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The experiences and memories we accumulate over time are not unlike leaf mould. Year by year, just as the leaves of a million trees rain down upon the ground, so an infinite number of sensory [...]

Writers of all stripes and levels of experience have something in common. It’s not necessarily a particular love of words. Some writers, after all, are moved more by a love of the rewards they [...]

Covid has provided us with a real-life example of something critical to every form of creative writing. It has shown us how, when things stop happening, time becomes muddled and we lose [...]

I remember, many years ago, catching the eye of a pretty girl at a party we’d thrown at our student digs. I realised that her interest in me matched my interest in her. Glasses of wine in hand, [...]

We meet Alexander musing moodily about the impending dissolution of his marriage. He wonders whether there isn’t any chance of rescuing it. He agonises over the effect of the breakup on the [...]

I’ve been watching Dark, the fabulously complex story of time travel and alternate universes, on Netflix – and am currently drowning in that very complexity midway through the third season. Time [...]

I love it when good writers give advice on “small issues”. When would-be writers sit at the feet of writers they admire, they’re often looking for pointers on the grand roll-out of plot, or ideas [...]

The building blocks of drama We all recognize the scenario. We’ve got the story – or at least the beginning and the end – in our heads. We know our characters. But now we have to start, to [...]