wanted to surprise him, but it was necessary to clarify some details, particularly as the poster showed the date as Thursday 7 May, whereas the Ko-Fi page initially listed Tuesday 12 May.

So with my train booked and a rough idea of where I was going, I arrived just in time for 7pm. Cards on the table, I would typically steer clear of any pub so closely associated with a football team; in this case, Hearts of Midlothian FC.

However, I found the place nothing less than welcoming to a variety of drinkers, almost none of whom were in team colours. I was particularly impressed by the snug at the back, sectioned off by a thick door from the noise of the main bar. It even contained a makeshift cloakroom.

These are not luxuries I’ve always experienced when running my own events, not by a long chalk.

Ross was the last headliner of the night, with Annie Brechin presenting a wonderful spoken-word set in the first half. I was able to speak to both of them throughout the evening. In between, we heard Grant B Robertson playing comedy songs on guitar. It’s a purely personal view, but what a welcome break from the navel-gazing I’ve come to expect from solo musicians.

The Graveyard Shift also opens its stage to a handful of open-mic performers, who are allotted up to four minutes apiece. Not every one of them was up my street, but grassroots poetry thrives on that mix of voices from the beginners to the seasoned, from the angry to the jaded, and all in between.

The next event in July is on a Tuesday evening when I’ll be running my own group, so I know I won’t make that. If the stars align again, however, I’d be delighted to go back and perhaps grab one of those open-mic slots.

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Trying Out Urban Folklore

On Thursday of last week, I was invited to a storytelling event in Dundee run jointly by the authors behind MK Hardy and the science fiction publisher Shoreline of Infinity.

I was given around six weeks’ notice to prepare a piece around the theme of dark folklore. I needed that time because I’m the first to admit I don’t typically write folklore, unlike one of my fellow performers, Erin Farley. However, an idea did eventually hatch.

In storytelling circles, local stories tend to be well-received, especially if the details are spot-on. I realised this year marks the 70th anniversary of when the trams in Dundee were discontinued. I built my story around that event, placing myself into the position of someone who was involuntarily taken on the last tram ride, and setting the story on the same day as the event.

I approached this story in a different manner from any of my previous ones. Instead of starting with a pencil and paper to jot down ideas, I began to piece together its constituent elements while out walking. This wasn’t a concious choice, just the way the story naturally presented itself.

I found one great advantage straight away. Had the story been written down first, it would almost certainly have been more difficult to memorise, but composing it in my head produced a memory palace effect, especially as much of the action involved physical movement.

This method allowed for a lot of embellishment, as no two versions were the same in rehearsals, but this also made the timings difficult to predict. I knew the slot was eight minutes; when I first performed the piece against the clock, I initially believed I’d need to stretch it out to fit the time.

Instead, the clock reached eight minutes and I was barely halfway through. That triggered off round after round of edits, removing and simplifying details while trying to keep a sense of suspense that a longer story allows. That said, these edits helped to solve a major problem near the start: how to contrive a way to make a character from 2026 voluntarily step onto an unfamiliar tram from 1956. In the simplified version, the character instead catches a modern-day bus and is transported through time involuntarily.

Around the time I started regularly performing, I would sometimes adopt a prop. I have one particular piece, for instance, that is most effective when delivered through a megaphone. At the event on Thursday, I revived that idea, taking a last-minute decision to wear my rucksack because it lent a sense of transience to the occasion.

By all accounts, the whole Shoreline event went down a treat with the Dundee audience. This was the publisher’s first foray in the city, as they usually run their nights in Edinburgh and Glasgow, so I hope they’re persuaded to come back in the future.

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A New Impetus for Writing

I found myself with more time than expected at the weekend because two seperate plans were cancelled. I used the time to catch up with some overdue writing. I’ll address that later in the entry, but we firstly need a little background.

I’ve occasionally mentioned that I write fantasy stories under a pseudonym on a well-known website. For the avoidance of doubt, I’m not at a stage where I wish to claim ownership of these, so references to the plot will be vague.

Since my last update about the matter on 27 August 2024, the situation has progressed a little.

After writing 24 parts of my first story, which we’ll call Series A, I then posted an unrelated Series B. That comprised seven parts, drip-fed from April 2024 to February 2025.

In September 2025, I then added a surprise 25th part to A. I consider B to be complete, but I also thought A was complete at 24 parts, so there’s always the possibility of another.

If you’re still following that, good work.

With that unexpected time available at the weekend, I cracked on with two new pieces.

The first is a one-off story that isn’t intended to be a series. It’s also set in a different universe from the other stories, where genetic modification is almost as easy as laser eye surgery is in our world. I’ve been working on this for months to reduce the worldbuilding and exposition in favour of story. I’ve now struck a suitable balance, so that’s been submitted.

The website has decent standards of quality control, so there’s always a wait for approval, but I hope to see that online over the next day or two.

The second is a new series, which we’ll call Series C, and is unrelated to the aforementioned two series. The difference here is that I know where the end-point will be, whereas I kept writing A and B until running out of ideas.

The main character in Series C is travelling a specific circuit so the reader knows from the outset how many parts there are expected to be. This also more easily allows me to introduce recurring characters at specific points without resorting to retcon techniques. What the readers won’t know until the final part is that the character is not quite who she claims to be.

All I need to do now is keep up the motivation to write those parts without too many other distractions.

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Listening to Lunar Lore

Like millions of people over the last few weeks, I’ve been following the progress of the Artemis II project to orbit the moon and return home.

I’m no expert on space, but the mission appears to have been a textbook one. The splashdown was even timed perfectly for primetime Friday night TV in the US, although we in the UK had to stay up somewhat later.

Since the last visit to the moon, computing power and data rates have improved enormously, offering a multimedia experience that was still science fiction in 1972. Despite this, I largely followed the trip in audio form.

BBC Sounds already had an podcast called 13 Minutes to the Moon that was resurrected for the occasion. The title is somewhat misleading because the episodes aren’t 13 minutes long; rather, it orginally covered the final 13 minutes before the Apollo 11 landing.

In its most recent form, Maggie Aderin from The Sky at Night presented a daily summary with guests including the astronaut Tim Peake.

Oddly enough, the lack of visual information didn’t diminish the coverage at all. At times, in fact, it helped when the presenters stepped in with context and small details that a video stream probably wouldn’t have paused to explain. I’ve mentioned before that I enjoy audio drama, and listening to each update felt like the next part of the saga.

These missions are all but guaranteed to seep their way into popular culture over the next few years because we’ve seen this pattern before.

We’ll see retrospective documentaries and scripted dramas exploring the relationships between the crew members. We’ll see a glut of novels using space travel as a backdrop or a metaphor, much like we’ve seen terrorist attacks used since 2001.

Some works will be thoughtful, and a good many more will – frankly – be opportunistic. Either way, they’ll be trying to make sense of a moment that’s not only historic, but already feels that way.

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Join the ALCS Today

Year after year, there’s one topic I revisit on this blog, and that’s encouraging readers to join the Authors’ Licensing and Collecting Society (ALCS).

For nearly 50 years, the organisation has been collecting royalties on behalf of authors. Unlike primary royalties, such as book sales, these are from secondary uses of creators’ works, including: photocopies, cable retransmission, digital reproduction and educational recording. Members receive a bank payment in March and/or September every year, depending on the types of work registered and how often the works have been requested.

If your work appears in at least one publication with an ISBN, you’re almost certainly eligible to join. You’ll need that ISBN, plus a few other details about the work.

Be aware of the one-off membership fee of £36, which is deducted from your first payment rather than paid upfront. There is also a commission of 10% taken from each annual payment, which allows the ALCS to continue to fund its work.

This year, writers received a total of £47.5 million. This is not shared equally, but is based upon the number and type of works registered. It almost certainly won’t be enough to live on as a passive income, except perhaps if you’re a prolific author.

Rather, it’s an acknowledgement of the principle that authors should be paid when a transformative or derivative work is made using someone else’s source material.