Knight of the Rocks

The perfect bait to catch a bigger rock

"Knight of the Rocks" has been published by Postcard Shorts! It's a short story about the start and end of a long-term relationship. If you're a soppy sod like me then it might tug at your heart-strings!

[EDIT: This story has now been recorded as audio release, here: Old Words Home]

Head Case

More exciting news! Today I had a new piece appear on the 50-Word stories site. It's called Head Case and it's weird in all the ways I think a story should be!

I'm really enjoying learning how to submit pieces for publication. So far I've managed to get nine acceptances which has really helped boost my confidence. Three of those pieces are already live (the rest are due out later this year).

[EDIT: Woohoo! "Head Case" was named Story of the Week!]

[EDIT: Woohoo again! The story also got named Story of the Month!]

Headless Skeleton by Lisa Zador

The Circus Comes to Town

I'm very pleased to announce that Verse-Virtual accepted my daft circus poem! Exciting! :-)

Recommended reading: the editor of Verse-Virtual, Firestone Feinberg, wrote the wonderfully random No Cow poem which makes me chortle :-)

The Hero's Journey

No matter what book you're writing, I think it's really useful to read up on "The Hero's Journey". It's a useful framework to work from, and it's interesting to research how closely big hits like Harry Potter and Star Wars conform to its structure. There's no need to follow it perfectly, but I found it helped me generate new ideas, and also helped me put my plot in a good order. Here's a great video intro:

A few useful links:

• http://www.mythologyteacher.com/The-Hero's-Journey.php
• http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TheHerosJourney
• http://changingminds.org/disciplines/storytelling/plots/hero_journey/hero_journey.htm