Jason Arnopp's Blog: Jason Arnopp's Blog, page 12

The British Fantasy Society Awards 2014

Just an uncharacteristically brief post to say that I'll once again serve jury duty for the British Fantasy Society Awards 2014.  I'm handling Non Fiction in the distinguished company of Djbril al-Ayed and Emma Newman.  You can see the full list of juries here.

And here's the full list of nominees.  Naturally, I'm always especially interested in the Best Horror Novel category, which this year sees some really fierce competition between great books from the likes of Lauren Beukes...

Easter Insanity: Free Book! Half-Price Books!

Hello to you and your amusingly eccentric collection of severed heads on spikes.

Wanted to tell you about some discounts on books with my name on them, this Easter.  These promotions run for the duration of this fine Easter weekend, up until and including Monday April 21, 2014.

A SINCERE WARNING ABOUT THE ENTITY IN YOUR HOME: FREE!

There's an unbeatable 100% discount on this chilling short (10,000-word) story at Amazon sites around the world.  It's yours for zero pence from now until E...

The Blog Tour: What, Why & How I Write

There’s this ongoing cyberspace thing called The Blog Tour.  I have no idea who started it.  For all I know, the whole thing could be secretly funding Al-Qaeda in some obscure way.  But when William Gallagher asked if I’d like to be ‘tagged’ into writing a post answering four set questions about writing, I said yes, because it sounded like fun and also William is a very nice man with no known terrorist affiliations.  Here are some biographical facts about William...

Agent News!

Hello, lovelyface!

I'm absolutely thrilled to announce my new literary agent.  He's Oli Munson of AM Heath: the legendary mover and indeed shaker who represents the likes of Lauren Beukes, Sarah Lotz, Scott K Andrews, Stephanie Butland and Mari Hannah.  AM Heath was founded in 1919 and still represents the estate of the late, great George Orwell.  Christ on a crutch.

Oli is a tremendous, instantly likeable guy who shares my thoughts on contemporary horror and genre stuff.  He...

five ways to kill audience satisfaction

Being a writer tends to taint your experiences of film, TV or novels, albeit in a way which can improve your own work. While absorbing fiction, I'll inevitably analyse why I'm enjoying, or especially not enjoying, a story. Finding faultscan be brilliantly instructive, in terms of avoiding the same mistakes - provided, of course, that it's not simply an issue of taste. You don't learn much from not enjoying a gangster film, for instance, if you don't particularly care for the genre.

Here are fi...

Adventures In London And Brighton

Ah!  Hello there.  Do come in and warm yourself.  I'll toss another blog on the fire.

Just wanted to quack about a few events I've infiltrated lately, in London and indeed Brighton...

1) BFI SCREENING!

I delightedly trundled along to this November 12 preview at the BFI's London South Bank venue, thanks to the remarkable BFI-ticket-hunting skills of Roland Moore, the TV-writing genius who created BBC One's Land Girls.  An Adventure In Space And Time, as you may well know if yo...

eight ways to annoy people whose help you want

Hello you! Here are a few tough-love pointers about approaching people in the scriptwriting, TV, film, prose and generally creative industries. Specifically, via e-mail. I'm sure this won't apply to you, because you're lovely and you know better. But it might. And that being the case, you may find this useful. Here then, are Eight Ways To Annoy People Whose Help You Want...

1) Appear in someone's inbox, out of the blue, and immediately ask if they'll read your project.
If you really must do thi...

Scott, The Dog And Starting Your Story With Questions

Hello!  This lunchtime, while walking around Brighton, I overheard a snippet of conversation between a man and a woman.

Actually, "overheard" isn't the right word, as they were almost entirely toothless, can-clutching alcoholics, yelling hoarsely at each other across the full width of a road.

"Scott ain't gonna be happy when he finds out," shouted the man.

The woman's face crumpled with confusion and disgust.  "Who the fuck is Scott?"

"Yeah, Scott," came the reply.  "The one who g...

Free New Short Horror Story!

Hello!

I like the idea of giving away a free story as a PDF, which can then be freely distributed.  It's like throwing a bottled message into the ocean: one which then has the potential to magically multiply.

A year ago, I wrote a short supernatural horror story called A Sincere Warning About The Entity In Your Home.  It was written like a letter to you and really was about YOUR home.  No, really, yours.  Read the story and you'll see.

A Sincere Warning... was (and is) availa...

Ten Screw-Ups You'll Fix In Draft Two

I've blogged about how I love writing the very first draft, or Draft Zero as I call it.  The sheer exhilarating freedom of knowing that no-one will ever read it.  Slamming words down on the page, doing the very best you can, safe in the knowledge that subsequent drafts will sort it all out.

I'm on the second draft of my first novel since 2005.   (Because I call my very first draft Draft Zero, this means there is technically no first draft and I proceed directly to the secon...