It’s been almost a year, and I confess, I haven’t visited my own website or blog in nearly 6 months…
I realised last October, that unless I got back to writing, that would be it for me. The truth is, my day-job as “father,” “husband,” and “disability-do-gooder,” takes up 95% of my life right now.
The writing really has taken a back seat and has been sacrificed whenever the day-job takes up 100% of my time. In recent months, I’ve clawed that back, ring-fenced it, but if I were to return to blogging, tweeting, Link’ding etc, it would come out of those 8 hours a week I put aside to write. So, that means the end of this blog, for a while at least, until I get one of these dozen projects finished and published.
So then, this is an eternal placeholder, for those who have either:
1. Strayed to this blog by mistake– this is the wrong “Matt Curran”, the basketball Matt is somewhere else; or
2. You’re looking for news on my next release. Well, the news is that I’m writing again so hopefully in the next 18 months I can say I’m back as self-employed…
In the meantime, The Secret War is still available to buy as an ebook on Amazon (click here for UK, or here for US), and the other books are available too (click here for details on the website); or
3. You want some writing advice… Well, I can’t give real-time advice these days as I won’t be visiting this “dusty blog-shack” on the shores of writing-social media for a while (and hell, it’s one big ocean these days). But what I can offer are 3 tips that have got me through writing so far, and probably for the foreseeable future too…
Matt’s 3 bits of writing advice:
· Write from what you’re interested in– and ignore the mantra “write from what you know”, which was probably created with good intentions, but like Chinese Whispers, or a fable retold too many times, it’s become something else entirely. It’s become the shackles of good writing, and completely misunderstood, (and perhaps out of touch with modern writing, in a world where we can experience so much.)
For example, I know a lot about politics – it’s my job. But I won’t ever write a book about it. I mean, really? It’s dull. And while I’m old enough to have felt a vast range of emotions, does that mean young writers should only write about their limited emotional experiences? Can they not write about what it means to lose someone? Or have their hearts broken? I wrote about that very thing when I was 17 years old, ironically months before I had my heart broken, and my imagination was pretty close to the real deal.
I know, if I’d followed that mantra “of write from what you know” from the beginning (when I knew precious little), I would never have become a writer. Not in a million years. The mantra is a fallacy and the antithesis of the imaginary muscle we all have inside ourselves. It is often spouted as the most truthful maxim about writing, from once-were/or would-be writers who have lost touch with the craft, if we’re honest. Good writing is so much more than that – and is far more complex to describe, than distilling it into five, banal words.
What good writing boils down to, is the freedom to mix the imagination with experiences. For example, most SF writers have never been into space, but they can imagine it. Sure, they’ve done their homework about zero-G and rocket propulsion, but that doesn’t make a good story. They have longed to go into space, and their imagination has propelled them there. They didn’t need to be on a NASA program to write about it. They worked their imagination hard, as they would as children. And if you wanna know how to use your imagination, just watch your kids, or you nieces and nephews play, how they can see things you can’t, as vividly as these words on your screen. And then teach yourself to grow back something that many of us discarded in our teens.
Because the imagination is everything. Without it, we don’t fly, we don’t cry, we don’t even wanna die. But our prose will. It will be as lifeless as something unearthed after a thousand years – perhaps something that has curiosity value at best.
Now if you need to, research stuff you don’t know that well. Because knowledge shouldn’t stop you from writing about a subject. And if you get bits wrong, then you get it wrong. I’ve read stuff from so called experts that get things wrong all day long, so don’t let it stop you.
And if you feel uneasy ditching that mantra completely, then think of “write from what you know” as “get out there, and experience life, for godsake!” Writers can shut themselves away from the world they want to portray to the detriment of their writing.
Having a life ensures you can put something relevant on the page. There are plenty of distractions out there – more so now we have the internet – that makes you think you have a life, when in reality, it sucks the marrow from your bones! So, writers beware of the following bad practices…
· Writing forums or writing blogs can be good, but can be bad too. A good blog or forum is the place where people encourage you when you doubt your abilities; that can give you a sense of direction, or offer those write-saving tricks that mean the difference between explosive and dull prose. But above all, a good community forum provides you with the company of like-minded people in a hobby/career that relies on solitude.
And yet a bad blog or forum is the anathema of all that, with mods who are hypocritical, owners who have agendas, and bitter, snarky members who are probably suffering from writers block for the last few years, and wish the same on others.
If you’re going to head for any online forum, (and even some local face to face ones), or engage with blogs, make sure you see the signs of what is good and what is bad, and leave the bad well alone as you would a dog with rabies.
Above all, follow this cardinal rule: you owe nothing to writers’ social media – they owe you everything.
Without members, their mods cease to have a platform to pontificate and their blog-owners cease to have a cash-cow. So allow yourself to cancel your membership or block their sites if you need to.
Because, if you don’t, well, I’m sure there are a fair few writers who’s confidence has been irreparably damaged by cliques and self-promoting semi-pros who believe they’re the internet’s-gift to writing.
And that is my Writer, Beware, folks. And from experience too: I dodged the literary bullet a couple of years back when I left one of the biggest writing on-line forums at the time. It was the best move I ever made, and one I should’ve done earlier. If I’d only listen to several writing friends before, it would’ve saved me plenty of wasted time… and that leads me to the next point nicely…!
· Don’t fall into the trap of just talking about writing– if online forums and speaking to other writers has taught me one thing, is that writers love to talk about writing, and sometimes enjoy it more than the writing itself. But if you’re only talking about writing, what are you? A dreamer, perhaps. But not a writer. We call out ourselves by the things we do. I could dream about being a singer, or an actor, but I am neither, because I don’t do it (other than the odd tune in the shower).
But I do write, and that’s why this placeholder is here, because while you are reading this, I’m not writing about writing, I’m probably sat at my desk trying to finish the projects that have grown around me during my 2 year absence from the craft.
Sure, you can make money out of talking about writing, but most of those who do – those who pontificate on the internet, or publish book after book – haven’t really got the impressive publishing credentials that you would respect if it came down to it. Stephen King is perhaps the one writer – regardless of your thoughts about his writing – that regularly deserves the recognition. He gives his advice freely, generously, and – well, shit – he’s made it. He’s achieved what most writers can only imagine.
The rest of us? Well, if you’re navel-gazing or just talking about the craft, you can just keep on dreaming of success, whatever you deem that to be. You’ll never reach it.
You gotta get out there and write.
Just write.
Laterz
Taterz x
MFWC
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