by Ashley Lister

It’s that time of year when my students are graduating and receiving their degrees. It’s a time of mixed emotions for me as I’ve known some of these folk for more than three years and, as they move onto bigger and better things, it might be the last time I see them. I’m particularly proud of the current cohort as these brave educational adventurers managed to achieve their success during the restrictions of Covid – and that can’t have been easy.

But, instead of viewing this as a sad time, we rightly choose to see it as a cause for celebration. It’s a time to celebrate the accumulated results from all the hard work and study and it’s a chance to look forward to the bright future that’s awaiting each graduate.

Which is what I’d like to do on this post. I’m not going to spend the remainder of this post bragging about my personal achievements (other than to mention I’ve published a book of my incredibly rude poetry and recorded an audiobook version of that title).

What I’m more interested in is: what have YOU been doing over the past couple of years that is worthy of celebration? And yes, dear reader, I’m talking directly to YOU.

Please shout about your reasons to celebrate in the comments box below, share links to your work if that’s possible, and give us all a chance to congratulate you for your success.

On the third of June I was sat in front of my PC, wrestling with edits from a recently completed chapter. The document itself was roughly 23,000 words of a developing idea: a WIP I’m currently calling Seagulls from Hell.

The seagulls in my story had just been getting frisky. They’d done something that only the naughtiest seagulls in the world would be likely to do. And I felt as though the story was progressing in exactly the right direction.

SMASHCUT TO BLACK.

The screen died, as did every other electronic device in the house. The silence was sudden, eerie and inescapable. “Powercut,” I muttered. I smiled because I didn’t know those were still a thing. Deciding I was probably wrong I checked the fuse box to see if the safety switch had been activated.

A neighbour came to tell me his daughter had been on the phone to the electricity company and they expected to have the power back up by 9.00pm. I glanced at my PC monitor to see what the time was then, and realised the PC monitor wasn’t working because of the powercut.

It transpired I had two hours so I elected to use that time wisely. My desk had been buried under a mountain of paperwork whilst I went through the process of marking dissertations and exam scripts. I figured it was time to give the office a little TLC. I finished the desk swiftly, cleaned a couple of windows, put away some laundry that had been waiting on me and then read a paperback.
The lights came back on without any ceremony and I sighed with a little relief, switched my PC on and tried to remember where I’d been up to with my Seagulls from Hell.

An error box appeared claiming I was trying access unreadable content. I thought, if this is a criticism of my writing style, Microsoft Word have suddenly become brutal and more than a little hurtful. The error box gave me options to try and, like the well-trained Pavlovian rat that I am, I installed devices that were guaranteed to open my unreadable file and patiently tried each one.
I’m exaggerating a little when I use the word ‘patiently’. The truth is there was a lead weight in my stomach and the idea that I’d lost 23,000 words was making me sweat like a priest in a playground. None of the software downloads worked and, with rising desperation I tried one new fresh alternative after another. When I finally managed to get the corrupted document open the contents were nothing but hieroglyphics and gibberish.

It’s no exaggeration to say I was on the verge of tears.

By a strange coincidence, a pop-up box on my laptop asked me for feedback, wanting to know how likely I would be to recommend Word for Windows. My response was: “Since Word for Windows has just crashed and lost 23,000 words of a story I was writing, I think it’s highly unlikely that I’d recommend this product to someone unless I hate their f***ing guts.”

Then my wife came to the rescue. She was calm, patient and just what I needed. I had no backups of Seagulls from Hell. With it being stored on a cloud, I wasn’t even sure I had a copy of the damned file. But she went to the corrupt file and managed to go through the version history. By the time she’d finished her magical computer shenanigans, I was looking at all 23,000 words of my original story. I was still on the verge of tears, but this time they were tears of relief.

And I mention this as a cautionary tale for any writers who are reading this. To be safe, and not have to worry that you’re going to lose a huge chunk of valuable data, you’ve got two options: either regularly back up, or marry someone f***ing awesome like my wife, Tracy.

by Ashley Lister

“I’d rather have a cup of tea and a slice of cake than do all of that sweaty stuff.”

It was a comment that really pissed me off. And you can tell that I’m really pissed off because I don’t usually end sentences with prepositions.

I don’t mind constructive criticism. For example, being told that characters in a novel I’ve created are unlikeable is often justified: sometimes I write about people who are unlikeable. When someone told me they didn’t like an abrupt ending to one of my stories, I fully agreed. A longer ending would have been more satisfying. Admittedly, it would have involved padding and made the pacing drag, but it would have kept the characters alive for a little longer and that would have been a good thing.

But this comment, the comment about someone preferring a cup of tea and a slice of cake to ‘all of that sweaty stuff’ was fired at me as a direct challenge.
It happened because a colleague had been looking at Amazon and they’d seen my back catalogue (that’s not a euphemism). The colleague had mentioned it to someone else who cast a disdainful eye over the titles and then fixed me with their comment: “I’d rather have a cup of tea and a slice of cake than do all of that sweaty stuff.”

Fine. If you prefer anodyne beverages and pastries to physical intimacy, then you’re perfectly free to make those choices. This is what free will means. Also, if you’re psyche is so severely fucking damaged that you refer to physical intimacy as ‘all of that sweaty stuff’ then, may I suggest, you have that slice of cake and cup of tea at a psychiatrist’s office whilst he discusses your innumerable problems and (hopefully) prescribes euthanasia?

The reason why it annoyed me was because there was so much unnecessary judgement in the comment. It was almost as though, because I’d written extensively on the subject, this person thought I was challenging their opinion on sex and sexuality.

The truth is, I’m a relatively private person. I’ve written several erotic titles and, if you enjoy reading erotica, I think you’ll like my work. However, for those who don’t enjoy erotica, I’m fairly sure they won’t enjoy my back catalogue and I won’t try to force my work on those individuals.

But, whilst I’m not going to push my work on people who don’t want to read it, I don’t have to listen to asinine quips from people who describe sex as ‘all of that sweaty stuff’. And, if someone genuinely prefers tea and cake to physical intimacy, I don’t think their opinion on erotica is worthy of note.

The following writing exercise is taken from my book: How to Write Short Stories and Get Them Published.

One way to create new and unusual ideas is to write a sentence where each subsequent word begins with the next letter of the alphabet. For instance:

“All big children,” Donald explains, “find great happiness in jumpsuits. Kids like making new outfits popular.”

Quentin recoiled, surprised this uncommon view was…

Admittedly, this makes little sense. But it’s already inspiring me to think about the importance of clothes within the fiction I create. My mind is currently torn between ideas of researching sumptuary laws, and a discussion I had with a student who claimed he was the victim of ‘tracksuit racism’. Perhaps my thoughts might find a way of combining these two ideas.

For those who find it too easy to compile a sentence in alphabetical order, try to continue the sentence (or sentences) by returning to the start of the alphabet and continuing.

A boy child, Derek, encountered fossilised golden Hadrosauruses in Jane’s kitchen. Like many nerds, only practising quantitative rational study, to unequivocally verify wild xenolithic (yellowing) zoological anomalies, brainy clever-clogs Derek expected fame…

Again, I have no idea where this might be going, or where it came from. However, the idea of writing something about palaeontology and the excavation (or reanimation, or revisitation) of dinosaurs is now exciting me. Also, the idea of excavating a dinosaur’s fossilised remains from a kitchen strikes me as something whimsical and potentially workable in a piece of fiction.

A variation on this exercise is to take any single letter of the alphabet and see how long you can continue to write a sentence that makes some level of sense.

The Austrian-American author Walter Abish used this form of constrained-writing exercise to produce the novel Alphabetical Africa. The conceit behind Abish’s novel is that the first chapter contains only words beginning with the letter ‘a’. The second chapter contains only words beginning with ‘a’ or ‘b’ and this trend continues through the first twenty-six chapters of the novel. In the second half of the novel (there are fifty-two chapters in total) words beginning with the letter ‘z’ disappear in Chapter 27, and there are no words beginning with the letter ‘y’ in Chapter 28, etc.

To illustrate this with my own writing, below is an alliterative sentence which I’ve begun with the letter ‘m’.

Mondays make most men (mainly manly, muscular, macho-men) miserable. Maybe Monday-morning mating might make more men merry? Mayhap midday martinis might make Mondays more manageable? Meh! Most Mondays might maintain misery, making millions melancholic.

I’ll be honest and admit I have no idea where this is going (or where it came from). However, on a level of inspiration, I’m already thinking that I need to produce a piece of poetry that uses excessive alliteration for comic effect. The repetition of that ‘m’ sound is so obvious when this is read aloud it comes close to making the whole piece unintelligible.

I also think there’s something very relatable about miserable Monday mornings. Perhaps, as a way of introducing a character in a piece of fiction, I might introduce him or her trying to put on a brave face and cope with the Monday morning blues. Conversely, I might write a story where the villain is someone who smiles and acts obscenely cheerful on Monday morning.

Write an alphabetical sentence. Go on for as long as possible (keeping in mind that the letters X,Y and Z don’t make this exercise easy). If the challenge is not too demanding, work backwards once you’ve completed a sentence.

Alternatively, select a letter of the alphabet at random and see how long you can continue a sentence (or string of sentences) using only words that begin with that letter.

Exercises such as these can sometimes yield fresh and surprising concepts or descriptions. Whatever ideas they inspire, make sure you record them in your notebook so that they can be utilised later.

How to Write Short Stories and Get Them Published is available through all major suppliers.

By Ashley Lister

 Because of my job, I often end up talking about the benefits of being a writer. I can wax lyrical for days about the joys of making my own hours, sharing my stories with those who want to be entertained, or simply losing myself in my own imagination. But one of the main blessings to my mind is that I get to spend time with this furry bastard.

 This is Oswald. Oswald is a mix-breed, half chihuahua and half Yorkshire terrier. We refer to him as a Chorkie. He’s also disturbingly intelligent. We taught him to swap things he finds for treats. The reasoning was, rather than him picking up potentially dangerous detritus and consuming it, he would give his findings to us, and we can then exchange whatever he’s got for a harmless piece of kibble.

 Oswald took advantage of this quite swiftly. He went scouting around the house for anything that looked like it might be worth exchanging. Socks, receipts found in pockets, envelopes that had been left on desks, general household litter. Once he’d asset-stripped the house he then went outside and swapped half the gravel from the rear of the building for kibble. After that he moved onto leaves, twigs and dead-headed rose hips. He retrieved them from outside, took them to the treat station in the kitchen, and insisted on being paid for his findings at the current kibble exchange-rate.

 But his genius didn’t stop there.

 Whilst my son was visiting we had closed the lounge door so Oswald wasn’t able to get into the room unsupervised. (My son had left a bag in there and Oswald would have been through it like a villain in a heist movie). Oswald kicked and kicked at the door but we ignored him and told him that he wasn’t going into the lounge.

 Oswald went and found a twig. Instead of taking it to the treat station, where he had performed his previous transactions, he dropped the twig at the lounge door and stared up at my son as if to tell him that he would trade this piece of contraband for access to the forbidden room.
 

 To most people this will sound like the ramblings of a dog-owner anthropomorphising a pet and imbuing causation and correlation where there is only coincidence. But for me, as someone who gets to spend so much time at home, seeing this remarkable behaviour is one of the added benefits of being a writer.

By Ashley Lister

Not only is this a time for celebrating and overindulging, it’s also time for me to issue an annual reminder for how to improve your writing.

As I’m sure I’ve mentioned before, when I’m not blogging for ERWA, or writing stories that amuse me and my modest readership, I lecture in creative writing. Around this time of year I end up doing a lot of marking and I’m repeatedly struck by the common errors that are made in student submissions.

This is a list of my top four bugbears.

1. Apostrophes.
There are two reasons for using an apostrophe: to show omission and to show possession. Apostrophes of omission are the ones we find in words like they’re, don’t and we’ll. Apostrophes of possession are the ones that show ownership, as in the boy’s books, or the girl’s guns. Apostrophes of possession become potentially confusing when we deal with plurals but it’s not really quantum physics. If we’re looking at books belonging to several boys, the apostrophe goes after the pluralising s (i.e. the boys’ books). If we’re looking at guns belonging to several girls, the same rule applies as before and we write the girls’ guns.

2. Run-on Sentences
Somewhat ironically, this is the definition of a run-on sentence from Wikipedia: “A run-on is a sentence in which two or more independent clauses are joined without appropriate punctuation or conjunction, and this is generally considered a stylistic error, though it is occasionally used in literature and may be used as a rhetorical device, and an example of a run-on is a comma splice, in which two independent clauses are joined with a comma without an accompanying coordinating conjunction, and some prescriptivists exclude comma splices from the definition of a run-on sentence, but this does not imply that they consider comma splices to be acceptable.”
Admittedly, run-on sentences can suggest an unconventional mindset, or give an idea of stream of consciousness writing that reflects the reality of our chaotic mindset. However, unless they’re being used to create a specific effect, sentences should be used to express a single thought with clarity and concision. Anything else is going to drag a reader out of the narrative.

3. Dialogue Formatting
In short: start a new paragraph for each speaker and keep all reported speech and punctuation within speech marks. For a lengthier overview of dialogue this link to a MasterClass article might be helpful. 

4. Proofreading
Typos are inescapable. We all make occasional mistakes or suffer at the helpful hands of autocorrect. But printed typos will only ever bite you in the arse and the best way to eradicate them is to thoroughly proofread everything prior to hitting the metaphorical SEND button. This is not my way of saying everything needs to be perfect and typo-free. I’m the last person in the world who could argue for that. But the fewer mistakes on the page, the easier a text is to read. This is a link to one of my favourite poems on the subject of proofreading. 

Reading over this I realise I’m starting 2022 in a grumpy mood, which is probably not a bad thing. The last couple of years have been difficult for all of us and I hope this one finally gives us the respite from tension and stress that we all deserve. Happy New Year xxx

By Ashley Lister

Well done. If you’re reading this, it means you’ve got to the final month of 2021 and the end is in sight. This accomplishment is no mean achievement. We have had two years of WTF moments including pandemics, lockdowns, political upheaval and more deaths than any of us wanted.

So, congratulations on your good fortune and tenacity. Let’s see how we can build on that to make 2022 a massive improvement for all of us. And, the best way any of us can improve things is by taking care of ourselves. Here I’m going to myth-bust some self-care tips that are supposed to help those of us who’ve used up the last of their determination to get this far and give you the advice that I know will really help. (NB: I Have no qualifications for giving this advice and cannot guarantee that it will help in any way).

1. Exercise Regularly. I don’t understand why this is on so many lists. I go to the gym regularly but only so I can tell people I go to the gym regularly. This is the only health benefit. I wear a FitBit to monitor my heartrate and sleeping patterns, but I don’t bother looking at it if I’ve skipped the gym for a day or two, or overdone the beer. The advice should be: exercise as regularly as suits your needs. Walk a dog. Wank. Dance a little. (But try not to do all three of these at the same time).

2. Eat and drink with health in mind. I don’t like to throw the word ‘bullshit’ into a conversation so early, but: BULLSHIT. I’ve made it through the lockdowns on a diet of bourbon, croissants and chocolate bars. I’m not trying to say this is always a healthy option but, if I’d been expected to graze on kale and lentils, I’d have given up during the first week of the 2020 pandemic. Eat and drink what makes you happy. If that happiness comes with a cost of adverse health implications, make sure you’re aware of them and balance the choice judiciously.

3. Practice relaxation techniques. One of the things that has often heightened my stress has been the pressure I put on myself to be able to master relaxation techniques. Trying to think of nothing is impossible. Trying to concentrate on my breathing just makes me think of respiratory illnesses. I find the most useful relaxation technique I know is going to sleep. I appreciate this is difficult for some people with insomnia and sleep difficulties but those guys need to seek the advice of a trusted medical expert to help them overcome those issues. The rest of us should simply chillax and take a much deserved nap.

4. Avoid Internalised Negativity. This is one of the few ones in which I do believe. When I drop something in the kitchen, I will call myself every name under the sun and berate myself with an internal monologue such as, “You clumsy fucking halfwit! Are you too dumb to operate a teabag nowadays?” The thing is, this sort of self-talk is not particularly helpful. I wouldn’t let my worst enemy talk to me in such a way, yet I’m internalising negativity because I think it’s acceptable. It’s not and I’d advocate for everyone to stop bad-mouthing themselves in such a way.

5. Leave a positive review for your favourite author. This isn’t going to reduce your stress in any way, but you’ll make an author happy. And, if you don’t think that’s a good thing to do with your day, you’re clearly an evil person in need of genuine self-care advice.

by Ashley Lister

We all understand that writer’s block is the state of being unable to proceed with writing, or the inability to start writing something new. Whilst some tell us it’s a genuine disorder, there are others who claim it’s just a state of mind. Either way, we can all agree writer’s block is a condition that needs to be vanquished.

Clinical psychologists in the 1970s identified four common causes for writer’s block:

Excessively harsh self-criticism
Fear of comparison to other writers
Lack of external motivation, such as attention and praise
Lack of internal motivation, such as the desire to tell one’s story

As Val Penny points out in a recent blog post: “In other words, writer’s block stems from various feelings of discontent with the creative act of writing. But these feelings are by no means irreversible! After all, every writer begins with a sense of purpose and excitement; beating writer’s block is about getting those feelings back.”

Consequently, here are five tips to help break through the block.

1. Avoid Perfectionism
Remember, as Hemingway remarked, “The first draft of anything is shit.”
I believe this is true in several areas of life, and I say this with the confidence that comes from being the second child in the family. Wanting to achieve perfection is a laudable ideal. But don’t let the quest for perfection stop you from producing a shit first draft that can then be polished for your audience’s consumption. Without that first draft – nothing is going to happen.

2. Change Your Weapon of Choice
If you’ve been working on a word-processor, consider changing to paper and pen. Or try dictating your story into a voice-to-text app. If you’ve been using MS Word, consider a writer-focused tool such as Scrivener. Sometimes we suffer from writer’s block because a part of our mind is rebelling against contemptible familiarity and changing our weapon of choice for recording our ideas can give us a boost that lifts us away from the ennui of the overly familiar.

3. Don’t Write
I appreciate this is what we’re already doing when we have writer’s block, and I understand this is a dangerous piece of advice that can be used as an excuse to compound the condition. However, sometimes we need to stop writing so we have a chance to recharge the batteries of our imagination. Watching a film, reading a book, visiting friends or taking an invigorating walk can provide the stimulus we need to bypass the issue causing a stumbling block to our creativity.

4. Creative Exercises
As a lecturer, I repeatedly throw exercise at my students and, to my constant surprise, students invariably come back with imaginative and stylish responses. This is usually done in the dry and imaginatively-inconducive atmosphere of a classroom/lecture hall: an area that is possibly the antithesis of creativity. Perhaps a creative writing exercise won’t help you complete your current project but it might be enough to remind you that your imagination and abilities are still formidable. It could even provide an idea for a project that might be more in line with your current storytelling needs.

5. Fail to Plan or Plan to Fail
If your story is dead in the water, take a structured approach and write an outline. Identifying how a story will develop can help to avoid future blocks on the same project. There are lots of ways to look at story structure, from Campbell, Propp, Vogler or Freytag, and any of them can provide a helpful template which you can use as a blueprint for your work. Once you know where the story is going, and how characters are going to get from the beginning to the end, it can be easier to approach writing about their journey.

Keep in mind that none of these are foolproof, but this list is not exhaustive. If you’re struggling with writer’s block, remember it’s not terminal and it can always be beaten by time, patience, and resolution. And, if you have a preferred way to beat writer’s block, I’d love to read about it in the comments below.

Ash

By Ashley Lister

 I can’t remember if I’ve shared this before or not but it’s always worth revisiting. My favourite writing exercise is the swifty. What, you might ask, is a swifty? (other than a rather awkward rephrasing of the term ‘quickie’). According to Merriam Webster a ‘Swifty is a play on words taking the form of a quotation ascribed to Tom and followed by an adverb. Here’s a good example: “The thermostat is set too high,” said Tom heatedly.’

The form takes its name from the main character (Tom Swift) in a series of adventure books ascribed to the authorship of Victor Appleton. In the series Appleton was meant to have a weakness for adverbs, attaching an excess of them to dialogue in order to add colour and variety to the narration.

“I’ve got a knife,” said Tom sharply.
“Get to the back of the boat,” said Tom sternly.
“I like the herb you’ve used for seasoning,” said Tom sagely.

I like these because, as a writing exercise, they’re a fun diversion from the seriousness of writing, they allow a little bit of silliness into the otherwise formal world of fiction writing, and they teach a valuable lesson about the way the artifice of some adverbial tags can distract a reader from the content of dialogue.

“Baa,” said Tom, sheepishly.
“I have a thing for redheads,” said Tom, gingerly.
“Have you ever tried figging?” asked Tom, gingerly.

It’s a relatively easy exercise – simply write a swifty – but it is a liberating process that reminds us of the fragile balance between dialogue creation and speech presentation. I’d love to see your examples of swifties in the comments box below.