CHECKLIST FOR SUCCESS

You want to be a successful writer. You would like to have dollar signs coming out of your ears. Here are a few tips on how to achieve that:

1. Treat your writing as your profession. Make sure the family know, those are your working hours and no one is to intrude on them. If the house has caught fire or someone has broken a bone then they may knock on your door. Otherwise, be firm. Your writing has moved from being a hobby to a profession. You are going to write every day, you are not going to write when you “feel” like it. You wouldn’t do that if you had a boss and went into an office every day.
   
2. Decide on how many words a day you are going to write. Aim for 1,000 words. It’s not impossible, its only three pages. Think of it long-term. With 1,000 words a day you can churn out a book in three months, three or maybe four books a year. Thing is, if you have set your goal at 1,000 then you write 1,000, not 900, not 950. Sit there until the magic 1,000 is done. And it will be magic!
   
3. Don’t diversify. General advice is to stick to one genre and, preferably in that genre, to a subject that will turn into a series. For example, you are going to write thrillers and, more specifically, paranormal thrillers. With one subject area your readers will know what to expect when they see your name on the book cover. (And this is where I have fallen very short. I’ve written bios, novels, a gift book, an instruction manual. It’s time I took my own advice and had a major subject area in which I can specialise.)
   
4. The well needs to be filled so make sure you take a break. Just as if you were going into the office every day you need to have time off to cool down and re-source. That means spending time at the beach, or walking in the wetlands, or even having coffee with friends at the local café. (I was offered a day at the races. I didn’t go. Darn! That could have been a source of a new book.)
   
5. Spend some time in the week doing your marketing and promotion (and that’s another blog waiting to be written).
   
6. There are some necessary tools you are going to need in your “office space”. First is Roget’s Thesaurus. A dictionary; I have a two-set Oxford I wouldn’t be without. Elements of Style by Strunk and White and I have a copy of Write Edit Print: Style Manual for Aotearoa New Zealand. Poetry books galore and a couple of shelves of how-to write books.
   

You are now set to be the best and most professional writer you can be. Good luck.

Thank heavens for those who mangle the English language. The likes of the Reverend William Archibald Spooner and Richard Sheridan’s Mrs Malaprop bring to the language a sparkle and a sense of humour that, if it doesn’t drive you to distraction, invigorates and amuses.
Over the years, I have created a couple of characters whose personalities are molded by their, shall we say, unique approach to the English language.

In my book The Indigo Kid, Stella Goodstar runs the Sixty-Nine Club, a porn-slash-spiritual store (she didn’t know which end to cater for, so she combines the two). Stella has decided to dispense with posters in her store as someone has promised to ‘paint a nice Muriel on the wall’ for her. And discussing a charismatic evangelist: “That Peter Shepherd...A real fox in the penthouse, that one.”
In Rusty and Slasher and the Circus from Hell the priest, Father Shamus Appelbaum, follows in the splendid footsteps of Rev Spooner by urging his congregation to ‘hollow their fart’. Slasher is not averse to mangling the language either. “Maybe that’s because wriggle mortis had set in.” Slasher gave a theatrical shudder. “Now I know why they call them stiffs. He was like a cardboard box with legs.”
Creating such characters is fun. And that’s what it’s all about, isn’t it? This writing lark. Having fun. Creating characters you like, that are maybe a little spark of your own inner, hidden, self. Characters you wouldn’t mind having a cuppa with. (And, yes, I do like Nana Naills – she is naughty and not-so-nice and she needs adult diapers before going on a heist.)

Comparisons are odorous, I know. I will never write a spy novel, like John le Carré, about a Soviet agent who defecated to the West. I will never write a classic like Lame is Rob by Victor Hugo or Don Coyote by Servants. I may never win the Pullet Surprise with my novels but, boy, I’ve had fun.


(With apologies and humble acknowledgements to Des McHale who wrote A Decapitated Coffee, Please)

I don't do cockroaches very well. They scuttle. They glare. I may be a gazillion times bigger than them but they're not frightened. They just wave their antennae at me, lift their claws into a Mohammad Ali position and stand their ground. Is it because they know something?
Yes they do. They know that when we humans are no longer on this planet they'll be in charge. Except I have news for them. Don't they read science fiction? Don't they know that after we've nuked the planet and they are marching around military style, there will be a score of us coming out of the caves and ready to take them on. We won't have totalled ourselves and we'll still be squashing those little bastards underfoot.
Except, I'm not like that. I have a soft spot for anything uglier and smaller than me. When I see a cockroach, I find a tissue, clean of course, and wrap it up. You have to be quick about this or else they crab away faster than you can catch them.,
 
Wrapped up neatly in a tissue package I throw them out the window.  They float away on my tissue parachute.
 
I hope they remember who saved them.