Jake Grey's Blog

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Also available on iBooks, probably, but I don't have an Apple device.

I recommend buying from Smashwords if possible, because it comes DRM-free and a greater percentage of the cover price reaches me directly.

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https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/888322

"Outpost 219-A is not a very exciting place to be. High up in the mountains a long drive from anywhere, the only thing the two radio technicians have to do all day is perform a daily inspection of the huge radio antennas that listen to the signals sent by their potentially unfriendly neighbours, fix anything that breaks and make note of local weather conditions and the risk of forest fires.

"Between the tedium of their duties and the taciturn nature of his only subordinate, Warrant Officer Peter Wilson lasts less than a week before he starts treating the "Remarks" section of the log rather less formally or reverently than modern military thinking would approve of.

"After all, he reasons, who reads the logbook of an outpost where nothing has ever happened and probably never will happen?"

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Yet more research. What would a bunch of hip, socially and sexually liberated teens and young adults keep in the fridge in their youth club when they're living in a post-apocalyptic survivalist commune? I've spent this afternoon reading up on everything from growing lemons in a rather cold and wet climate (achievable on a small scale if you have a greenhouse, by the way) to recipes for Victorian soft drinks...

This is going to be another one of those minor background details that gets added because the idea amuses me. I have a bit of a weakness for old-school ginger beer, cream soda etc. Not the stuff you get in a can from Barr or Schweppes, but the real deal, brewed the old-fashioned way with yeast to get the carbonation and no artificial anything. The result probably isn't much healthier for you than a regular soft drink, all-natural organic sugar is still sugar as far as your metabolism is concerned, but I guarantee it tastes better!


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In Chapter 4, there's an offhand mention of "balloon bush", a biofuel crop that has only moderate yields but can grow acceptably well in soil that's too shallow and stony to be useful for anything else. I didn't make that up out of whole cloth. It's based on Jatropha curcas , sometimes known as "bubble bush" among other things. In its current form it's not actually that good a biofuel crop -growing it on marginal land nets you marginal yields, and it needs a hell of a lot of watering- but it's only been cultivated as such for a short time and isn't really domesticated yet. Balloon bush is what J.curcas could be after a few hundred years of selective breeding and a bit of genetic modification.


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If you want to know how to write compelling, convincing and relateable female characters and a believable and healthy romance arc, you can learn a lot about what not to do from going to Smart Bitches, Trashy Books and reading the negative reviews. You can learn a lot from the positive reviews as well, but the negative ones are much funnier.


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Running your concept for a nonbinary character past a nonbinary friend and getting a thumbs-up, and a comment about how I'm getting good at developing characters when I don't have firsthand knowledge to draw on for their life experiences.

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Things I've done instead of writing today: Update my Smashwords profile. Yes, that really is me in the picture; I think it adds to the "mysterious reclusive artist" image I'm trying to cultivate. Besides, no less than three attractive women said it looked good.


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Really, really good article on the subject: Writing People of Color (if you happen to be a person of another color)

"Recently, a friend of mine asked for feedback on her manuscript. Her novel was filled with complex characters, a thought-provoking plot, and enough intrigue to keep the reader riveted. I did what any good editor and friend would do, honestly praising the good parts, and delicately noting which parts could use work. This part is confusing, I wrote. This part seems out of character. She nodded along while reading my notes, completely prepared for all of my comments, except for one: Where are the people of color?

"When we discussed this later, she (a white writer) admitted she feels uncomfortable adding people of color (PoC) to her fiction, as it feels disingenuous. “Write what you know” and all that. How could she add, say, a Japanese person without it seeming like a token gesture?"

Truth be told, this is an issue I struggle with myself. I've never liked the saying, "Write what you know"; I've always agreed with Joe Haldeman's quote about how that adage is a surefire way to get lots of mediocre novels about English professors contemplating adultery. But I do believe that you shouldn't try to write what you don't know, and as a white guy from a relentlessly middle-class background in a very white part of the East Midlands I most definitely don't know the first thing about what it's like to be non-white on 21st century Earth. Luckily, science fiction lets me fudge things a bit...
 

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Music plays a big part in my writing, and indeed my life in general; silence has a way of messing with my head, so I have some sort of music on at all times, even when I'm in bed.

Generally speaking I'll either stream one of a few radio stations I like or just have my massive, sprawling library of MP3s that I've been collecting for over a decade playing in a shuffle in the background, but of late I've been making a bit of an effort to pick out something appropriate to what I'm working on.

For the project I started this blog to promote, that's involved a somewhat eclectic but enjoyable mix of folk and prog rock, vaguely hippyish Seventies pop songs and even quite a lot of ambient nature noise. You could probably infer a lot about the story from the playlist.

In fact, here's a not even close to comprehensive list of the stuff I listen to while writing. Listen to some of it on YouTube and tell me what sort of themes you think the story will contain!

Artists: Ballycotton, Blackmore's Night, Varttina, Beltaine, Jefferson Starship (particularly "Blows Against The Empire"), Yes, Electric Light Orchestra

Stations: Radio Rivendell, Radio North Sea International, BBC Radio 3, assorted ambient nature noise longplays on YouTube



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406 words in the last 24 hours. Not my best but not bad either.

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