Ask the Author: S.E. Ney
Answered Questions (10)
S.E. Ney
Wouldn't be a mystery if I told anyone, but incidents in my life did make it into the books at various points. I doubt there's an author alive who doesn't use personal experience as the basis for plots/characters/responses. Including those moments adds a verisimilitude that the reader can pick up on (and several did).
S.E. Ney
I'm afraid at the moment I'm actively avoiding reading fiction. I have a tendency to mimic whatever I'm reading at any given time. It's unconscious rather than deliberate, but it's very hard to stop. I'm writing the third book in my trilogy and it's important the author voice remains consistent. As a result, my only reading right now consists of textbooks needed to ensure my history (when my characters visit the past, such as Titanic and Ancient Greece in book 1 or Ptolemaic Egypt in book 3) or other verifiable details are correct.
S.E. Ney
The extremists made good on their threat and their destructive weapons, carefully planted, responded instantly to the press of a single button. In one fell moment every piece of literature or knowledge outside their solitary chosen source was obliterated and mankind sent back to the intellectual stone age.
S.E. Ney
The new world I've created in book 3. It's already fascinating and filled with things I never imagined when I started writing it. I've only touched the edges and I find I'm curious and want to know more. Just as well as I plan to send my characters there in another novel!
S.E. Ney
I read, I go for a walk outside (inasmuch as I can. More a hobble in my case!), I clean my pet's cage, watch a film... sometimes I just go to bed. I've found if I try and force it I end up writing a ton of rubbish I'll end up binning or -- much worse -- write myself into a corner I can't get out of. If I leave it and wait, eventually the characters tell me what they want to say and then a load comes out in a rush. Ideas come to me in all sorts of places, so having my mobile with a voice record feature is useful, but normally I just roll it around in my head, working it all out and repeating it, looking for problems and fixing them until I can get to my computer. My friends have got used to me suddenly stopping a conversation because a really good idea has come into my head. They know not to interrupt. Doesn't happen often, but it has been known. Writer's block, to me, is just my subconscious holding up a 'wait' sign while it works out the kinks. It always comes back to me eventually.
S.E. Ney
Being your own boss! I was a teacher for 35 years (writing all that time, just nothing original!) and bit by bit the independence of thought and approach that used to mark teaching was eroded until I felt that everyone is supposed to take the same approach in the same way every time. That, to me, takes away the difference between good teachers and bad teachers (potentially a positive) and replaces it with a general mediocrity (definitely a negative) of conformism and box-ticking. With writing, so long as my readers understand me I can break rules or follow them when it suits me. In one chapter I had to try to get across something it was almost impossible to put into words, so I used formatting to get the message across. On the one hand, it hurts to read it (which is exactly what it SHOULD do), on the other, it perfectly captures what the characters are going through. Is it uncomfortable? Yes! Does it make your eyes hurt? Yes! Is it what you're supposed to do in a novel? Nope -- or, at least, I've not seen it before. That doesn't mean it's not been done, just that I've not encountered it. It was simply my way of doing it. Does it work? Absolutely, and that means it's fine. I won't have someone slamming the 'rules' in front of my face and saying 'you can't do that!' I DID do it. You don't like it, read something else!
S.E. Ney
As trite as this sounds, write. Get feedback wherever and whenever you can and don't be afraid of negatives. I know some writers who despise anything but positive feedback, which is nice but useless if you want to improve. I think you need to recognise the difference between constructive and destructive criticism and have enough faith in your own work to know when to reconsider and when to stick to your guns. That takes practice and experience. That's not to say being told something you've written is wrong or isn't good enough doesn't hurt, but you learn the difference between 'that IS wrong and I need to correct it' and 'that's right for MY story and MY characters, it stays!' You need to build confidence but not so much as to be blind to obvious mistakes.
S.E. Ney
Book 3 of my trilogy, Oslac's Odyssey. Book 1 is called Entrapment in Oestragar. Book 2 is The Anquerian Alternative. Book 3 is Ystrian Dreams. Chapter 1 of Book 3 is done. Chapter 2 is nearly done and I know what chapter 3 is about.
S.E. Ney
No idea. Somedays I wake up and there are loads of ideas waiting in my head and I can't get to my computer fast enough. Other days there's nothing and I stare at the page, re-read what I've written so far (and take the opportunity to edit it), or potter around waiting for my characters to tell me what's happening. Writer's block could be seen as a negative, but I'm on no deadline so it's not so bad. Book 1 is done and out there. Book 2 is with a professional editor and will be released in December. I have time to finish book 3.
S.E. Ney
It came to me while stuck in traffic on the M25, but it's a cumulation of a lifetime of experiences. No one thing gave me the idea.
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