Helen Lowe's Blog, page 61

A Snippet of Summer

I thought I’d share this photo as a wee snippet of my Southern hemisphere summer.

About The Characters: Meet The Minor Players in “The Wall Of Night” Series — Meet Ilkerineth

UK/Aus/NZ

USA

Hokay, team, we’re well into 2020 now and back to our normal routine — although maybe not quite when it comes to what time this is posting! However, I thought it was time to resume theAbout The Characterspost series.

A Few Thoughts On Word Of Mouth…

“Word of mouth” is one of those topics that comes up reasonably often between writers, chiefly because it’s an alchemy we all hope will bless our books, i.e. that readers will be so entranced they not only tell everyone they know, but do so with the kind of great enthusiasm that naturally engenders a snowball effect.

A Few Pics From M’Holiday

Lighthouse at Cape Palliser, Wairarapa

The Christmas-New Year holiday in New Zealand also coincides with the main summer holiday. Perhaps because of that, it’s also an important family gathering time, with lots of travelling part of the mix.

This year (which is also kinda last year now: heigh-ho!) both my Christmas and New Year family times were in the North Island, with the between days and new year focused on the Wellington area.

This year (2020), Worldcon is being held in Wellington, too,...

Starting As We Mean To Go On

Back to Haarth & The Wall Of Night #4

I am a little late with this blog today but for what I (and I suspect my readers, editors, and agents) will feel is the Very Best of reasons, which is that the past few days have been all about focusing on getting back into the writing routine with WALL #4 (WT: The Chaos Gate.)

A statement that should make the title of this post self explanatory.

On Supernatural Underground Now: I Welcome 2020 & A Year of Celebrating Worldbuilding

Fantasy worldbuilding, that is!

In December I wrapped up a Year of Romance #YoR in Fantasy Fiction: #RiFF

Yesterday, by way of welcoming in the new year I announced that 2020 would be my year of celebrating worldbuilding on the Supernatural Underground: throughout the year I’ll be focusing on a few of my favourites among the wonderful, and wondrous, worlds that form part of Fantasy literature.

In short it’s going to be a #YoW #YearOfWorldbuilding year.

The Most-Read “…On Anything, Really” Posts of 2019

So here we are, having run our race of 2019, on the penultimate day of the year—the perfect time to review the most read posts on Anything, Really during the course of the past twelve months.

Usually I review the top ten posts in chronological order through the year, but because of the nature of the post that garnered the most distinct reads, this year I’m going to list in order of hits — and hope that next year will be one where I can revert to the old order!

A link to the post is embedded...

A Geography Of Haarth: Winter Country (Updated)

The Wall of Night Series map; artist Peter Fitzpatrick

It seems fitting that the very last entry for the current A Geography Of Haarth post series, which has posted every second Thursday for most of the past two years, should fall on the very last Thursday of 2019.

During that time, the series has traversed the full range of locales and places fromThe Wall of Nightworld of Haarth as featured in Daughter of Blood (The Wall Of Night, Book Three). Previously, from January 25, 2013 to November...

Merry Christmas!

Pohutakawa: the NZ “Christmas” tree

Best Wishes To All Of You!

Many years ago, when I lived in Sweden for a time, the festival known as Lucia (aka Saint Lucia’s Day) was a pretty big deal in the immediate run-up to Christmas.

Lucia falls on December 13 and light is a big part of the celebrations, with young girls being chosen by their church or community to wear the traditional crown of candles.

My calendar tells me that today is Hannukkah this year (although it is not celebrated on a fixed date like Lucia or Christmas.) And Hannukkah, like Lucia, is...