Tag Archives: fiction

Whatever it takes

whateverAn artist is a creature driven by demons. He doesn’t know why they choose him and he’s usually too busy to wonder why. He is completely amoral in that he will rob, borrow, beg, or steal from anybody and everybody to get the work done. The writer’s only responsibility is to his art. – William Faulkner

Writing is kind of difficult. Even if you write only for yourself, or maybe especially when you write for yourself. It takes an enormous amount of courage to write about things you’d much rather forget, to confront serious issues. It takes a lot of courage to write something most people would never have the courage to write. Continue reading →

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Happy endings

happy_endings“If you want a happy ending, that depends, of course, on where you stop your story.” Orson Welles

Sometimes when I write I think too much. I worry about things I shouldn’t worry about, and I write as if I’ve got something to prove to someone. That’s a mistake. Over thinking, trying to outsmart the reader only to outsmart yourself.

When I wrote Jazz I wanted for the ending to the story to deliver a certain message. Throughout the novel there’s some talk about happy endings, about what we want to get from life, and stuff like that. Of course, those characters are mistaken in their belief that happiness is a destination, but nevertheless… they want and try to reach for something, and they’re not even sure what that something is. Continue reading →

Interview with Karen Robiscoe

graphic insert 1Every once in a while I feel like doing things differently on this blog. And so I decided to interview Karen Robiscoe, an avid blogger and author I’ve come to know through the WordPress Blog-o-sphere. *looks worriedly toward crashing sounds emanating from the kitchen*

Of course, I wasn’t really expecting to find the lady on my doorstep this morning, but I have to admire her get-up-and-go. She certainly got up and went *winces at the sound of shattering glass * and who knew she even had a passport? Continue reading →

Baz Luhrmann’s The Great Gatsby

The-Great-Gatsby-Baz-Luhrmann-myLusciousLife.com-Carey-Mulligan-Leonardo-DiCaprioMost of you already know that F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby is my favorite novel. I’ve made a custom out of reading it once a year, so I just had to go see the movie on the night it premiered here in Constanta.

And I wasn’t dissapointed.

Baz Luhrmann managed to produce a movie with strange qualities, most of which will appeal only to those who have read and loved Fitzgerald’s novel. When it comes to book to movie adaptations, most producers are maybe too keen to leave their own mark, to change things and show us what they see. Luhrmann shows us how this decade sees this classic novel, how our decade sees decadence and opulence and slowly peels off all the greedy, dark layers of human nature in this modern world. Continue reading →

The little things…

thingsWe’ve been told (and we keep on telling ourselves on a regular basis) that life finds a way, that somehow things turn out for the better. That if you want it, you can have it.

Sadly, that’s not true.

Do you know what keeps me up some nights? It’s the fear that somehow I won’t be able to write anymore. That somehow life’s going to take that away from me. And that I won’t be able to find a way, that life just won’t want to present me with a solution. Continue reading →

Why failing is (kind of) a good thing

failingThey say you can’t beat a man who doesn’t give up.

The first piece of writing I ever wrote was rubbish. And I kept on adding more rubbish. Then I wrote something else. And then someone said I was a retard. And I wanted to prove them wrong.

I’ve failed time and time again. In all aspects of life.

The first novel I self-published sold 4 copies in 4 months. It got a single 2 star review on Goodreads, and then I unpublished the damn thing.

And yet I didn’t give up.

Continue reading →

A lonely job…

lonely“An artist is always alone – if he is an artist.” – Henry Miller

Writing is a lonely job, no doubt about it. And no matter how successful you might become, you’re still alone. It’s the inexorable truth of the writer’s condition: you sit at your desk, in an empty room or in the most crowded McDonald’s, and you’re alone. You just do your thing.

Of course, this poses a rather interesting question: if you spend that much time alone, how do you find stuff to write about? Continue reading →

Spring e-book bundle

bundle2I decided to release an e-book bundle with all my releases. It’s sort of a like a limited time offer, and it runs out at the end of the month.

What do you get?

1. Jazz – my debut novel, which currently holds a 4.9 rating on Amazon.com. I had this to say about it:

A heartbreaking portrayal of ambition, treachery, and deception, Jazz tells the story of Chris Sommers, an aspiring writer from New York, who travels to Paris in the hopes of meeting Amber, a mysterious and beautiful woman he has always been irresistibly drawn to.
Chris is soon thrust into a world where everyone seems to be playing a dangerous and corrupt game. Anything is permissible, and even secrets that have been locked away inside the most hidden drawers of the soul will resurface. Continue reading →

International Jazz Day

pg99_jazzToday is International Jazz Day, which I just found out about, actually. But I thought I should share with you one of my favorite scenes from my debut novel, which is incidentally called Jazz. It’s a scene close to the end, and I remember having so much fun writing it. I was dancing to this really cool jazz tune, and I was really, really enjoying myself. It’s strange, isn’t it, that something so simple as writing some words on a piece of paper can bring us so much joy?

When it doesn’t matter, and we simply don’t care about whether or not people will enjoy it, when we don’t have to worry about marketing, about target audiences, about reviews, pricing, and whether or not the cover will suit the story.

So, yeah, here’s one of my favorite scenes from something I wrote a while back. Continue reading →

One word at a time

one_wordWhen asked, ‘How do you write?’ I invariably answer, ‘one word at a time.’ – Stephen King

Sometimes I catch a glimpse of the future. Whether is just a scene from a chapter I have yet to write, or the ending line, or just a few lines of dialogue. That’s magic. That’s power. I know something that no one else knows, and it’s entirely up to me to bring it to life. I’m unique, in the way that I’m the only one who can write that scene or chapter, I’m the only one who can write my story. Continue reading →