Nice bit of promo.

What I’ve learned this year: if it isn’t costing you more than you want to give, if it isn’t pushing you into unknown places and if you aren’t entering dangerous territory armed only with your wits, intuition and ballpoint pen, you haven’t started the real work yet. ... See more

So very very true.

Story Seed: I was trying to work this morning when I heard singing. Ran outside to find CPUT marine science students rowing past, most of them coping well, but one boat far behind where they couldn't get their strokes to synchronise.

So let’s put them in another place, another time, sixty nineteen year olds rowing towards something they desperately need. Or away from something they must get away from.
Shall we throw in human sacrifice just for fun? A devastating volcanic eruption? A larger ship hijacked by mermaids? ... See more

If you can closely relate the inciting incident to the climax you'll find they prop up the middle section and give cohesion to the whole piece of work.

Grit means keeping your bum on your chair, working at improving your technique, maintaining energy through all the rewrites, being able to get up after rejection knocks you down, and maintaining focus, despite bad (or good) reviews.
These you can learn. ... See more

Nice to get a mention in Publisher’s Weekly. One day I’ll go to Bologna too.

This is aimed at non fiction writers, but much of it applies to fiction to.
To put it simply, Keep it simple.
https://www.inc.com/jessica-stillman/a-harvard-linguists-13-simple-tips-for-becoming-a-great-writer.html?utm_source=ForTheInterestedNewsletter ... See more

Preparing for the writing class I’m teaching this afternoon. My two year old grandson ‘helped’ bake the chocolate brownies. He ate 90% of the chocolate chips, and a good amount of the batter before he found the butter dish and ate a chunk of that. Left teethmarks as proof.
The brownies look good but they’re probably not safe for human consumption. Luckily I also have a baked German cheesecake from the local market. ... See more

Whenever I meet famous people I want to run away, in case they think I'm fawning over them. I'd rather ignore them and pretend I don't recognise them than come over as all needy and sycophantic.
Andre Brink used to collect his adopted daughter at the school where I walked, and I'd see him sitting on a bench, waiting for her. I only talked to him twice, the first time when I asked him if the way the end of 'An Instant in the Wind' speeds up so suddenly was intentional. (the answer was, 'of course,')

But reading the last page of 'Before I Forget,' and analysing it for the course I'm teaching tomorrow, I wish with all my heart I had been braver, and had known him better. It's so moving in its sensitivity, the poetry of each sentence, the perfectly balanced way it lies on the page.

The other thing I said to him was that he should have won the Nobel Prize instead of JM Coetzee. I still stand by it, because Brink shows himself so mercilessly on the page, whereas Coetzee's work, although extraordinary, doesn't show his vulnerability in quite the same way. ... See more