One of my great frustrations is characters in stories that don’t do things for believable reasons. That’s why I wrote this guest post for Reading The Dream Life on Good vs. Evil and Believable Characters.  It’s gold, people.  Gold. Richard Parry on Good vs. Evil & Believable Characters @TactualRain #AmWriting #Thriller http://t.co/2ZTa2iaTDR — Mike Grey (@ReadDreamLife) May 1, 2014 You ever seen one of those villains in a movie that cackles with glee, rubbing their hands together at the downfall of the heroes? Just being a bit of a dick? The thing is, people are dicks all the time, but only super rarely do they wake up in the morning and say to themselves, “You know, it’s Tuesday: I’m going to be a dick today.” If we start from there, it gives us our first hint on how to make Read More …

Someone at the work cafeteria today was complaining that the faucet was broken. “It doesn’t work,” she said. Turns out, there’s a subtle shift in some obscure, alien-originated technology we’ve adopted for Earth use.  I think the key is this: if it doesn’t work with a twist, try a pull.  The scary thing is, she’s been working here longer than I have, so I really want to know: how has she survived more than six months without a drink of water?  Does she usually lap it from the toilet? I’d love to include things like this in my writing — but no one would believe me.

I’ve prepared a piece for From Mind to Mind Books on Work Area Inspiration. Colour theory. There you go: guest post done. … Okay, apparently I need to do a little better than that. The thing about my work area is that I want to make sure that it doesn’t jar with my delicate eyeballs. My home office desk is this sheet of tempered glass, and I’ve got the various technology pieces in step with this: the MacBook is grey like the desk, and the mouse, monitor, and keyboard are black. Even the mouse mat is black.Maybe it’s not colour theory. Maybe it’s OCD. I use this basic premise for anywhere I write — it’s a pretty good determiner of whether I’ll get good writing done. I sometimes like to lean back, take a rest from the keyboard, and let my eyes Read More …

Lonely Heart have just put a piece up I wrote on avoiding procrastination.  Go check it out. Oh, the irony: you’re surfing the Internet right now. Is it helping you write, or whatever it is that you should be doing?  I don’t know.  Maybe not.  Don’t beat yourself up about it: I surf the web when I should be doing things that are more productive too. I’ve got a few techniques that I use that I’m happy to share.  It’s not really a recipe — it’s just how I work out whether I’m in a good place to mess about on the Internet or not.  Here’s my top five tricks. Trick one: set aside some time to write.  I put it in my calendar.  It’s regular — same time each day, same amount of time each day. Trick two: avoid assholes.  Read More …

This is not about Dr. Phil, despite how much of an admirer of his work you may be. I’ve put together a piece on writing believable characters over at the Author’s Friend.  Check it out. You ever seen one of those villains in a movie that cackles with glee, rubbing their hands together at the downfall of the heroes?  Just being a bit of a dick? The thing is, people are dicks all the time, but only super rarely do they wake up in the morning and say to themselves, “You know, it’s Tuesday: I’m going to be a dick today.” If we start from there, it gives us our first hint on how to make our characters more real.  Start with them being human, and having human drivers.  People are “evil” or “good” because they want to achieve a Read More …

You read it here first. Ok, maybe you didn’t: it’s not a new idea.  Just a little piece I did on the importance of covers for Nose In Books. Sex sells. The thing is, our eyeballs are attracted to shiny things.  It probably all started with the basics: does that food look good to eat?  It does make me question the good judgement of the first person to eat a mussel, but whatever: we make a lot of calls based on what we see.  Despite our great technology and evolved art, we’re still animals at the core.  We like to eat, sleep, and make baby animals. Like I said, sex sells. Focus, people.  Back to book covers.  This means that your cover needs to grab a browsing reader by the eyeballs, travel down the optic nerve, and hunt around a little Read More …

In a rampant aberration against all that’s holy, I’ve been interviewed on a site called Mommy Adventures. I can’t make this stuff up, people: it writes itself. It must be the shower scene.  That’s what I’m thinking.  You haven’t reached that part in Night’s Favour yet?  Best get reading then.

A so-called-friend nominated me for more work.  Thanks, Cassie. The rules are:  Answer the four questions below, link back to the person who invited you, and name the people who will be posting the following Monday. What am I working on? Outside the reach of the G Men, I’m working on a dystopian future story called Upgrade.  I’m trying to explore a little inside the concept of what makes us truly human, and how you might get back in touch with that from inside the machine.  If you were born into it, would you even know what you’d lost, and how would you know what it looked like if you found it again. Also, there are guns and giant mechs.  You can relax, this isn’t some story about a woman dying of Alzheimer’s.  It’s an action story with energy weapons and Read More …

Balance is important. You’ll remember I put something up a couple days ago about Edward Snowden, and about how good and evil are just points of view, right?  Meet…  The NSA. TED did a good job here of allowing a response from the NSA — the approach feels fair, even if the questions don’t seem quite balanced.  You can watch that for yourselves, you don’t need me telling you which one of these points of view is right or wrong.  That’s your thing, right? The interesting part for me is the insight into the political machine.  At the start of the talk, the G Man is talking about how Snowden had opportunities to address his concerns without dumping classified information onto the Internet.  The trail of tears he describes is my fucking life.  Select committees.  Managers.  Directors.  And it struck me: Read More …