Just Scribbling
This is where I blog about writing, music and inspiration. I am also prone to doing obscure brain dumps. Have a read!Book Related
Why Being an Author is Like Being a Top Athlete
At the end of the Paris Olympics this year, Sifan Hassan did the unimaginable. She won medals in two long-distance races and then topped it off by winning gold in the marathon. All within 10 days with barely any recovery time between races. This feat in athletics had...
10 Signs You Should Invest In A Witch
This advice will only apply to you if you no longer inhabit the world of the living. In other words, 10 signs that you are possibly deceased, according to the ground rules of Anaïs Blue series.In Thistle Witch I use the premise that the dead need a witch to sort them...
Around the World: Who Has the Right to Write About Indigenous Culture?
After Hong Kong, my trip around the world took me back to my birth country: Australia. It had been some years since I had returned and I had assumed the country had progressed. At least in terms of attitudes to the indigenous population. What I found distressed me....
Getting Book 5 out into the World
Recently, Brimstone and Ashes, the story I worked on for more than a year, was published.To be honest, there were times I thought it would never get there. But it has. I can sleep soundly at night. I am still an author! The past year has been hell. A messy...
Going Postal: Why Delivering Mail Is Like Writing A Novel
Several months ago I took a part-time job to supplement my author activities. I am at the relative beginning of my publishing career and have not yet generated a stable income. Therefore, I became a postman. Apart from the financial aspect, it has also has proven to...
How (Not) To Write A Debut Novel
A long time ago, in a land far, far away, a writer slaved over a mechanical typewriter… He didn't know it at the time but he was writing what would one day become his debut novel. The typewriter had been procured at the local market for the princely sum of fifteen...
My Writers Journey and Inspiration
Why Being an Author is Like Being a Top Athlete
At the end of the Paris Olympics this year, Sifan Hassan did the unimaginable. She won medals in two long-distance races and then topped it off by winning gold in the marathon. All within 10 days with barely any recovery time between races. This feat in athletics had...
10 Signs You Should Invest In A Witch
This advice will only apply to you if you no longer inhabit the world of the living. In other words, 10 signs that you are possibly deceased, according to the ground rules of Anaïs Blue series.In Thistle Witch I use the premise that the dead need a witch to sort them...
Around the World: Who Has the Right to Write About Indigenous Culture?
After Hong Kong, my trip around the world took me back to my birth country: Australia. It had been some years since I had returned and I had assumed the country had progressed. At least in terms of attitudes to the indigenous population. What I found distressed me....
Lockdown Stories: The Spaghetti Incident
The Netherlands has gone into another full lockdown in the past week because of a resurgence of the virus. At first I was frustrated by this. For one thing it means going back to homeschooling my kids. However, out of the dark depths of this situation, I found some...
Around the World: Escape From Hong Kong
In my previous post I detailed some of my experiences during my short stay in Hong Kong in October 2019. I mentioned that my timing for going there had perhaps not been wise. Even before I flew out from Amsterdam the news had been full of coverage of the protests...
Around the World: The Riots of Hong Kong
As a writer, the journeys I take are usually in my head. However, towards the end of 2019, I embarked on a physical journey. I went around the world one and a half times between October 2019 and March 2020. After which, the world as we know it changed and put a stop...
History
Around the World: Who Has the Right to Write About Indigenous Culture?
After Hong Kong, my trip around the world took me back to my birth country: Australia. It had been some years since I had returned and I had assumed the country had progressed. At least in terms of attitudes to the indigenous population. What I found distressed me....
Being Unemployed Is Hard Work
I’m not unemployed. It’s not true. In fact I’m constantly employed. I write. I make music. I run two bands. I do historical research and take courses in marketing. I maintain a website. I blog. I soak up every snippet of information on writing that I can find. I am a...
What Happens When You Drop A Bomb On An Ancient Civilisation
In the novel Loreless I touch on a few major moments in modern Aboriginal history. I do this by way of describing the fictional experiences of the ancestors of the protagonist Billy. In each case I tried to put myself into the mind of the ancestor; the characters...
A Tale of Two Plates
Precisely four hundred years ago one of two plates began a startling journey around the planet. This morning I find myself in a stairwell at the Rijksmuseum. I intended to write in the library but it's closed as it is a public holiday. It kind of sucks but at least...
The Curious Case Of Constable W. H. Willshire
William Willshire was one particularly bad egg. Central Australia in the 1880s was considered the outer frontier. In some ways it still is, and continues to be most people's image of what epitomises the Australian outback. When William Willshire went to serve as a...
The Passing Of Daisy Bates
During the writing of Loreless I did an enormous amount of research, much more then I could ever actually use in the book. I have decided to share some of this information, and at the same time, give you a bit of an insight into the writing process. In the book there...
Music
Don’t Look Back In Anger
One of the finest songs Noel Gallagher ever wrote was “Don’t Look Back in Anger”. I rediscovered it yesterday and it is stuck in my head and won’t leave me alone. I was a fan of Oasis in their early days. Then they lost it and they lost me. I was only interested in...
Should Patti Smith have won the Nobel Prize?
A few months ago, in March of 2016, I saw Patti Smith perform for the first time. Before seeing her live show I knew her music but nothing about her background, nor anything about her real personality. I was both impressed and moved by her performance. At the Nobel...
A Croatian, An Australian, And A Dutchman Walk Into A Studio
Locked together for a weekend in Sing Sing Studio, they discussed the state of world affairs, exchanged life experiences and shared personal insights. They listened intently to a songwriter screaming his lungs out and tried to formulate a cunning plan. After three...
Finding Your Voice Is A Balancing Act
In a couple of days the band will be returning to the recording studio for probably the last session this year. It’s mixing time! I have just been listening back to the first rough mixes of the recordings. We did them over six months ago during our first session in...
Overcome Your Fear In The Recording Studio
There was a time when I was afraid of the recording studio. I thought that it would show me up for my inadequacies. I thought I wasn’t good enough. I was wrong. Studios are friendly places. They are full of like-minded people trying to create something and you, as a...
Acting, Opportunities And The Advantages Of Persistence
I could have been an actor. It just didn't pan out that way. Life doesn't always give you the chance to take every offer that comes along. Fate hangs it tantalisingly in front of your face and then whips it out from under your nose. Then you are left with the regret...