C.M. North's Blog, page 5
December 25, 2019
'Tis the Season
Marley was dead: To begin with. Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol Yesterday, I challenged a few people at work to identify the quote above. No guesswork here, though – it’s the opening line to A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens. This is perhaps my favorite holiday story ever, and of course the only worthwhile film […]
December 8, 2019
What Brings Joy?
It might seem an odd topic to discuss for me – an aficionado of the miserable and depressed – to discuss the concept of joy, but however difficult it might be to believe, it’s still something I keep in my heart, deep and buried though it might be. You see, I believe that there are […]
November 21, 2019
The Whirlwind of Emotional Free Fall
There’s an old Iron Maiden song called Man on the Edge, based on the movie Falling Down with Michael Douglas. The song (and the movie) are about a man slowly losing his sanity, and the repeated lyrics, “Falling down, falling down, falling down” echo through my mind frequently these days. You see, going into autumn […]
November 11, 2019
I Think I Have a Structure
After something of a brainwave last night, I spent a good deal of time thinking about how I want The Broken to flow, and I think I’ve come up with a final structure! I had a structure for my first draft, but I trashed it when I realized it didn’t contain half of the things […]
October 31, 2019
Happy Birthday to 22 Scars
Two years and two days ago, my debut novel 22 Scars was made available digitally, with the print copy following two weeks later. Since then, I’ve garnered almost 100 reviews on Goodreads, and a respectable 25 on Amazon. Can you believe it? The overall rating is standing at 3.58/5 on Goodreads, and 4/5 on Amazon, […]
October 29, 2019
The Distance from the Familiar
It’s almost impossible for me to comprehend that it’s been two years since 22 Scars was published. At times it feels like yesterday, and others an eternity. The process, the writing, the stress and honing and making it as perfect as it could be, and then releasing it into the world and waiting anxiously for […]
October 15, 2019
The Crushing Weight of Despair
Apologies for the clichéd title, but it’s an apt metaphor. Despair, sadness, depression … all of them are associated with a sense of feeling weighted down, and (for me, at least) it ties to a genuinely physical sense of being unable to move, of having some great pressure pushing in on your chest, your stomach […]
October 7, 2019
More Music, More Ideas
Last time I wrote here, I mentioned that I’d finalized the list of songs for the album that might accompany The Broken. I still had some work to do, but I was getting close. Now, I’m proud to be able to say that I’ve finished the album (compositionally, at least)! I have 11 full-length songs, […]
September 16, 2019
Almost Back to Writing!
The past few weeks have been a whirlwind of productivity, but not in relation to the actual writing of the book, The Broken. Instead, I’ve been pouring my efforts and resources into completing the writing of the album that may or may not accompany the book … when it’s ever released. To that end, I’m […]
September 5, 2019
What if I released a book and an album together?
As those of you who follow my (somewhat lackluster) progress on here, I’m in the middle of writing my sophomore novel, The Broken. About events involving a band in the nineties, and the fallout of a tragedy they are blamed for, music is, clearly, an integral part of the story and plot. What you might […]
