Enormous thanks to the hugely talented people that gave their time and attention to critiquing Sleepwalker in the BFI Southbank - it was such a fabulously energising and encouraging experience.

Big love goes out to K D Grace, Melanie Garrett, Tom Pollock, Sumit Dan, Rosanne Rabinowitz, Denni Schnapp, and Mark McCann who attended, and also Gary Couzens who couldn't come but sent notes.

The new deadline for the final draft is now the end of August, so I'd better crack on with it!

Just about to bust out the Jack and Coke - Sleepwalker has gone out to the participants in the workshop.
I'm too exhausted to do much else but sleep, drink, and catch up with some rubbish movies!

I've been hearing a lot from various T Party friends about the benefits of posting some of your work online so people can get a sense of what you do.

I'm not sure I'd describe "Sex and the Single Hive Mind" as a true reflection of what I do - it's rather unabashedly a horror story. Even though there are horrific elements in Mephistophela and to a lesser extent Sleepwalker, I wouldn't describe myself as a horror author.

Still, I had fun writing it, and decided to share it online. If you enjoyed it, do let me know. I live for that stuff! If not, then I probably need to hear that too.

Click here to read it.
 
Thanks, and hope you like it!

(WARNING: It's got disturbing themes and adult content, so not suitable for Under-18s.)

Hi - there might be some problems viewing my Journal pages while I tweak the style (it's all so incredibly pink!). Hopefully this will be sorted very shortly...

The first draft of Sleepwalker, my second novel, was finished this morning at 4:50am. Really excited and hoping to announce an expected completion date for the next draft shortly - once I get some sleep!

T Party member, longtime pal and Sheherazade alumni K D Grace, recently described as one of "the most exciting new names in modern British erotica" by her editor Adam Nevill, will be providing some Christmas spice when she reads her story "Vegging" at the Best Women's Erotica 2010 event organised by Cleis Press at Sh! Women's Erotic Emporium, 57 Hoxton Square, London N1 6PB, at 7pm on December 18th! (the first reading will be at 7:30pm).

And I'm on the guest list. Yay! Really looking forward to it, never having been in a Womens Erotic Emporium before. I anticipate cocktails borne to me by oiled and strapping male slaves in loincloths. Ideally.

The authors reading are:
Jacqueline Applebee
Scarlett French
K D Grace
Violet Blue

For tickets, call 0207 613 54 58, and ask for Joanna. The event is expected to be packed out, so make sure to get your seats early!

Marcus Chown, popular science writer, New Scientist contributor, and author of We Need To Talk About Kelvin, will be guesting on my blog, The Book of Lost Nights! How cool is that?

The theme is "Science Questions from SF Writers" - we thought it would be a nice angle to tackle, considering how difficult it is to get personalised advice of this sort. My friends at the T Party have been extraordinarily helpful so far, coming up with questions and generally supporting me, as well as Litopia and Absolute Write, and it looks like it's going to be good!

So, if you have a plot issue, set piece, or anything else in your writing which you'd like to use but wonder what the ramifications would be, you can post it here and Marcus will have a bash at answering it.

The piece goes live on December 11th, 2009, but you can submit questions now at this link! The response so far has been great, and I'm really looking forward to hearing your questions!