Austin Clarke at Bim Literary Festival
After my unintended gatecrashing of a class with Derek Walcott earlier in the day, this was an event I was actually allowed to attend.…
Learning from Derek Walcott: Bim Literary Festival, day one
How often do you get to meet a Nobel Prize winner? That was my main rationale for going along to a Master…
Great opportunity for unpublished UK writers
If you are an unpublished UK writer with a novel manuscript ready for submission, I’d strongly recommend that you check out the…
How to write a book review
Just saw a nice post on Read.Learn.Write which goes into the methodology of writing book reviews, using my novel On the Holloway…
How writers generate ideas
One of the most common questions I'm asked whenever I give a talk is "How do you generate ideas?" The honest answer…
The Sense of an Ending, explained
A quick explanation of the ending of Julian Barnes's novel The Sense of an Ending—followed by a long discussion in the comments for those…
How much would you pay for a short story?
Quick question for you. I’m thinking of making some of my short stories available for download from this site, but am not…
Beauty is a sleeping cat
So, a post in honour of one of my favourite book blogs. My wife and I have adopted a little kitten here in…
Where are the Women?
Palestinian Women by Fatma Kassem This book is a series of accounts by Palestinian women who lived through the ‘Nakba’ of 1948,…