NaNoWriMo, ah yes. To some, it is just a baffling not-quite-word that clogs up the Twitter trends every November. To others, it is a golden chalice; to partake from its wine is to enter a nirvana of creative solitude. For a month, the belly of the whale is home to you, your laptop, and your … Continue reading Diary of a NaNoWriMo Virgin
Author: ngfclark
The Bone Clocks by David Mitchell – Review
If you’ve come into contact with any of David Mitchell’s work before, you’ll be well-acquainted with the sort of genre-switching, time-slipping, scene-shifting fiction that the author is best known for. A film adaptation by the Wachowski siblings in 2012 brought his lauded tapestry of souls, Cloud Atlas (2004), to a wider audience. 2014 heralds the … Continue reading The Bone Clocks by David Mitchell – Review
The Drowned World by J G Ballard – Review
Long before the issue of climate change had really impacted on popular consciousness, there was J G Ballard’s The Drowned World. Ballard’s 1962 debut novel (or rather his second – his first novel, The Wind from Nowhere, he went on to disown) was a product of its time, yet speaks to us today with perhaps … Continue reading The Drowned World by J G Ballard – Review
Opera di Cera by Kelley Swain – Review
Threaded through the twisted physiology of Opera di Cera is a fairy tale of the most fluid sort. It’s as if all the latent symbolism of the venerable story type has been set in a pot and put on a long simmer. The reduction is the concise yet flavoursome verse form of Kelley Swain's unique … Continue reading Opera di Cera by Kelley Swain – Review
The Latent Cannibalism of Mario Kart 8
It seems almost cruel to cast an overly critical eye on Mario Kart 8. After attracting headlines for plenty of wrong reasons, Mario Kart 8’s arrival is, for Nintendo, like the triumphal fanfare of Tywin Lannister relieving King’s Landing from the siege at the Blackwater. Finally some good news: 1.2 million copies sold over the … Continue reading The Latent Cannibalism of Mario Kart 8
The Vorrh by Brian Catling – Review
“My name is Muybridge and here’s the answer to the letter you sent my wife.” The trigger pulls, the muzzle flashes, the bullet cracks, and Major Harry Larkyns is dead – shot at point-blank range in an act of pre-meditated vigilantism. This event is not fiction. It happened in California on October 17th, 1874. The … Continue reading The Vorrh by Brian Catling – Review
The State of Fantasy: Videogame News from the Scrying Glass of E3
This article refers to news from the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) held in Los Angeles in June 2014. Fantasy has always been a salient feature in the videogame landscape, right down to the essential footprint of guiding an idealised persona through an imagined world. The hallmarks of fantasy – high fantasy especially – have become … Continue reading The State of Fantasy: Videogame News from the Scrying Glass of E3
Love and Eskimo Snow by Sarah Holt – Review
Ideas-driven fiction is perilous ground for writers at any stage of their career. It poses the constant challenge of balancing the insistent voice of theme with the integral components of the story itself – character, plot and pacing. Too much theme, and you risk turning your fiction into a political pamphlet – too much story, … Continue reading Love and Eskimo Snow by Sarah Holt – Review
Ganondorf and the Hardcore in Zelda: The Wind Waker
SPOILER WARNING: Contains plot spoilers for Zelda: The Wind Waker and Zelda: Twilight Princess. Although if you haven’t played these by now, WHAT THE HELL. It’s 2003. A young, wide-eyed Link ascends into a shipwreck penthouse atop a crooked tower. Ahead of him stands a dark, perplexingly fat figure, as misshapen as his home, and … Continue reading Ganondorf and the Hardcore in Zelda: The Wind Waker
The Problem with Ideas-Driven Fiction (And How to Fix it)
Theme folds in meaning to our writing and gives a recognisable shape to the underlying structures that form the narrative. Without theme the narrative can feel flat or disjointed, but a strong theme provides an overall consistency that holds everything in place. Scenes, characters, and events take on new poignancy, attracting deeper sympathies. Most importantly, … Continue reading The Problem with Ideas-Driven Fiction (And How to Fix it)
Monsters in Eden 