Mr Strange's Christmas Dream

Wednesday, December 28, 2022

 I had some fantastic gifts this Christmas, amongst them these - an original hand-written draft of a Guy N Smith's short story, along with its finalised printed book form. He wrote the tale on old banking paper whilst keeping down a day job as a clerk there in the early days of his career.

It is fascinating to see how Guy's original draft had changed by the time it was published.

The acquirement of this fascinating handwritten draft of my favourite author has enthused me to the degree where I am going to read as many of his horror novels as I can. I certainly have enough books by him on my library shelf:

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

Sunday, December 11, 2022

Sunday morning ~ words are formin'. -Thankfully, as I've given myself one hell of a task of completing both a second and third draft of a 100,000 novel! Still, I'm enjoying it at the moment as I really can't remember from one page to the next what i going to happen next. A quarter of a century has not been kind to my memory.

What horror awaits in 2023?

2023 will see the conclusion of my 'Old Monsters' trio of novels, started in 2019 with the publication of my werewolf tale, Berserk! 

Cold Comfort, my take on the zombie genre, tells the tale of resurrected murder victims of a devil-worshipping serial killer. The first draft of this book was actually written in 1998 but was left in a drawer to ferment for a quarter of a century before finally being delivered to the publisher. 

One Night Buried concludes the series with a modern-day tale of inner-city vampires and follows the trials and tribulations of a recently converted misogynistic vampire in a world of empowered feminism. 

As well as being published individually in paperback and Kindle formats, these three novels will also be published as a single collector's edition hardback book in time for the Christmas 2023 market. 

~

On top of these horror novels, I will also add to my Explore Gower series of guides with a study of the World War II buildings that can still be explored on the Gower Peninsula. 

So, along with my online projects, Explore Swansea and Magickal Gardening, 2023 looks like being a very busy year indeed?

Cold Comfort

Thursday, December 1, 2022

Twenty-three years ago, I decided to write my first novel, Cold Comfort, in the gap between discovering I had landed myself a new job and taking up the position. I believed that in taking the job, the likelihood of me finding the time to become an author would be restricted. And so I sat at my old computer, typing at the keyboard every day until my fingers were sore, determined to complete the story that had sat in my head for a long, long time. My determination was such that I completed the task before the drudge of a 9-5 life engulfed me. And the printed manuscript was put in a drawer - where it remained for nearly a quarter of a century. 

The other night, I dusted down the old stack of paper, expecting to throw it in the trash. But the writing was pretty good, and the story better than I had remembered. And so, I decided to give the thing a polish. The digital file was long since lost, but I found an app that allowed me to photograph the pages and get them converted into an editable word doc, and so here I am, finally bringing the beast into the light of day once more. Hopefully, 2023 will see it finally published, twenty-four years after it was first put to paper 🙂

Familiar Progression

Tuesday, November 22, 2022

Taking a short break from One Night Dead, I thought I'd spend a couple of days working on another project, one that I've left gather dust of late. And so out came my Familiar notebook once more:

 Familiar will no longer be a novel, but will, instead, be a collect of folk horror short stories. Given the amount of books I have planned for publication, I can't really envision this project seeing the light of day until 2024, at the earliest. Though, as in Solstice, if any of the short stories are completed well before the publication of the larger volume of work, I may publish them as individuals and alone titles as well...

Skipping Work

Monday, November 21, 2022

Didn't go into work today as it was raining and the office heating is broken and there's no running hot water there. I'm getting older and I still haven't fully recovered my health and the thought of sitting in the office, wet from the rain and shivering in the cold, was enough to stop me going in. Now, in the warmth of my own home, I can continue with my own work, in the fine company of this one:

One Night Buried - draft 1 completed

Sunday, November 20, 2022

Well, this is quickest first draft of a novel I have ever knocked up. And, given the speed of its construction, I am quite pleased with the tale. The storyline has more twists in its plot than any of my other books, many of which surprised even me! I am already looking forward to the hard graft of crafting, polishing and word-smithing draft 2 of One Night Buried.

One Night Buried

Saturday, November 19, 2022

Well, the good news is that this has been the easiest first draft of a story I have ever written. I am now happy to report that I am just a couple of chapters shy of completing the first draft of this book. My target for the completion of this draft was by the close of November so all good there. Eagle-eyed visitors to the Pixie-led blog may have already spotted that I have now finally decided a title for the book, which can be found in the title of this blog post. 🙂 For this story, the emphasis is firmly on Goths, secret occult sects and vampires!

More woodland magic

More woodland magic from Gelli-Hir Woods, Gower:

Sulphur-Tufts

Two more photographs from my recent walk through Gelli-Hir Woods, Three Crosses, Gower. When the weather is pretty dire, mushrooms always makes a woodland photogenic. In this particular instance, it's Sulphur-Tuft that add a definite magical vibe to the woodland:

Spots

I stumbled upon this interesting character whilst visiting some local woods recently. Lovely isn't s/he!

Whilst you can see all the photographs I took on the walk on my Explore Gower blog, I'll probably post more of my favourite images from Gelli-Hir Woods here over the next few days too. I hope you like them :)

A Welcome Intrusion

November 12, 2022

Doomflight by Guy N Smith

October 8, 2022

You can't beat a bit of Guy N Smith:

Saturday Morning Writish Sesh

November 6, 2022

Guy Fawke's Night

 November 5, 2022

I spent this bonfire night comforting the furry girls and progressing my new Vampire novel...

Candyman Pop

October 31, 2022

And this is my final horror Pop Funko pic for 2022 - a really cool funko version of the scary Candyman!

 Happy Halloween.

Bram Stoker Pop Funko

October 30, 2022

The man himself - mighty Bram Stoker. Pardon the pun(let), but I was really stoked to see the funko factory had brought out this particular character :)

Vincent Price Pop

October 29, 2022

Not one of Funko's greatest likenesses, but I couldn't say no to adding Vincent Price to my collection of horror Pops:

Untitled,. Chapter 5. Draft 1. Complete

October 28, 2022

Twin Peaks: The Giant

October 27, 2020

"The owls are not what the seem."

Twin Peaks Pop Funkos

October 26, 2022 

Todays Funko foto features not one, but four Pops! I present a dead Laura, her possessed father Leland and the demonic Bob! Dale Cooper is there too, looking well too happy with his coffee given the gruesome circumstances, but hey ho. Happy Halloween 🎃

Burning the candles at both ends

October 24/25, 2022

Well, who would have thought it? Not me, for one. Yet here I am, working on a vampire novel!

The plot and main characters just sparked in my head the other night in the kind of clarity that my muse has been shy of delivering this past year. I received it's suggestion with earnest thanks and have made it my duty as I writer to crack on with translating these flashes of storylines into words on a page.

I'm tired now, but before I go, I thought I would use the opportunity offered by this post to communicate my publishing plans for the year ahead. I have nothing at the moment we close to publication but I do plan to release three completed books over the course of 2023. 

The first to reach the Amazon shop will be this vampire novel I am currently working on. This will be followed, sometime in late Spring by my local history book detailing the WW2 structures still visible on the Gower peninsula. My final publication, The Curious Adventures of Mister Pyewacket should reach the light of day by late 2023, after which I really have no idea what I will be working on.

But, as usual, watch this space and I am sure these will be detailed at the earliest opportunity...

Leprechaun

October 23, 2022

It seems like it's that time of year again lol. Time to get my pops out!

All-nighter!

October 22, 2022

It's not often I throw an all-nighter. But it's a rare treat to have a new storyline present itself to me so vividly, and such moments have to be savoured.

Pyewacket

Tuesday, October 4, 2022

With the closing of Magickal Gardening until early 2023, and time off from my day job to recover from a suffocating cold virus, this morning gave me the opportunity of progressing my next book - The Curious Adventures of Mister Jonathon Pyewacket. 

This story is not my usual folk-horror fodder, though it is set in both the real and magickal world. It is, instead, a twisted children's story about a man borne from a love affair 'tween a human mother and an elf. Bored by the mundanity of the 'real' world, he nips in and out from the world of fae, to make his life more bearable.  Unfortunately, if this has whetted your appetite to read the tale, I am still progressing the storyline on its first draft so this won't be available for purchase just yet... 

Pyewacket

Sunday, September 18, 2022

DNA

 I had my DNA results in recently. Slightly on the pricey side  but it's well worth it. Click on the link below to see my results:

https://www.ancestry.co.uk/dna/origins/share/320f4f06-f191-4d6b-bfe4-815f2d475816

Jumping out of my skin!

Saturday, September 17, 2022

When you stumble into the bathroom without your glasses and jump out of your skin when you see a huge dead spider - only to then find out it's just a hair grip lol!

Note Taking

 Thursday, September 15, 2022

Autumn Knocks

Incy Wincy

Sunday, September 11, 2022 

Tomorrow I return to the job that pays my bills. I thought I'd make the most of my remaining free time with a little creative writing. As I opened my writing pad, a small spider scrambled across the page and lingered there. It was nice seeing him take such a keen interest in my work-in-progress 😀

Ironing Pyewacket

August 29, 2022

Managed to get my head around the first curious adventure of Mister Jonathan Pyewacket today. It's story has been coalescing for around a year now but today's stint of work in the garden has helped iron out the creased beast into something that will be far more presentable and should hopefully astonish the reader enough to make them anticipate any further magickal adventures Mister Pyewacket might stumble upon in the future.