D.C. Farmer's Blog

July 12, 2024

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Welcome to WordPress. This is your first post. Edit or delete it, then start writing!

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Published on July 12, 2024 05:13

August 7, 2015

A visit to the Hipposync Archives.

Pageflex Persona [document: PRS0000026_00021]

Following the recent release of Frivolous Pursuits as the second book in the Hipposync Archives series, a reader recently asked if they had to read the first book, The 400Lb Gorilla, in order to enjoy the second. The answer was an emphatic, no. A serial is a story told in many installments with a story line weaving through the books and leading to a single point of conclusion, as with The Lord of The Rings for example, and it makes sense to read them in sequence. In a series, the same charac...

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Published on August 07, 2015 01:37

July 9, 2015

Frivolous Pursuits Giveaway

Goodreads Book Giveaway Frivolous Pursuits by D.C. Farmer Frivolous Pursuits by D.C. Farmer

Giveaway ends August 06, 2015.

See the giveaway details
at Goodreads.

Enter Giveaway

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Published on July 09, 2015 23:34

July 4, 2015

Frivolous Pursuits

Pageflex Persona [document: PRS0000026_00021]

Delivering a book for publication is a lot like delivering a baby. And, as a man of a certain age, I would now all about that, right? Well, I’ll have you know, part of my medical training involved delivering 20 odd souls into the world. Okay, it was a few years ago, and, after some over enthusiastic use of the ventouse on my part, suctionsome of those poor souls did look very odd indeed. All one or two of them needed was a bell to tie to their wispy hair and they could have passed for Noddy any da...

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Published on July 04, 2015 23:58

April 16, 2015

Snuff – an election antidote.

Snuff (Discworld, #39; City Watch #8)Snuff by Terry Pratchett

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

As an homage to Terry Pratchett and in the wake of his death, my wife’s book club decided they should read one of the great man’s books. Not their usual cup of warm brown liquid by a long chalk. Over breakfast recently, the current Mrs DCF and I discussed the pros and cons of satirical fantasy fiction from a man who, at the turn of the century, was Britain’s second most-read author after one Ms Rowling, also a fantasy author. The Colour of Magi...

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Published on April 16, 2015 23:15

March 15, 2015

TAKE MY ARM AND LET’S GO. SO LONG TERRY PRATCHETT

MORT

In the space left by someone dying there’s usually a house full of drawers containing papers that have instantly lost their significance, shoes that no one else will ever wear, and photographs of people no one else needs to be reminded of. Not many of us get to shuffle off and glance back at that last moment (While a chap with a scythe on a big white horse waits) to see our comet tail spelling out the word ‘legacy’. You have to have made something with your life for that to happen.

TP

1680x1050_discworld-terry-pratchett-wallpaper-e1367902680361Pratchet...

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Published on March 15, 2015 13:05

February 19, 2015

On becoming a hybrid scribe.

hybrid


shockNo, not another apocalyptic-dystopian-28-day-triffid-zombie book, but a description of my new status as a writer. So yes, my nice, but now sold, Independent Publisher and I have parted company and I am going to do it on my own.

Like any divorce, it leaves you feeling a little miserable and vulnerable, but then the second jack and coke kicks in and you begin, if you’re anything like me, to marshal the troops. My army will include:


1/ Beta reader–tick (someone who already likes my stuff)


Beta reader


2/ Editor...

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Published on February 19, 2015 09:08

January 29, 2015

Reading scared and writing it.

scared


I’m like most people in that I give in to the universal fears of pain and death and unnoticed-until-too-late-empty-toilet-roll-holders. toilet roll1


All perfectly understandable from a survival/cleanliness perspective. But the most interesting fears are those that are irrational, the ones that come from the sub conscious. Such as Coulrophobia the fear of clowns, or ornithophobia – birds, or Gephyrophobia, the fear of bridges.

Sk it



All totally ridiculous, unless your Stephen King,




a worm, Bird



or someone needing to c...

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Published on January 29, 2015 23:12

January 10, 2015

Fantasy reads; fiends with benefits.

intense



So tell me, DC Farmer, what would I get out of reading your book? Will I even like it?




Not many people ask that directly, but it’s the unspoken question whenever we make the decision to read anything. And if you’ve written a book, isn’t it about time you had an answer?


Now I have a very serious job. I mean the 9-5 (okay 7-6). It involves helping people, making decisions almost every minute of the day which materially affects people’s lives. It may sound a little melodramatic, but that’s the re...

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Published on January 10, 2015 01:52

December 20, 2014

Follow the story, not the joke. Adding the funny to fantasy.

killer


I’ve written about humour in fantasy before here, and how it can be a double edged sword when it comes to blurb and Choosing the Best Browse Categories on Amazon. But when you write a funny anything, do you go for the laughs and tag on a genre, or do you try and treat that genre with respect, and dial in the humour?



KKlownsYou see, there’s funny, and then there’s taking the Michael big time. Call a film Killer Klowns from Outer Space and it better be good or it might fall flat on its face (into a cus...

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Published on December 20, 2014 10:10