Ben Hennessy's Blog, page 4

Making it to the page again.

When I first started this blog last year, I had just completed the first draft of Queen of the World. Now I’m working through the follow up, and I thought it’d be an idea to go through the writing process a little bit to give an idea of how it works. Now to anyone reading this who has written a novel or another long body of work, I guess this is a chance to compare notes and whatnot. To those who haven’t, then this will either be interesting or boring as shit.

Once I finally get down to writin...

The book asked me to press Y?

“The writing and story of the **** were especially praised by reviewers. Kieron Gillen of Rock, Paper, Shotgun said that after playing it he “can’t think of a better love story in the western medium” and that the terse and minimalist prose worked well to create clearly defined characters.A reviewer from The Economist called the story “engaging”, saying that it provided a “memorable and thought-provoking experience”.In an analysis of the ****’s story, Emily Short of Gamasutra called the decisi...

Up, up and away.

I’ve been putting this off for a bit too long now. I have a reasonably decent excuse, though – I’ve been a bit under the weather, and I’ve also been writing. As in working on the next book, instead of promotional stuff. The mind boggles.

So! The book launch went really well. After meeting my editor, Sara, for the first time and grabbing some sushi – possibly my first ever ‘business lunch’! – we turned up to Waterstones with thirty copies of Queen of the World, a very expensive pen I’d filched...

Never read this. Never.

If you read a writing advice article that says you must never do something, it’s probably not a good writing advice article.

Think about it. Never. NEVER DO THIS. Writing isn’t regimented or inflexible. That’s the beauty of it. Write however you want to. There are certain guidelines you should probably adhere to, obviously, but one shouldn’t be ashamed of one’s own style. And this isn’t grammar I’m talking about. Grammar is mostly strict. The basics are, anyway. Capitalise at the start of a se...

Kick off.

Whoosh.

Things are kicking off at a pretty quick rate. We’ve had all kind of developments here in the last week. Currently, for example, I’m sitting in the sunshine on St. Martins in the Scilly Isles. It’s blistering heat with not a cloud in the sky, about a five minute walk from the beach. Hard life, I know, but what is a man to do? I’d love to say that this is a result of the millions of book sales we’ve had, but instead it’s for an equally good cause: I’m visiting family here, family I have...

Whaddya mean ‘Eastwood’s busy’?

Paperback’s out within the next day or two. My editor’s been flailing around with excitement, to the point where she asked me ‘How can you be so calm?’

My answer was that I’m the Fonz. In reality, it’s still all intangible to me at the moment. All the promotional stuff, the eBook release, the cover work; I can’t touch any of it. Once I have a physical copy of Queen of the World in my hands, though, I’ll certainly lose my shit and do a bit of a dance.

While I have a little bit of time, I’m going...

Probably not lies.

Here’s a quick update on things. I’m halfway between ill and bored, and yesterday I spent seventeen hours proofreading for the paperback release of Queen of the World, so my brain is mush.

Have some FACTS. Cold, hard FACTS, ladies and gentlemen.

- FACT: Queen of the World has sold more than five copies as an eBook. Five copies was my perennial answer for ‘I’ll be happy if it sells X amount’, so officially it’s a success. Woo! You can pick yours up here.

- FACT: The paperback is coming soon. The...

Ready, steady, stop!

Queen of the World launched on Saturday in eBook format.

It was probably one of the most exciting days of my life, along with being one of great stress.

Here’s a rough idea of what happened. I woke up with a minging hangover from the Friday before, after a night in which I got pretty drunk, had a moustache and monocle painted on my face, then drank a dodgy pint and got sick. I had to sleep it off on a buddy’s car for a couple of hours until everyone else was ready to leave. While steering my in...

Full Guest Post.

I’ve written a guest post for Full Moon Bites, hosted by the marvellous Holly Polk. I submitted my post about fifteen hours late and she didn’t even shout at me. Therefore, she must be good people.

The direct link to my guest post can be found here, where I’m discussing support characters and why we must protect them from ill-tempered mutated sea bass.

Oh, and thanks for all the cover art feedback on various social media outlets, which has so far been universally positive. You guys really made...

Cover Art.

Y’know, it’s funny.

When I first considered the cover for Queen of the World, my brain was stuck within the Isle of Generic. “I want a photo of some trees. And there’s a sword in the middle of it. It’ll be amazing!”

Sara and Rushton –my editor and intern, respectively, from Inspired Quill – gently convinced me that a photo of some trees wouldn’t be quite as cool as I’d envisaged. So we conversed and bargained for a long, long while, and eventually I consented to allow for an artist to draw some...