For me getting to know your characters and seeing them develop into fully rounded, if at times eccentric, individuals is one of the great pleasures of writing. They become friends (is that strange?). This is especially the case with the three Inspector Kirby books (I’m now working on a fourth). But where do those characters they come from? 
When you read a book the setting is like another character. It’s important, you want to picture the characters in their surroundings, even if your version of that picture is different to everyone else. I’ve written before on how I see describing settings as a balance between giving enough information to convey something of my vision of any given place while still leaving enough room for the reader to form their own picture. It’s like I provide the outline and the reader colours it in. For the Inspector Kirby books this was an interesting and evolving process.
For me the setting of any book if it’s pivotal to the story becomes a character in the story. The reader has to be able to see the setting in the same way they vision the characters. This means giving enough description to convey a frame work for that character/setting without being to prescriptive and depriving the reader of the fun of having their own vision of what the person/place looks like. 
I guess even if you don’t live in the UK you’ll be aware we’re going through something of an upheaval called Brexit. Now, before I go any further I emphasise in this post I am not taking sides, or expressing a political bias. These are my feelings, on those elected to represent us in this matter and how that relates to my own work. I am intrigued as to how these political characters and the stories they are telling compare to any of my fictional characters and my stories in general. 
At this time, in early January, I’m looking forward to what the new year might bring. However, it’s always good to look back at the year just gone and see what nuggets of wisdom it left behind. So here goes:
First to regular readers of my blog, apologies. I know I haven’t written a post for some months now. Nothing dreadful has happened, it’s just for various reasons it’s been, and still is, a busy time (OK not all of it). I haven’t stopped writing, sometimes I think it’s the only sane place to escape to. In fact I have two more Kirby books waiting for proof reading completion (bit of a snag there as well) and a fourth one started, more of that later. I’m also trying to edit two follow-ups to the first book I wrote that have been sitting on my hard drive for a few years (I know, I know….). So you see lot’s going on.
I’ve read science fiction from an early age and always been enthralled by its possibilities. Even if man can't visit the stars in person just yet (someday I’m sure we will) we can go there in our imaginations. Eventually science will follow and get us there. However, at university I also read, as did most students of my age, the Hobbit and Lord of the Rings which led me on to more fantasy including one of my all time favourites, The Magician by Raymond Feist. And then of course every other book in that long series. For me one of the main appeals of those books has to be the use of magic.
Like most indie-authors I’m looking for the “secret of sales". How do I get the word out, how do I attract those followers I need. And yes I know it’s not all about selling, at least not for me. I enjoy the writing and I get a real kick out of people who tell me they’ve read my books and enjoyed them. In many ways I just want more people to enjoy them and if I can make a little on the positive side of expenses:sales balance sheet that would be great. 
I was asked what influenced me as writer recently. At first I thought it was an easy thing to answer. I’ve said before that Arthur C Clarke’s Childhood’s End is what got me hooked on science fiction, the ending blew my teenage mind. That lead me to reading more Clarke and Asimov then authors such as Greg Bear and Ben Bova. Also, I grew up at the time of the Apollo missions and the moon landings. As a young lad, how could that not captivate my imagination? Then later films such as 2001, Close Encounters and Star Wars were taking science fiction on the screen from clunky B Movie status to the mainstream.
There’s a lot in the media at the moment concerning Artificial Intelligence, some hailing it as the next industrial revolution, others as Armageddon waiting to happen. I know science fiction over the years has been full of the latter. However, as any writer will tell you a good story needs conflict and in sci-fi what’s better than man vs. machine?. I also know that Stephen Hawking is suggesting we, or at least some of us, need to get of this planet before the end of the century and find a new home before AI becomes too powerful. I just don’t see why it has to be that way. Why does it have to be the alarmist view? Although, I admit neither I nor the professor will be around at that time, mores the pity. 
In my previous blog I reflected on what I'd learnt in 2017. So now It’s time to look forward to a new year and make my writer's plans for 2018, a.k.a. resolutions. I do this every year and yes, I do look back at them from time to time. Like most of us some I have fulfilled, others have been partially met and some discarded along the way. So are they worth it? I think so. It’s a good time to re-focus, to assess what I’m trying to do, what I want to achieve.
Well, that’s almost it for 2017. I don’t know whether it's because I'm a writer and there never seems to be enough time, or it’s just that I’m getting older (as everyone does of course). However, I sure someone is sneaking days out my years while I’m not looking. Still, it’s time to reflect, which I think it’s important, especially for an indie-author. What have I done well and what could have done better? Where have I stepped up to the plate and where have I shirked or side stepped issues?
Part of my first job on leaving Uni was in the quality assurance section of a scientific organisation. Believe it or not, before the late 1970s little of it existed. After all everyone was doing their best so the data and reports would be fine wouldn’t they? Answer, no. Because if nothing else Sod’s Law operates. i.e. whatever can go wrong, will go wrong. And one of the problems back then was that nobody understood what could go wrong – it was of course, anything and everything. So after a few well published cases, which I won’t go into, the need for a formal system of quality assurance was established.
For most writers success is not an overnight event. One of my all time, and sadly missed, writer heroes, Iain Banks, completed five or six books before being published. He persisted.
Inspector Kirby, Jonah to his friends and 'old school' to his junior colleagues, wandered out of the cottage. He crossed the road and headed down the lane, with thorny hedge rows either side, that led to the sea. He’d put this off for days, wondering how it would make him feel. Still there was nothing quite like a walk along the coast with its prevailing North East breeze and the smell of salt and rotting seaweed in the air to clear the mind. And let’s face it there was a lot to clear.
My latest project, Inspector Kirby and Harold Longcoat, due to be launched in a few week’s time, was great fun to write. Possibly, because it’s a change from my normal diet of science fiction, set as it is in the present day, more-or-less. It’s a detective, mystery story, again something new for me, although not quite that straightforward. If you’ve read some of my short stories you’ll understand. It’s also allowed me to play with the humour in my writing. However, I think one of the keys to getting that part of it right was developing sympathetic characters who would play off each other.
I haven't produced a science round-up blog for some time. It’s not that I haven’t been following events and news, it’s just that I’ve had other things to blog about. Anyway, time to put that right. As always these are in no particular order of importance or merit they are just an eclectic mix of items that have caught my eye.