Apologies as it’s been well over a month since my last update and during this time not a lot different has been going on but I’ve just not had the headspace to come to the Internet much, or read, or write.
But I’m back, having taken the time I needed to recoup, reenergise and reorganise.
What I’ve been up to these past few weeks.
As I said above I’ve pretty much been away from the Internet if not in body, definitely in spirit as I’ve had a massive reset on how I’m approaching my relationship with the Internet and my various blogging projects.
I’ve reset all the blogs and added another blog during this time, each aspect of what I was blogging about on Big Bearded Bookseller now has it’s own blog and there is a separate blog to collect all the posts together in one place called Gallimaufry, if you don’t mind a random collection of things.
So photography is separate from tarot which is separate from book blogging and so on. All the cooking posts will only be on my Ko-Fi from now on as will every new post that goes on any of the other blogs.
These are all the blogs now:
These have all seen a theme redesign and standardisation so that they all look similar, but there will be some differences in each.
I’m also back onto reading after having a three or four week block, but it’s slow going right now as the books I’ve chosen are bigger non-fiction tomes and need close reading, but isn’t that the fun of mood reading and reading what you want.
I’ve also decided to no longer take many review requests, each one will be taken on it’s merit and with what I feel like reading, whether I’m booked up, and whether I can be bothered with a timetable to read a book.
I’ve also traded out my PS4 for a PS5 and there will be some gaming posts on the Playing With Myself blog when and if I can be bothered, more like little updates than full posts.
Other news
A great interview with Stu Hennigan can be found on the Northern Voices podcast which lets you in on Stu’s thoughts, practice, and process.
Ghost Signs is such a brilliant book, so good I’ve still not finished it as it’s so close to my personal past, and am really looking forward to Keshed.
Find out more about Stu at stuhennigan.substack.com
Northern Voices podcast hosted by Jen Bowden can be found on Soundcloud
Indie Bookshops
Page & Turner (Australia)
Red Kangaroo Books (Australia)
Recently added publishers
Recent book reviews
The Night Mother (14/07/24)
We Called Them Giants (14/07/24)
Crave (16/07/24)
The Undermining of Twyla and Frank (16/07/24)
SmörgåsBOARD (31/07/24)
Invasive (31/07/24)
Of Cattle and Men (02/08/24)
Other blog posts
Words to Use More Often (19/07/24)
NOT NaNoWriMo! (21/07/24)
Solo Gaming (21/07/24)
Solo RPGs (21/07/24)
Double Feature (23/07/24)
Cyanotype (28/07/24)
The Simpsons Movie - 2007 (28/07/24)
the wandering moon tarot (31/07/24)
My Neighbor Totoro - 1988 (05/08/24)
Questions for Authors
The Author Q&A has been running for almost two and a half years now and there are 79 interviews on the blog.
There are still about four interviews in the pipeline but I’m always on the lookout for more authors who would like to be involved so please email me if you’re interested.
Here’s a list of questions, just answer what you want and feel comfortable with and feel free to adapt where necessary 🙂
The finished Q&A will go on my blog and a separate newsletter.
Tell me what inspired you to write your (debut) novel?
What came first the characters or the world?
How hard was it to get your first (debut) book published?
How long did it take to write?
Do you have a writing playlist? If so do you want to share it?
How many publishers turned you down?
What kind of reactions have you had to your book?
What’s the favourite reaction you’ve had to your book?
What can you tell us about your next book?
Do you take notice of online reviews?
Would you ever consider writing outside your current genre?
What did you do before (or still do) you became a writer?
Which author(s) inspire you?
Which genres do you read yourself?
What is your biggest motivator?
What will always distract you?
How much (if any) say do you have in your book covers?
Were you a big reader as a child?
What were your favourite childhood books?
Do you have a favourite bookshop? If so, which?
What books can you not resist buying?
Do you have any rituals when writing?
How many books are in your own physical TBR pile?
What is your current or latest read?
Any books that you’re looking forward to in the next 12 months?
Any plans or projects in the near future you can tell us about?
Any events in the near future?
and finally, what inspired you to write the genre you do?
please remember to add your socials, a small bio, and a few photos and email the answers to bigbeardedbookseller@gmail.com, and if you prefer you can fill a Google Form instead.
thanks
Stephen
What’s happening in the next two weeks?
‘I would challenge you to a battle of wits, but I see you are unarmed!’ William Shakespeare
The next couple of weeks will be taken up with continuing the reformatting of the blogs whilst adding new content.
This will include making sure that all the themes are working properly and are set out in a similar manner so the family of sites work as a whole.
I’ll also be starting to add more new content to the Indie Bookshops and Indie Publishers sites, unfortunately I’ll also be removing some publishers and bookshops that have closed down or gone on indefinite hiatus since I last looked at the sites properly.
I’ll be adding some more author interviews to the Big Bearded Bookseller site as I’ve been letting these pile up, and whilst doing that I’ll be reformatting some of the older ones to work better with the new blog design.
And, as always, if you have any news/offers/events you would like included in the newsletter, or know of any publishers or bookshops I’ve missed please email me at bigbeardedbookseller@gmail.com and I’ll get it on ASAP.
A reminder that a paid subscription to this newsletter is only the cost of one large coffee a month. This helps with lots of things but right now it would help with domain and hosting costs for the various projects.
If I could get 700 or so newsletter or Ko-Fi subscribers I could work on these projects full time including travelling to visit bookshops and publishers!
The links to the various projects can be found at: