I’ve read the tip many times that all writers should read widely through different genres, not just sticking to their personal favourites. I have to admit, this is advice I usually ignore, because I figure there are only so many reading hours in my life, and I don’t want to waste them reading stuff that’s not really down my alley.
Of course, I was wrong. Thankfully, I’ve been pushed out of my literary fiction corner for a few moments recently and have seen the benefits of (at least occasionally) stepping out …

Unless you’re reading Becoming A Fiction Writer through an RSS feeder, you’ll have noticed that there have been a few changes. Yes, I bravely upgraded to a new Wordpress theme because I’m trying to make this site a bit more user-friendly – during the transition phase, it might be a little bit less user-friendly, but please hang in there. It’s all for the best, of course.
If you have any feedback on the new design (so far) or you find anything broken, do let me know. My skills in this area …

It might take me a while, but I do, eventually, get around to doing everything I promise to do. (Except perhaps mopping the kitchen floor. But even that will happen one day). Way back before Christmas, Kate over at Live Out of the Box tagged me for a meme with the topic of six random things you don’t know about me. That’s a curious challenge, because of course there are hundreds of things you people out there don’t know about me, but most of them are not too exciting. But …

I’m not at all sure that Christmas is a very inspirational time of year for writers – I’m fairly certain it’s not for me. Instead it’s more a hectic time which seems to tumble into my life far before I’m ready and tells me quite bluntly that another year has gone by. Fast.
New Year’s resolutions are another topic for another day – but let me tell you, I’m already thinking deeply about them, especially the writing-related resolutions. For now, all I wanted to say was that I hope everyone reading …

I’ve been having one of those weeks in which my brain is completely filled with tasks that must be completed, problems that must be solved and the looming feeling that both Christmas and my as-yet-not-really-organised holiday are closer than they should be. As you can guess, that translates to not much writing, and not even much inspiration – it’s one of those survival-mode weeks.
Inspiration where you don’t expect it

As most of you know, I teach English as a Second Language three days per week, and my students often provide me …

Ideas are pretty much bread and butter to a fiction writer, right? Where would a novel be without there being an idea first? I guess it’d just be a blank book.
So on the premise that having inspiration and ideas hit is totally important, I have to tell you about the results of a study I bookmarked a while back. It was one of those weird hotel chain surveys (done by various chains, on a bizarre range of topics, just to get the name of their chain in front of more …