writerscoffeeclub

#WritersCoffeeClub Oct 10.

Do you have a guiding principle as a writer?

go where the story leads.

so far, that's made my stories unmarketable.

at least I'M enjoying them.

#WritersCoffeeClub October 23: How do you make sure you deliver on your writerly promises?

It's all about closure. Readers will forgive a few dangling story hooks in a long work as long as you deliver a suitably scaled dollop of closure for the main arc, resolving the main source of narrative tension.

#WritersCoffeeClub Sept 8. International Literacy Day! Share a moment when a reading of your work surprised you.

I am old and cynical and beyond weary at this point, and NO reading of my work surprises me any more, because you can say the sun rises in the east until you're blue in the face and 25% of your readers will berate you for saying the sun rises in the west.

(Having said that, I enjoy re-reading my work and tripping over the jokes I've long since forgotten putting in there.)

#WritersCoffeeClub 17: What are the defining traits of your niche in your genre?

Nearly all of the bestselling authors in Science Fiction/Fantasy Humor are quite dead and nobody has stepped up to fill their pointy shoes.

They also make no unfortunate reputation destroying remarks or get caught out in embarrassing peccadilloes that impact sales. Deadness has some obvious drawbacks, but it is an ideal state of being for an author living rent-free in all aspects in exchange for the minor inconvenience of housing a few worms and subterranean bugs.

Dead men tell no tales is absolutely true.

However, the tales they told are still very amusing and selling quite well.

There is obviously a vast unfilled market niche with a dearth of new titles and few new authors while everyone else writes in pursuit of plucky girl archers and cliché Red Weddings or dark dystopian robot infested futures dominated by psychotic narcissistic oligarchs.

If only I could puzzle out the present day publishing labyrinth and sneak a manuscript or two past the Minotaur of Procrastination and the Monopolists of Despond and out into the world for the amusement of the humor deprived giggling iconoclasts ensconced in their very comfortable Hobbit inspired bunkers eating second breakfast while re-reading dogeared novels that never go out of print and remain posthumous bestsellers.

The traits of this niche are: Fanciful use of language. Absurd use of common tropes from related genre. A manic sense of fun. The surreal feeling that one is far and away not in Kansas, anymore. A totally unwarranted belief that good will in fact conquer evil. No matter how dimwitted, cruel and mediocre the villains become.

That a microwave and a toaster make it possible to squeeze in a third breakfast provided the buttons on one’s waistcoat are firmly attached and that one has long since given up belts in favor of braces, not the ones on teeth, or suspenders, not the ones for silk stockings.

Hope the jelly will last.

#WritersCoffeeClub 9 Sept. What's your standard operating font, size, format? Or do you not have a standard?

That's the publisher's job; I format my text on screen using styles, in whatever font/size/zoom level doesn't make my eyes bleed, then reset the style to standard manuscript format before submitting.

#WritersCoffeeClub – 16th Oct. How do you feel about people reading your works without buying a personal copy?

Long-standing publishing lore is, there are roughly four readers per book sold. This includes library loans, second-hand sales, and friends borrowing books. This is normal.

I don't get mad at warez sites (most downloads go unread, most readers wouldn't have bought one), but I *DO* get enraged by pirates who re-list and sell my ebooks on amazon (they're stealing income from authors).

#WritersCoffeeClub Sep24 Do you write primarily for yourself or a reader?

I write for a market consisting of people who understand where I'm coming from and enjoy my stories. (Experience suggests there are enough of them to make this a viable business.) At the same time I try to tell stories that nobody else is telling. And to keep myself amused while I'm doing it.

#WritersCoffeeClub 6 Oct
What might an inattentive reader miss in your work?

Tons of subtext, lots of buried jokes and references to other media, subplots, and above all, thematic preoccupations.

Trouble is, with 30+ novels in print I've no idea what the common denominator is! Or even if there is one.

#WritersCoffeeClub 26th Sept: How does your faith feature in your works?

@rubyjones wrote an excellent thread on why this question makes an awful assumption and is exclusionary to those who do not have a faith… and also why “belief system” and “faith” are NOT actually interchangeable terms. I won’t be repeating it, since they said it better than I could.

But as an atheist today was not a great day for me to decide to start participating in this hashtag again. 🤷

#WritersCoffeeClub 18th Oct ~ Talk about a time you had a revelation.

I can't; revelations are a routine part of my writing process, they happen every few days during a draft.

#WritersCoffeeClub Oct 24 What is currently provisional in your workflow (or work)?

At this point in my career only the publisher is provisional—and even then, only before my agent has sold the book! (I usually work to contract with everything set out years in advance, but the times, they are a-changing.)

#WritersCoffeeClub Oct 18: Talk about a time you had a revelation.

Just this morning I finally realized what the MC's goal is.

I knew she considered herself to be dead, despite evidence to the contrary.

Now I know what she really wants is to find out who killed her.

#WritersCoffeeClub 25 Oct. Tell us about inspiration from an unlikely source.

The 2008 Global Financial Crisis! Without it, I'm pretty sure I'd never have written "Neptune's Brood", which is a space opera about financial fraud on a scale so vast the perpetrators had to colonise 200 new star systems to launder the proceeds.

I don't think even Elon Musk is thinking that big … yet.

#WritersCoffeeClub Oct 26 - How did you develop your voice?

I evolved it over about a decade of writing and selling short fiction. The first clear examples were written circa 1992, but I'd been selling to Interzone since 1985, appropriating other people's style insofar as I recognized style. (I'd been writing for more years before I got that far.)

I'm a slow learner and an autodidact at writing.

#WritersCoffeeClub October 27:
As a writer, what do you need right now?

A straight street—the Royal Mile will do—at least a kilometer long, with a billionaire impaled on a stake every two metres on both sides. (Don't worry, we won't run out of billionaires before we get to the end.) And complete criminalization of all commercial applications of AI. Plus the end of crapitalism as a cherry on top.

#WritersCoffeeClub Oct. 30: How does your work immortalise those who came before you?

Many of my novels are explicit homages to/pastiches of other writers.

The Laundry Files started out with four different British spy thriller authors, plus H. P. Lovecraft: Len Deighton, the Broccoli Bond movie franchise (rather than Ian Fleming's originals), Anthony Price, and Peter O'Donnell.

"Saturn's Children" was a riff on "Friday" by Robert A. Heinlein.

Current WIP is a Stainless Steel Rat tribute.

#WritersCoffeeClub Oct 28: Do you hide 'secrets' in your works?

Tons!

(There are sufficient numbers that I routinely post a blog essay full of spoilers/easter eggs/in-jokes for each novel, 6-18 months after publication: search for "site:antipope.org", "book title" and "crib sheet" (or "crib notes") to find them.)

This is in addition to the subtext and theme of each book, obviously.

#WritersCoffeeClub Apr 26 - Recommend a nonfiction book about writing.

It's not exactly non-fiction, but anyone planning or writing a high fantasy story (or even a D&D campaign) really should read Diana Wynne Jones' "The Tough Guide to Fantasyland" first. Structured like a Lonely Planet guide, but parodic by intent, it skewers all the clichés of the genre. A bit dated now (written in 1995-ish, so it misses out urban fantasy and romantasy tropes), but still valid!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Tough_Guide_to_Fantasyland

#WritersCoffeeClub October 29:
Pass along a book which came with a personal recommendation.

I was at a writers workshop in 1985 led by Ian Watson and someone asked him for book recs. "Neuromancer, by a new American writer, William Gibson," he said. "It's really hot right now!"

Reader, he was Not Wrong.

#WritersCoffeeClub 29 Sep: Talk about something with your work this month you're really proud of.

Can't: I'm flailing around aimlessly in the middle of a rewrite!

…

Well, I DID add this sentence to the WIP (our protagonist is embattled by bureaucracy):

"... Not to mention budgets to approve, six distinct defense committees to chair (all with conflicting agendas), and a blight of crottled greeps infesting the shaddock harvest to be addressed. And all of it needed to be dealt with yesterday."

#WritersCoffeeClub 11 Oct: What's a turn of phrase you've 'inherited' from someone else?

I'm doing my best to add a little gravitas to all my space operas, going forward … IYKYK!

#WritersCoffeeClub October 31: How did this month's writing go for you?

It's October, and I *always* get sandbagged by SAD.

On the other hand: got revised STARTER PACK off to my agent, rolled over into another redraft of GHOST ENGINE … and figured out what was wrong with the plot of GE, at a fundamental level, and how to fix it.

I am about to go on a 3 week long mini-tour in Spain so reworking GE is now on pause until I get home.

#WritersCoffeeClub 1 November: How much writing are you hoping to accomplish this month?

Very little! I'm on a rail trip from the 2nd through the 19th to Spain, for book events and a couple of literary festivals. And also to recharge.

When I get home afterwards that's a different matter because I have a plan …

#WritersCoffeeClub #WritingCommunity

28th Sept 2026. Could you work without the internet? What would change?

I'd be a lot happier with an offline wikipedia dump (yes, I have one, just in case!) but I could. I'd be less distractable: but on the other hand, those distractions feed into the complexity of my backgrounds and ideas, so the fiction would suffer unpredictably.

#WritersCoffeeClub Oct 2 Do you have plans for your next work yet?

Ha ha lolsob

After I finish the current rewrite I have to rewrite *another* novel (I know where the last rewrite attempt went wrong).

Then I have a half-written novella to dust off and probably finish.

Then I have the first 50K words of a sequel to the current WIP to continue, but only if my agent successfully auctions the current rewrite.

*Then* I have a stack of book ideas deep enough to see me through to retirement age.