…is where I’m at.

Flew last Wednesday from London to Perth, Australia, via Singapore. Then Sunday from Perth to Brisbane. And on Saturday we’ll fly from Brisbane to New Zealand, where we’ll have four weeks of touring (by car – no more flights, thank the Lord).

The plan is to have a plotted novel when I finish, but with the joys of jet lag, that’s on the back burner for now (much easier to listen to Mark Billingham on audio at 3.00am than scribble – and with headphones I don’t disturb anyone either).

It’s America’s National Punctuation Day!

And to celebrate, my first sentence used two apostrophes, one to indicate omission and one to indicate possession, along with an exclamation mark, purely to highlight my surpise of anyone recognising the importance of punctuation. Perhaps the nadir of civilisation has already been reached and we’re on the way up!

Books I’d recommend for writers:

The Elements of Style - Strunk & White

The smallest (and best) book covering the elementary rules of vocabulary usage and principles of composition you’ll ever need.

Self-Editing for Fiction Writers (or how to edit yourself into print) - Rennie Browne & Dave King

A really useful book by two very resepected American Editors.

On Writing – Stephen King

Half memoir, half writer’s manual, all entertainment.

Writers’ and Artists’ Yearbook

The industry bible to the published and unpublished alike.

Now I have a number of other books on my shelves that I don’t have the same enthusiasm for, so I’m not going to promote them here. One book I have been recommended to read time and again is aimed for screenplay writers, but I am told is of equal use to the novelist. That’s Story, by Robert McKee.

Any other suggestions?

Update 20th September: Darksculptures has added two to the list:

Bird by Bird - Anne Lamott

Zen in the Art of Writing - Ray Bradbury

There are many people who are fond of tall stories, who cannot resist embellishing tales to just beyond credibility. You can usually spot them a mile off – their enthusiasm often gives them away. This is fine when it comes to writing, I guess, but can be a little wearing in real life.

Then there is a very small number of people who are the opposite. They tell tales of exciting exploits in modest tones, underplaying the action in such a way that you know the truth is even more fantastical than the stories being unfolded before you.

I was fortunate enough to spend some time with someone from the latter group last night, and what an interesting night it turned out to be!

Saturday late afternoon saw me driving from Kingston Uni over to Reading, for the evening of the Reading Festival of Crime Writing - Day 2.

7.00pm saw an audience with Mark Billingham and Christopher Brookmyre. I’m a big fan of Mark’s Tom Thorne detective novels, so it was a real treat to hear him speak and meet him afterwards (please excuse the duff photo – my LG phone clearly wasn’t up to the job). Mark was a stand-up in a previous life, and you can tell – as well as a great author, he really is very funny and well worth seeing (not to mention reading) if you get the chance.

I haven’t read anything by Christopher before, but that’s something I need to rectify sometime soon – his on-stage reading was very funny. Plus the fact I want to know if it was just his Glasgow accent that pronounced ‘pish’ on stage, or is that how he’s written it!

Sunday morning saw an hour and a half with Patrick Lennon, who gave a very useful insight into his own ways of approaching a novel, including a very interesting storyboarding concept, usually only seen in movies. Must give that a go, myself. Patrick is author of 3 published Tom Fletcher novels, and is currently writing an international thriller.

Unfortunately I didn’t get to meet Patrick afterwards as his session finished as the “Inspector Calls” panel event started. This was hosted by Peter Lovesey (who has won the CWA Silver, Gold and Cartier Diamond Daggers as well as their Short Story Award) and included Elizabeth Corley, Alex Gray, Cynthia Harrod-Eagles (who has written over 70 books!) and Graham Hurley. Their discussion was around the ‘police procedural’, with a Q&A at the end. It’s amazing the length some writers go to to ensure authenticity in their novels, from attending post-mortems (thankfully you can’t do that nowadays!) to taking diplomas in forensic sciences.

My afternoon was rounded of with the “Thrill of the Chase” panel, hosted by Peter Guttridge, the Observer’s crime fiction critic. The panel discussing crime fiction thrillers comprised Meg Gardiner, SJ Bolton, Nick Brownlee, Bill Vidal and Dreda Say Mitchell. Again, this was a lively panel discussion, including a Q&A, and, as with the police procedural, has added some notable names to my ever-expanding “to read” list.  And the strongest message was? Maim and kill adults and children, but make sure you leave those cute, cuddly pets alone if you don’t want to incur the wrath of your readers!

This weekend was busy, busy, busy. But great!

Saturday saw an early start with a drive down the (always delightful) M1 to Kingston University for a writers’ conference. The course was led by Alison Baverstock, former publisher, author and now acting course leader of Kingston Uni’s Publishing MA.

The keynote opening speech was given by Richard Charkin, Chief Exec of Bloomsbury, on the current state of the publishing industry. Richard has been in publishing for nearly 40 years, so has a wealth of knowledge and experience about the industry. His talk covered everything from book pricing to E-books to Google books.

This was followed by a talk by Carole Blake, MD of the Blake Friedmann Agency. Carole is a real character – very entertaining and gave a useful insight into what agents are (and aren’t) looking for. And yes, I think everyone got the message that she DOESN’T do children’s!

Jo Herbert, Editor of the Writers’ and Artists’ Yearbook, gave a useful talk on synopsis writing. I was recommended by another participant to read her blog, so it is duly bookmarked.

The afternoon saw a couple of workshops. Commercial Fiction by Emma Burstall turned out to be Commercial Women’s Fiction. Oh well, never mind. It was quite interesting, and the short stories on my website show that I’m in touch with my feminine side!

Writing for Children was facilitated by Linda Strachan. Linda hails from north of the border, and is really enthusiastic about her subject. And with more than 50 children’s books to her name, she really knows her subject. A really useful workshop that could have easily filled two hours instead of the one allotted.

And then it was on to Reading, for the Reading Festival of Crime Writing. More on that to follow…

I have updated my website – http://www.djpaterson.co.uk

Hopefully it looks a little more professional – at least all the links seem to work!

Well, I predicted I might in September last year, after winning a writing competition to appear as a character in Meg Gardiner’s new book, The Memory Collector.

The book was published in the USA a few weeks ago, and will be published here in the UK in July. Meg kindly sent me a USA edition, and although I’ve not quite finished it yet, I have met myself. Well, the character who now shares my name (poor soul).

And did I die?

Mmm, better not post any spoilers. You’ll just have to buy the book. Go on – it’s worth it!

Google sure are getting about.

I live in a very small market town in the Midlands in England, but have just been “Street Viewed” by one of their cars:

Apparently, it takes several months before street view pictures appear on Google Maps, and part of the process is ensuring their face blurring technology has worked (I feel I’ve given them a headstart already this morning), but it will be interesting to see if a blurred faced bloke in scruffy jeans and a scruffier fleece is leaning casually against my car when they do.

Update 19.03.09 – Looks like even the BBC have picked up on it (no, not me being ‘Street Viewed’, but rather Google’s Street View hitting the UK. )

I’m sure that I would have seen it coming - although perhaps not. How a choice of book title can change the way people refer to you:

‘Ugly’ author a ‘liar and thief’

For 20 years the Telegraph’s Matt has been showing us the funny side of life with his cartoons. Today’s is particularly relevant to a writer: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/matt/

(I’ve linked rather than copied – don’t want those copywrite polis (sorry, police – just finished Naming of the Dead) on my tail.)

Anyway, Robert Gray has got the story off to a fantastic start, and my instalment is due on about the 20th. If you’ve got time, pop on over and have a read: Halloween Story 2008.

But I’m more excited than worried! And anyway, I still might not die.

If you think my attitude is flippant, I ought to explain that my death will only be on paper (hopefully!). I won a competition on Meg Gardiner’s blog to have a character in her next Jo Beckett book named after me. Chances are Jo isn’t going to be taking up with a new long-term lover called DJ, so I guess my namesake’s appearance will be more akin to that of a USS Enterprise “Red Shirt“.

That means short-lived if you’re not a Captain Kirk fan.

If you’ve not read the first Jo Beckett novel, why not? Go buy it. Here it is:

Join the club!

Adrienne Kress, author of the great children’s book, Alex and the Wigpowder Treasure, (or Alex and the Ironic Gentleman for American and Canadian readers) has some good posts on her blog about this very thing – check them out:

The Agent Aquisition – Part 1

The Agent Aquisition – Part 2

The first two above chart Adrienne’s own story (and make me smile every time I read them). These next two are her own view of the practical steps to getting published.

So you want to get published? – Getting an agent.

So you want to get published? – from agent to publisher.

Check them out. And buy her book (soon to be plural) – even if you don’t have kids! 

I had a great evening on Tuesday, travelling down to London (well, technically Hampton, but anything inside of the M25 is London to a Midlander like me) with a mate to see two of our favourite authors: Meg Gardiner and Peter Robinson were interviewed and read a brief extract from their new books in front of an intimate audience of forty or so people, which had been organised by CrimeSquad.com and hosted by Andrew Clark.

I have met Meg on a number of occasions and she never fails to be entertaining. Peter was good value too – relatively quiet spoken, but with a dry sense of humour. When asked about comparisons between himself and his main character, DI Alan Banks (DCI now!), he tried to distance himself, but I think I could see more of DCI Banks in him than perhaps he could. Not sure if my fellow audience members would agree?

It always surprises me – no, I don’t think surprise is the right word as I’m not surpised, perhaps amazed is more appropriate – that these events are not better attended. So many people devote a large amount of their spare time to reading these authors, yet so few attend these kind of things to actually meet the people behind the novels. I guess that unless you’re local to an event, then you only find out about them if you’re geeky enough to visit the authors’ websites on a regular basis. Mmm… that must be me then!

Peter Robinson doing well to hide his concern about the future competition for shelf space

A relaxed Meg Gardiner having long ago concluded, “Competition. What competition?”

And yes, I did take the friend along as protection, after what happened last time!

I’ve been blog-tagged by Meg Gardiner!

But it doesn’t hurt – the game is to write down six random things about myself, then tag six others, so here goes:

1.      There’s a litre of me swilling around in an American man, somewhere in Washington State, USA (it’s not as bad as it sounds, honest!)

2.      I’ve only ever had three limbs in plaster – but they were all at the same time.

3.      I’ve been hit with a speeding fine whilst towing a caravan, but not whilst travelling at almost three times the speed on a motorbike.

4.      I’ve held a Karate black-belt for nearly as long as I haven’t.

5.      I have a fascination with all things post-apocalyptic – hence my love of Stephen King’s The Stand (can’t wait for my I am Legend DVD – I never made it the cinema in December)

6.      Jeff Wayne’s War of The Worlds sends shivers up my spine!

And now to play tag with six others – let’s see who’s game:

Adrienne Kress

Joe Hill

Jojo Moyes

Don

CD Reimer

Steve Stack

Rules:

·         Link to the person who tagged you.

·         Post the rules on your blog.

·         Write six random things about yourself.

·         Tag six random people at the end of your post by linking to their blog

 ·         Let each person know they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their website.

            ·         Let your tagger know when your entry is up.

I was enjoying a quiet rake through the papers today after an enjoyable Sunday lunch at my in-laws’ (all the tastier because we’ve been sans kitchen for a week – I’m fitting a new one), when I came across the following story, which irritated me more than it probably should:

Judge quashes £300 parking fine…because it set out to ‘frighten and intimidate’ driver

By MARTIN DELGADO
Mail on Sunday
22nd March 2008
 

Car park operators could be forced to stop threatening motorists with huge penalty charges after a landmark court ruling.

In a decision that will be welcomed by many aggrieved drivers, a judge has ruled that the demands for hundreds of pounds in penalties which a parking company sent to one woman driver were illegal because they were too high.

The court was told they were intended to “frighten or intimidate” her rather than compensate the firm for any lost income.

And what’s the problem with this small victory for the oppressed motorist, I hear you ask? Well, nothing, but just look at that sign! 

This follows an article on page 5 of yesterday’s Daily Telegraph regarding a VW ad which appears to show a dog in distress, the final sentence of which read, “It’s welfare was paramount throughout the shoot.” 

Grrrr. 

’nuff said. 

Happy New Year, everyone – I hope your holiday break was better than mine - I won’t bore you with the continuing tales of woe that befell the Paterson household over the Christmas period.

I’m not normally one for making New Year’s Resolutions, but let’s see if I can stick to these.  

In what she’s dubbed Grammar Humbug Week, Meg Gardiner asks what grammar atrocity annoys you the most? Despite being a relatively recent perpetrator of most crimes against the English language, my own pet hate is the missing apostrophe.  I find this more annoying than the atrocious additional apostrophe. Just.

I have even taken to stopping the car to photograph signs that are a little lacking in punctuation – surely a prerequisite for a signwriter should be an English qualification?

This one was at a day out to Legoland with the kids: