Ruth’s Blog
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Algorithms for Marketing? What?
I was talking self-publishing with an old friend who writes and publishes in a different genre to me, and does very well. Most of his sales are on Amazon, both paperback and ebook formats. 'It's all about algorithms,' he said, and I nodded sagely. I should have said...
‘Foreshadowing’: can it be overdone?
Louise Doughty had a profound impact on my fiction writing when I first met her on an Arvon course in 2008 called 'How to Write novel'. She was already a well-published author, although not as famous and celebrated as she has since become. More importantly for me at...
‘It’s been a long time’ – again!
I wrote a good post this afternoon, illustrated with the cover of my new book, 'Fatal Reckoning' - due out end of November. The post was full of wise words about the need for visual images, that I learned in a workshop on blogging at the Killer Women event in London....
First post for a long time! Did anyone notice?
It's been a long absence!
Does it matter that a title’s been used before?
There's no copyright on book titles. I didn't realise that to start with and fretted that I couldn't ever use a title that had been used before, but I can, although it's still needs thinking about. The easiest way to check is to do what I did yesterday - draw up a...
The book title dilemma
My editor and I are having a disagreement about the title of the new book. The first title I chose sounded fairly dull, and I wasn't convinced. Then I opted for a phrase 'Seize the Day' which appears once in the book, and quite significantly, but right at the end. She...
How important is ‘authenticity’?
Problem: I want to write a crime series based in Cumbria. I want to have a female detective, who needs to be at least at sergeant and better still at inspector level. I want to keep clear of the technical complications of the DNA, Police and Criminal Evidence Act and...
Here’s to the Society of Authors
I love the Society of Authors, for all sorts of reasons. For a start, they let me join, which for an independently published author is a real bonus, as most of the writers' groups won't let me join regardless of how many real, well-produced and well-written novels I...
Simplicity is seductive
Who remembers good old Sergeant Dixon, courteous, uncomplicated, with his files and his big black phone, solving crime through listening to people and figuring things out? Those were the 'good old days', before DNA and computers and CSI forensics, when policing was...
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