Mark West's Blog, page 81
December 17, 2010
More writing news
Really chuffed to announce that my short "Dreaming Of A Black Christmas" will appear in the Estronomicon Christmas edition e-zine. I'll post the link up when the zine goes live.For those who might recognise the title (thinking of my kid sister, here, nobody else is likely to!), the story originally appeared in the Terror Tales Christmas anthology of the same name back in 2000. It was reprinted in
December 8, 2010
Success!
Some writing news - I started the 2nd draft of "The Lost Film Novella" today and managed to cut about 1,000 words from 12,000. Not the best of starts, so I may have to do a draft 2a before I send it out to my pre-readers. I posted this up at Facebook, along with the fact that I didn't have a title and no less a horror-writing-personage (and literary hero of mine) than Nicholas Royle commented,
December 5, 2010
I want to read these!
Jason Morgan, over at the Peter Raft Online Resource, has posted the cover art of some more books by Mr Raft. You might recall I read "Zombie" a little while back and really enjoyed it and these latest additions seem right up my alley (more so that a couple were published by Fontana, so they should be easier to pick up).As good as the stories sound, however, it's the artwork that I think is
November 29, 2010
The Lost Film novella (1st draft completed!)
That's it, I've done it! Today, I finished the first draft of "The Lost Film Novella" - 47 writing days (from 7th September through to 29th November, which includes the 36 days I took out in the middle to work on the ZoQuNo/Mr Foo pitch) for a grand total of 52,547 words. My original plan was for 30,000 words, but I do have a tendency to overwrite massively on the 1st draft (I'm a taker-outer, to
November 24, 2010
In Memory of my sister, after 7 years
It was seven years ago today that I got the phone call from Mum. I was at work, sitting in the canteen with my workmate. Mum told me that she had bad news and I paused, expecting to hear something about my Gran having fallen over or something.Instead, Mum told me that she was at Leicester hospital, walking back to the car with my Dad and that my sister Tracy was dead. She was 32.Tracy was two
November 22, 2010
Making progress!
The "Lost Film" novella is coming along swimmingly and I'm pretty much keeping up a 1,000 word-a-day output on it, which is brilliant for me. My original plan - certainly, it's the one I told Stephen Bacon, when he mentioned that he'd never worked on anything novella-length - was for 30,000 words in first draft but I'm currently at 39k words and the ending is still a little way off.But am I
November 14, 2010
Binary Sunset
We had a family day out with the Roberts today (David, Julia, Alice & Laura) and a great time was had by all. David & I were talking about different things and, combined with my Three Investigator blog, I was thinking about "Star Wars". I decided I'd like a picture of the binary sunset, for me the defining moment of the whole film and discovered a YouTube clip of it. Which is here.I love "Star
November 11, 2010
More love for "What We Do Sometimes, Without Thinking"...
Terry Grimwood has reviewed "Shoes, Ships & Cadavers" at his website and has some very nice things to say about it. He also really liked my story - "Mark West's dark and tragic [story was] one of my particular favourites, well told and moving."The full review can be found on his website, here.Thanks, Terry!
My Three Investigators Reviews, all on one new blog!
As you may or may not be aware, I'm a big fan of the Three Investigators mystery series, which shaped my reading habits through childhood and have continued - on and off - through adulthood too.In 2008, I decided to embark upon a bit of a reading adventure and work my way through the Three Investigators series (up to book 30, the last to be written when Hitchcock was still alive and the last one
November 4, 2010
Listen to The Dude!
Gary McMahon's novel "Pretty Little Dead Things" hits the High Street today and if you like your horror fiction dark and bleak, then this is the book for you.I'm lucky enough to have already read it and I can vouch that it's a corker (easily in my top 10 of the year so far) - go out and buy it! The Dude says so!
