Stuart Aken's Blog, page 208

Question for the Week. Democracy: Do We Know What It Is?

[image error] This image was selected as a picture of the week on the Malay Wikipedia for the 48th week, 2009. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

In this series of posts, which may go on for ever, I’m posing questions to elicit that most elusive of human activities: thought! Oh no: surely I’m not expecting people to use their most hungry organ and engage in a process unique to the species? I’m afraid so.

These posts won’t always necessarily represent my ideas or opinions, though they’re bound to be influenced by th...

Naked Truths About Getting Book Reviews, by Gisela Hausmann, Reviewed.

One of my writing friends blogged about this book, inspiring me to obtain a copy. I’m glad I did. This is a straightforward manual designed to explain all that writers, and reviewers, need to know about Amazon reviews.

The author is one of the top Amazon reviewers, so she understands the needs and concerns of such people. She explains why reviews are important, how to determine which reviews will do most good, and most harm, to your precious book, and how to go about engaging the attention o...

Cut The Fat; Make Your Writing Lean: #Tip 07.

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Most of us who write seem to enjoy sharing ideas to improve our craft. So, let’s chop the fat from our writing. Make it lean and trim. Readers will thank us.

In this series, I’ll look at some common redundancies.

But, reading this post and nodding wisely in agreement won’t work. We need to stay alert to those extraneous words that sneak into text, or they’ll intrude when we’re not looking. Including this as part of our editing process...

Running for ME/CFS no. 56: The End

One of Valerie’s pictures of the Red Arrows display.

So, how went the event? In case you didn’t know, I completed the course in 2 hours, 47 minutes and 50 seconds. That simple fact is for those without the time to read a longer account, but I’d encourage you to drop to to the foot of this post for some other information.

For everyone else, here’s a full account of my day on the Great North Run. It could help potential runners to decide whether they want to join such an event and should provid...

Running for ME/CFS no. 55

With my finisher’s medal.

A very brief update.

I did it!

I’ll fill you in on the details over the next couple of days. For the moment, let me simply tell you that I completed the race in 2 hours, 47 minutes an 50 seconds. I’ll provide the gory details in the next post.

If you’re so minded, now I’ve actually run the race, please donate to the cause I’m raising money for: Action For M.E. helped me through the trials of 10 years with ME/CFS, so I want to give them something back. So far, I’ve r...

Cut The Fat; Make Your Writing Lean: #Tip 06.

Most writers seem to enjoy sharing ideas to improve our craft. So, let’s chop the fat from our writing. Make it lean and trim. Readers will thank us.

In this series, I’ll look at some common redundancies.

But, reading this post and nodding wisely in agreement won’t work. We need to stay alert to those extraneous words that sneak into text, or they’ll intrude when we’re not looking. Including this as part of our editing process should catch most offenders.

All time record: A record, in this s...

Question for the Week: Have We Literally Gone Too Far?

In this new series of posts, which may go on for eternity, I intend to pose questions that might elicit that most unusual of human activities: thought! Oh no: surely I’m not expecting people to employ their most hungry organ and engage in the one process unique to the species? I’m afraid so.

These posts won’t necessarily represent my ideas or opinions, they’ll simply raise questions on many different topics in the hope of generating discussion, engaging imagination or simply making readers q...

Cut The Fat; Make Your Writing Lean: #Tip 05.

Most writers seem to enjoy sharing ideas to improve our craft. So, let’s chop the fat from our writing. Make it lean and trim. Readers will thank us.

In this series, I’ll look at some common redundancies.

But, reading this post and nodding wisely in agreement won’t work. We need to stay alert to those extraneous words that sneak into text, or they’ll intrude when we’re not looking. Including this as part of our editing process should catch most offenders.

Added bonus:

This is not as definite...

The King of Fools, by M.R. Mathias, Reviewed.

Fantasy embraces many styles, subjects and themes. This short is a great example of what can be done when a writer has imagination. It’s a piece with charm. Amusing, insightful, and caustic, it pokes fun at the idea of leaders.

There’s some repetition, and one or two small editing faults, but these are easily forgiven as the story takes the reader through events via the main character, the fool of the title. There is no background here, but the story carries its world well and the characters...

Running for #ME/CFS no. 54

Part of our walk.

This is the penultimate post on the run. I’ve completed the programmed exercise for this week. Tuesday (my usual Wednesday session was programmed for Tuesday this week) required a 30-minute easy walk. So, Valerie and I took a lengthy walk amongst the hills of the forest. Lovely to watch the squirrels, songbirds and buzzards. Today was just a 10-minute easy walk, which was simply accomplished with a walk down to the village shop. Again, we exceeded the requirements and went t...