Helen Lowe's Blog, page 12

It’s WALL #4 Update Time — Beavering On

Last Thursday, in my About The Characters post, I mentioned how quickly the weeks roll around.

A statement that applies equally well to months because I read Atrayah’s comment on the same post (thank you, Atrayah) and realized that it’s been five (5!) months since I did a revision update. Mea culpa!

WALL #4 update time

As you’ve probably guessed, a main reason for that is because the muses and the story have been working me as hard as ever, and I’ve been so busy ‘beavering’ that the weeks and mo...

Meet Onnorin — All About Minor Characters In “The Wall Of Night Series”

How quickly the weeks do roll around because already it’s time for another “About the (Minor) Characters” post.

‘Those who know’ will also know the drill—which is that the series focuses on the minor (or more correctly, sometimes “more minor”) characters in The Wall Of Night series because:

“I think it’s the presence of the smaller characters that “makes” a story, creating texture around the main points of view.”

~ from my Legend Award Finalist’s Interview, 2013

Initially, the series focused e...

On Writing A Novel: Haruki Murakami

“It’s kind of a cliché to say it’s a lonely process, but writing a novel—especially a really long one—is exactly that: extremely lonely work. Sometimes I feel like I’m sitting all alone at the bottom of a well. Nobody will help me, and nobody’s there to pat me on the back and tell me I’ve done a great job. The novel I produce may be praised by people (if it turns out well), but no one seems to appreciate the process itself that led to it. That’s a burden the writer must carry alone.”— Haruki Mu...

More Book Booty!

I’ve very nearly made it to the end of my January Book Booty list — only Pascal Mercier’s Night Train To Lisbon to go now.

And I’ve just been given three more for the T(o) B(e) R(ead) list. Herewith in alphabetical order by title:

City of Girls by Elizabeth Gilbert (2019)

Yes, the Elizabeth Gilbert of Eat, Pray, Love fame. This is a later work, which I would categorise as “recent historical” fiction, i.e. it starts in 1940 and covers a time period until 2010. From the backcover synopsis, it appe...

On Supernatural Underground Now: The Year of the Villain #8

You know the drill, right? Right on — 1 September has rolled around and that means a new post on Supernatural Underground.

Although I’m sticking with my “villains in fantasy” theme, so not completely new — but I’m still happy to get post #8 out there. The theme is:

Secret Villains: Year of the Villain in Fantasy #8

Halbrand in Rings of Power 1

Yep, these are the exponents of duplicity and manipulation, the éminences noire and fifth columnists of Fantasy literature. I’ve only used a few examples...

“All created works forged in their notebooks…”

As you’ve probably guessed, the title is is a quote from Monday’s Recommended Reading post on The Notebook: A History Of Thinking On Paper (The Notebook) by Roland Allen.

You may even recall it verbatim, only a few days having passed since the review posted.

The quote refers to how a range of authors from Geoffrey Chaucer to the current era have used notebooks to jot ideas, draft text, and forge works of literature. The chapter in the book devoted to writing is titled “Yes, better if dentist i...

Recommended Reading: “The Notebook: A History Of Thinking On Paper” by Roland Allen

This is the penultimate read in my Book Booty post from January, and although I’ve enjoyed the other four books read-and-reported on to date, so far this is my favourite.

The Notebook: A History Of Thinking On Paper (hereafter The Notebook), written by Roland Allen and published by Profile Books, is non-fiction. In terms of secondary categories, it is clearly history, but it also charts social, cultural, and technological change over (circa) the past eight hundred years.

So-o, onto what The Not...

On Writing — Louise Glück

“I tell my students, who believe passionately in explaining the work they’re sharing, ‘You know, when you’re dead, you can’t go around explaining this thing—it has to be right there on the page.’” — Louise Glück, 1943 – 2023

“It has to be right there on the page” — Just this! Which is why it’s important to keep going and striving to get the right words into their right order, even when the whole process feels a tad Grond-ish, as per Monday’s post.

To read more about Louise Glück, Nobel Laureat...

Oops: It’s Monday!

Oh-my-gosh-it’s-Monday-and-I-don’t-have-a-post-up-already — woe (and whoa!) is me and very many (a million? a myriad?) mea culpas!

[Takes deep breath, thinks…] Well, I had intended to bring you another review, this time of The Notebook: A History of Thinking on Paper by Roland Allen, which I’ve recently finished and totally loved — that’s the short version.  A longer version will follow, this I promise.

[Takes another breath, thinks some more…] But the reason you behold me, sandbagged by Monday ...

About The Characters: Meet The Minor Players In “The Wall Of Night” Series — Meet Orcis

The About The Characters series focuses on the minor characters in The Wall Of Night series, in large part because:

“I think it’s the presence of the smaller characters that “makes” a story, creating texture around the main points of view.”

~ from my Legend Award Finalist’s Interview, 2013

Initially, the series focused exclusively on characters from The Heir of Night, but now I’m continuing on with minor characters from both The Gathering Of The Lost and Daughter of Blood — in alphabetical order...