Ren Warom's Blog

Where I’ll Be: FantasyCon 2018

I thought I’d better make one of these posts explaining where I’ll be and what I’ll be doing in Chester at FantasyCon this weekend, just in case anyone has any interest.

I’m on three panels with absolutely lovely folk, all of which I’m very much looking forward to, and I have a reading with some rather splendid fellow authors of the Weird, for which I shall be horrifying all and sunder with an excerpt from COIL, so do come along to that. I guarantee a treat!

When not on panels or in my readin...

Basically the best news ever! The little book that could.

[image error] Where do I begin? Perhaps with a blog post I wrote a few years ago, about how a book I loved went out on sub and got many nibbles but no offers and how it broke my heart a little bit? Yeah, we’ll start there. Reader, Coil was that book. Is the message here ‘never give up?’. I’m not so sure. There are definitely books you need to give up on, but I think you know in the end what those books are and when their time has come. And you know equally when it is not time to give up on a book. It was...

Like Wheels For Wings is being published!

[image error]I’m absolutely overjoyed to announce that my mayhem-ridden biopunky YA novel Like Wheels For Wings, is going to be published this very year by the brilliant FoxSpiritBooks.

[image error]Kem’s story has been on my mind for years. I actually wrote it first as a short, to submit to the Glitter and Mayhem anthology (it’s a trend of mine apparently to write stories that end up becoming novels). Needless to say, it did not make it into that, or it would likely have remained a short, and I’ve been working on the...

MHM – Schizoid and Schizotypal. What’s the difference?

Schizoid and schizotypal personality disorders are in fact completely unrelated. They are both ‘eccentric’ personality disorders, but their characteristics, their outcomes and their relation to schizophrenia are both entirely unalike, though some characteristics may cause similar outcomes.

The first and most notable distinction is that schizoid is NOT related to schizophrenia and includes no danger of developing it, though it is understood that having schizophrenia in the family can mean you...

MHM:S.A.D/S.A.D-like-feelings & Self Care

Beginning note: I have not mentioned light therapy. I haven’t tried it. It seems expensive to me (both for utility bills and initial pay out for equipment). It is proven to work though, and tackles the depression feelings of SAD, which is immensely useful. I think that coupled with the things below it would be even more helpful, as those are things you can do quite simply and cheaply and are also super effective.

I think everyone knows what Seasonal Affective Disorder is, and I think a good d...

MHM Myths – Triggers

So why am I talking about triggers in a MHM Myths post/vlog? Triggers certainly aren’t a myth, but I wanted to talk about an unsettling trend I’ve been noting over the past fews years. That trend is people using the words triggered/triggers/trigger to describe *possibly* upsetting/distressing/emotionally taxing content in things they haven’t seen (books/movies/news stories etc). I wanted to tackle this notion that a trigger is something that can be avoided, and the notion that is merely upset...

MHM: Resolutions and Depression

Hello to 2016 and sort of a new/old direction for this blog. These MHM posts will continue, with links to the videos but I won’t link or blog about the book videos anymore, though I may do the odd review on here too. Anyway, to today’s topic, very relevant for January. Resolutions. Specifically, how the pressure to make resolutions may affect you if you’re suffering from depression or any other mental illness.

Specific set goals are really helpful for some people, and setting them at this tim...

MHM Recovery – The Importance of Honesty

Today’s MHM will be brief. We all know important it is to share, to be honest about what’s happening in our heads and in our lives, but it can be difficult to do so. The primary reason for that is the reaction of other people; oh other people, how they fail to mitigate our fear of being judged, or dismissed, or told that we’ve upset someone with our honesty, or simply told ‘well what I am supposed to do?’ – as if you even asked them to do anything. Newsflash: sharing is not asking.

Generally...

2015 Retrospective

Crikey. Here we are at the end of 2015, and it’s been quite the year. This is the year I got my book deal, started my YouTube channel and really began to feel like everything might be coming together at last. Not merely in terms of my dreams coming to fruition but in terms of my mental health and recovery. All my steps have been small but forwards, and that in itself is a vast difference to previous years.

I’m still in a valley of disbelief over the whole book deal thing, after over 3 years o...

2015 Reading Challenge, book 45: Drag Hunt by Pat Kelleher

Today is the final 2015 Reading Challenge. It’s been one heck of a journey. Next week I’ll be writing a retrospective of my reading year and how I felt the challenge went, and also talking about where I’ll be going next with all this. For now, on to my last book.

Drag Hunt by Pat Kelleher is set in the Abaddon Gods and Monsters universe (which I think no longer exists sadly). In this universe all the Gods and monsters have been locked into our dimension. We can’t see them unless they allow it...