Ian Patterson's Blog, page 7

Everything I know about writing I learned from riding my bike

Everything I know about writing I learned from riding my bike

I’m being hyperbolic, of course, and I know I’m far from the first person to draw a parallel between athletics and creative practice. But still, it stands out to me that the motivation and drive I built up training for high level competition, is the exact same thing that gets me to write every morning. So here’s the trick, I think, in a nutshell. Just show up. When you’re tired, when you don’t want to, when you’re excited, when you’re ...

Mushroom Blues

“…only once you lingered in a thing’s shadow could you comprehend its size.”

Here we find Detective Hoffman, standing in the shadow of a giant mushroom, starting to understand the even larger shadow that colonialism and racism have cast across Neo Kinoko, and the vestiges of it that she wears. It’s a confrontation with the other, a mushroom shaped specter that’s challenged Hoffman across the skyline of her city of exile, and a reflective turning point for her. There’s so much of the story, messag...

The Deep

I wrote this story a few months ago, before the major flooding that’s occurred in the US, and I wanted to wait to share it. Although this story is meant to be fairly lighthearted, I think with current events it could be perceived as making light of the situation. So to honor that a bit, I want to acknowledge that Hurricane Helene and Milton have caused incredible destruction, and it will take years for those communities to fully recover. We should all do what we can to help them out, and in that...

The Power by Naomi Alderman

I haven’t had the time to write any short fiction lately as I’ve been hard at work on a new book. I find I really do best when I stay focused on one project at a time, like at a certain point the creativity builds up from that and starts overflowing. I’m about halfway done with that first draft now, and because I’m planning on querying agents with it, I can’t share it on here yet. Like every writer, I’m currently convinced it’s the best thing ever until I eventually re-read it, and realize just ...

The Dispossessed: An Ambiguous Utopia by Ursula K. Le Guin

Ursula K. Le Guin is one of the best science fiction writers of all time, and if you haven’t read anything by her, you should. Last year, The Left Hand of Darkness had such a profound impact on me that I could only shake my head that I’d waited so long to read any of her books. Having read some of them now, I wish I could have met her before she passed. They are not just stories, but philosophical examinations of what it means to be human. They are thought experiments meant to make you see thing...

Transference Release Day

It’s been a long time to get here, to release day. What started as an attempt at writing long-form during NaNoWriMo last year, led to the completion of my first draft in 6 weeks (all of which was shared on here at the time), and then 6 months of editing, learning, formatting, beta-reader feedback, and working with other professionals to polish it. I’m thrilled with how it turned out, and I can’t wait to get more people to read it.

In the time it took me to finish editing and release my first book...

On Grief

My mom died four years ago. The cancer that resurfaced in February of that year ate her slowly, and then all at once. My brother and I sat with her at the end, listening to her ratcheting breaths, and then counting her shallow heartbeats as they faded. As she cooled. And we wondered at which exact moment the actual death happened.

I sang Simon and Garfunkel songs to her before that, a thing we’d done together so many times, and held her hand. Her eyes would sometimes jolt awake, clouded by a haze...

Dystopian Dream Girl

I told my wife recently that these moments in between writing longer things seem to be when my writing growth really solidifies. Like in the moments of rest, I can breathe and learn from it all. Which isn’t the case, of course I’m improving all along the journey. But I still think there’s something to it.

My second novel is getting ready to go off to an editor, and I’m just now breaking ground on my third. It’s very different, in topic and tone, and I think at this point I won’t be sharing excer...

The Mercy of Gods by James S. A. Corey

I never read the Expanse series, James S. A. Corey’s other major work, but did watch all of the series. I’d heard great things about the books though, and after finishing this one I can see why. Where the Expanse show does a great job of showing the action and hard sci-fi elements of the story, it leaves out one crucial thing. Corey is a phenomenal writer, with some of the best prose I’ve read in sci-fi recently.

It’s important to note here that James S. A. Corey is actually a pen name for Danie...

A Case of the Mondays

I’m in a bit of a break between publishing my first book and editing my second, so I’m back to writing some shorts. Mostly this is so I can keep my writing muscles active, and get a bit of downtime from longer form stuff before NaNoWriMo.

There is a structure to writing on a novel daily that I’ve really loved this year. I usually don’t struggle for direction, and if there are major plot issues to resolve I see them coming days in advance. It’s taking me a bit of time for shorts to feel natural a...