Hi all
Geoff Davis (creator of this site’s app) has a new author website (at last). Please visit
All posts by Geoff Davis
New site at Micro Arts Group for computer generated art 2019
We have a new site with many examples of generational art and story software. This was an art forum in the 1980s for artists. There was also a print magazine with many articles which is available for free there. Why not check it out now?
Please visit Micro Arts Group now
Heart of Glass – Ivy Ngeow – NSB Writer has a novel out
Ivy Ngeow has written some of the How to Write material we use on here and the Top Writing Courses site. She won the Proverse (Hong Kong) international prize for her first novel Cry of the Flying Rhino, and her new novel Heart of Glass is out in a week! Very exciting. See her video trailer for this book here:
Video Trailer for Heart of Glass by Ivy Ngeow (Unbound 2018)
Iain M Banks on Tor and the Culture
The Tor site from Macmillan is full of interesting articles (for geeks). They have a lot on Iain M Banks, currently a new series on The Culture, his socialist (ish) future civilization.
Here’s a link to an article on Consider Phlebas >
I first read his SF when I found a copy of Use of Weapons in a newsagent remaindered books bin. A good one to start with. I also discovered Adam Roberts in a remainder bookshop, with Land of the Headless.
Never know what you might find!
SF films by auteurs
What do these films have in common?
Valerian and City of a Thousand Planets, Sucker Punch, Jupiter Ascending, Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow and Chappie.
“I’m glad these crazy, audacious, personal projects exist because they make the often boring and predictable world of popcorn entertainment crazier and more interesting.
Yet I also very much intend to never see any of these movies ever again. Sober, at least.”
Botz Robots
Once the book is finished I’ll update with images from the book, downloads of extracts etc.
Everyone who has subscribed will get a free peek before official release, I’ll do a mail out about that in the next weeks.
Botz app
We have added a Botz version of our app. This has a file for robots information and is available here also. If you have the app already, just download the file below.
Use your current email or a new one. Free.
If you don’t have the app yet, go to Botz Tech website
Poetry competition win prizes 2017
You can also add images and create text art rather than poems.
Fish Publishing are having a competition, with the best 10 poems published, the first prize is €1,000, second prize is a week in residence at Anam Cara Writers’ Retreat.
The judge is Jo Shapcott. The top ten poems will be in the 2017 Fish Anthology.
For more details see Fish Poetry Competition 2017 >
For our writing advice and course visit Top Writing Courses now >
Short flash fiction with new app Tap
I tried some experiments but it is like making a large poster on the zooming canvas, so is not too practical a way to read.
Perhaps it would work better with flash or short fiction, keeping a strong narrative flow.
This is quite interesting! See the screenshots.
Of course, it depends on the quality of the content.
If any of you out there have any story uses for Notes Story Board, please let me know!
Crowdfund your novel – new ways to get your fiction published
We have an occasional writer Ivy Ngeow. She has had many short stories published, and has a new novel on the Unbound (part of Penguin, Random House) writers’ crowdfunding site.
NEWS Jan 16 2017: 44% funded in first month (two months to go)!
Visit the new crowdfund novel Heart of Glass by Ivy Ngeow here >
It is a finished and agent-edited thrilling novel about crime in Chicago and Macau, near Hong Kong China. You make a pledge (pre-purchase) and get your name in the credits inside the book. If the pre-sales don’t get to the target figure, the crowdfund stops, and you get all your money back, so there is no risk.
It is set in an anxious time, when Ronald Reagan became President of the United States, who was seen as very inexperienced. There were problems with Russia, which was still Communist at the time (and was the USSR – how long ago that sounds!). Of course, now we have Trump, Russian problems, etc. Perhaps there are historical parallels? You’ll have to read it to find out.
The way the crowdfunding works is that the publisher remove their risk by making the author raise the full cost of the first print run, before they publish it. The figures are high – £4000 for Ivy Ngeow’s novel, and can be much higher for non-fiction books or very long illustrated novels. This is a lot of pre-sales. Once it has succeeded, the publisher will take it on as a ‘normal’ book and market it via their channels. Unbound (Penguin) had a big hit last year with The Good Immigrant (essays) and have many successful books out.
So support our own writer here:
Crowdfund novel Heart of Glass by Ivy Ngeow here >