Welcome to the Darkside...

...join me, Akasha Savage, as I brave the deepest dungeons and scale the misty mountains to achieve my dream: to see my novel Bathory in print. I will take you by the hand and keep you beside me as I cross this uncharted territory...



...let us step into the moonlit darkness together...

Thursday 27 May 2010

A Good Rejection!

Last month I sent off my short story: Calling 666, to a magazine. It wasn't chosen for publication, but someone had taken the trouble to write this on my rejection slip:
Your writing style is good, as is your command of language. Please send us more of your work.
I had a smile on my face all day!


My novel is rolling along nicely.
My word count is going up up up.......

:D

Wednesday 19 May 2010

How to make a writer's blood boil.....

I know. I know.
I said I wouldn't be posting much at the mo, but I had to share this one with you all because it made me see red....
A 'colleague' at work found out I was in the throes of writing a novel, and then came out with that old familiar chestnut:

He's always thought he would write a book one day. When he has time he's going to 'give it a go'.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
When does ANYONE EVER have time to write a book? I know I don't. I have to make time.
Squishing my writing in between all the hundred and one other things I have to do in my life.

Then he said:
I have a title. Cos that's the important part isn't it?

Oh, that'll be where I'm getting it wrong then! Sod the research, the characters, the dialogue, the plot...it's the title you have to sort out first!
For months my work-in-progress was simply called Untitled, since then it's had about four titles before I settled on 'Bathory', and who knows if that will be the final choice.
When I said this to him, the person in question looked at me like I was a bug on his shoe, and that look said:
You might be writing a book, but at least I've got a title!

I told him to come and see me when he's written the first 50,000 words!

Okay....

Rant over...pass me a bottle of wine!

:)

Saturday 15 May 2010

Time out.....

The deadline I gave myself to have my novel polished and dusted and ready to be sent off to agents/publishers is fast approaching, and my MS is nowhere near as ready as I would have liked it to be by now; mid-May.

So, I have reached a decision: for a while(...days...weeks...months...?), I am going to focus all my energy and spare time towards my work-in-progress. I am determined to finish it by the end of the summer, and the only way to do this is to cull from my life - just for a while - all the things that get in my way. I am going to become a 'passive' blogger. I will still be reading your blogs once a week - and leaving a comment or two - but I will not be updating my own so often.

I may leave a twitter type comment now and again, just to keep you up to date on my progress.

For the time being, here's a sonnet I wrote inspired by my novel:

The night is still, the moonlight bright,
The midnight sky a deep blue velvet shroud.
A raven, startled from its sleep, takes flight.
Wings a solitary path across the misty cloud.
A woman's scream rips through the air,
Hands reach up to the blackened skies.
She has been trapped within her lair,
Caught in a web of self-inflicted lies.
With darkest venom in her callous heart,
She vows cruel revenge on all.
She'll never rest until the start
Of her murderous bloodlust ball.
With these words so forcefully spoken,
She falls to her knees. A woman broken.