NickNoWriQuart - One K, Once A Day

I stopped blogging regularly about my writing a while ago, felt I was running out of new/readable ways to say the same things - certainly, nothing I couldn't say on Twitter more concisely. However, I'm embarking on a Big Writing Exercise shortly, so I'm throwing it a post.

Because, yes, it's autumn, the end of the year is poking its head over the door, leaves are brown and it's cold in a Winter-Preview kinda way, all that can only mean one thing - Writers Doing Calendar-Based Word Count Challenges!

Obviously, I'm a little ahead of everyone else here - most are waiting for November to embark upon the epic NaNoWriMo quest. But I'm doing something a little different and I'll now attempt to explain it...

Hobson & Choi Podcast Special - Writers' Huddle Interview with Ali Luke!

Like a bolt from the blue, the Hobson & Choi Podcast is back on the scene!

I've moving house in the near future and will be without wifi, so internet content from the Nick Bryan/H&C Media Empire will be thin on the ground. But before disappearing into irrelevant meatspace for a bit, I recorded an interview for Writers' Huddle, a subscription-only writing forum run by the excellent author and blogger Ali Luke.

Listen now to hear me talk about H&C, serialisation, self-publishing, writing characters different from yourself and whether I ever considered putting Hobson & Choi into first person. Plus a little news about the status of upcoming H&C books in the outro.

So, download the episode here using the power of browser rightclicking!

Or use the embeddy player below, or if you're faithful enough to still be subscribed to H&C in iTunes, it should be there too...

Hobson & Choi Podcast Special - Writers' Huddle Interview with Ali Luke! by Nick Bryan on Mixcloud

Thanks to Ali for hosting the chat and letting me put it out to the wider internet. Be sure to check out her blog at Aliventures and her own self-published fantasy book Lycopolis. Plus she's on Twitter (obviously) as @aliventures.

If this interview got you interested in my Hobson & Choi darkly comic crime books, you can read more about them at HobsonAndChoi.com. Sounds by zagi2 on Freesound as before.

And that, for now, might really be it for a wee while...

Five ways my book plans collapse upon contact with the real world - A Metaphorical Disaster Movie

At this stage, I've written a lot of novels, and started even more than that. Every single one started with a plan of some form - sometimes a couple of ideas scribbled on a pad, other times thousands of words of ideas, followed by a chapter-by-chapter outline and then individual scene breakdowns within those chapters.

But either way, the plans always come a little unstuck when exposed to the writing process. As I've been doing a lot of first drafting lately, so spending a heaping helping of my time dealing with plans not corresponding to prose.

So, to inform and reassure anyone in a similar place, I've broken my Plan Vs Reality problems into an internet-friendly Buzzfeed-style five-point list. Yes, only a thin membrane separates some of these feelings, but I've spent enough time staring at my plans in despair to know they're all distinct. If you've experienced all five of these, you can award yourself a prize when you reach the bottom!

"No-one else dies tonight!" - Nick Bryan's Ongoing Commitment To Making Fewer Mistakes

It's been a while since I wrote about writing - in fact, it's been a while since I wrote a blog which didn't hinge around the Buy my work! message. So, since it's late on a Sunday and I'm feeling too tired from last night's drinking to do any hard labour, I thought I'd break things up on the blog by talking about my current writing obsession: not fucking up.

A couple of months back, I finished drafting a fantasy novel which ended up having the bulk of its middle act and about half its third erased - not after the first draft (which is kinda acceptable) but after I'd finished a beta-readable draft and thought things were going okay.

Interview with me about The Girl Who Tweeted Wolf!

I have not written a blog post today, but it's okay, because Julianne Benford has interviewed me for her blog, so I can just link to that!

It's a fun interview, I talk a bit about my inspirations and process, throw in a few jokes. Give it a look and report back.

And yes, the interviewer is also my girlfriend so there is a nepotism element in there. But don't worry, it's definitely addressed in the post.

Should reading that inspire you to pick up a copy of the book, below is the array of buttons enabling you to do so. And if it reminds you you've read the book and still need to write a review on Amazon/Goodreads/your blog/somewhere else, that's cool too.

Oh, and I 100% finalised my design brief for Book Two last night, so that's looming in the distance, ready to bubble over at any moment. But for now, let's focus on The Girl Who Tweeted Wolf. Read interview, buy, enjoy.

Work After Work - A Work Update Working 2014 Over With Work

Due to the combined impact of my book coming out, my first ever trip to a convention and the heat and humidity fucking with my motivation, I have not done one of these ramble-about-my-process blog posts for a while.

I miss them, I have a few minutes spare, I've recently changed my writing routine a little and solidified my future plans, so let's talk about that. Why would you work after work? Is it because you like work, or at least need to work on your work? What is work? What is my work? How is your work?

My Writing Music - Songs to mash the keyboard to

Some writers don't listen to music while they work, needing constant silence to produce their genius. However, I require an endless rolling soundtrack to drown out the screaming choirs of my own insanity (10 points for knowing where I stole that last phrase from), so I get through a lot of tracks.

A lot of the choices go in phases - new records come out, or I fancy immersing myself in the music of one artist, so I load my phone up with their albums. Then I listen to this person exclusively for a while, until I'm sick of them and don't want to hear anything they've done for months.

A few songs/sounds do survive the gap though - elevate themselves above the flighty phases and become evergreen presences. Here, then, are my perpetual audio companions. Apologies if a few of them turn out to be part of temporary phases and I'm just blinded by momentary love.

My Writing Process meme - The truth behind Hobson & Choi

So, for the first time ever on this blog (WOO), I have done one of those answer-some-questions-then-nominate-people memes. Because, y'know, why not? Lets me talk a bit about Hobson & Choi, which I always enjoy doing. For anyone who ever wanted a straight-forward pitch for the whole story, here it is.

Thanks to Lisa Goll of London Writer's Cafe for nominating me, you can see her pass at the same questions over at her blog.
But now, on with the ME.