You know how sometimes you read a report and it appears as if the person wasn't at the event at all? This is one of those, I'm afraid - I had a great time, I met a lot of good people, I went to a reading but I didn't do any of the main panels. So other people might have far more accurate reports of the con than I do. Oh well, I had a good time ( Read more... )

After attending many Con’s in the past, only for the Saturday, I decided to push the boat out a bit and stay for the weekend. And I’m really glad I did. I caught the train up and found my hotel, the Plaza, immediately (and thank you so much to Mick Curtis & Gary Cole-Wilkin for suggesting it - lovely room, plenty of space, very close to the Con ( Read more... )

Here's a round-up of recent entries at my blog, which resides at www.markwest.org.uk

"Come See My House In The Pretty Town" (come on, you knew the working title of 'david & the clowns' wasn't going to stick, didn't you?) has just winged its way over to the editors in-box and I await her decision with what approximates patience from me.

I like the ( Read more... )

The second draft of “Huxton” is now done and off to a handful of pre-readers and so I await their feedback. I’ll read the draft to Alison over the weekend, so I can get a feel for the story-told, as opposed to the story-written and I’ll combine my thoughts, with those of the pre-readers, to come up with the third draft ( Read more... )

I’ve just completed the first draft of a short story that has the filename of “Huxton1” (I did think of a working title - “Mr Huxton Goes Camping” - but that seems counter-productive now) and I’m really chuffed. Why? Well, this is my first short story since “Risen Wife”, back in 2004 and came about because I realised that as a horror writer, I ( Read more... )

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I received my contributor copy of “The 4th Book Of Terror Tales” yesterday, where my story “A Quiet Weekend Away” nestles in with tales by such genre luminaries as Peter James, Neil Gaiman, Kim Newman, Simon Clark, Peter Crowther and Tony Richards. I’m very chuffed with it.

I thought it might be interesting (perhaps only to me) to include some of ( Read more... )

So, that was 2009 and all-in-all, it was a good year. Writing-wise, 2010 is hopefully going to be as good. I have a story due in Terror Tales 4 (which should be out soon), my chapbook should also be out soon and I’m going to start work on a new novel. Yes, I’ve decided to go with the Zombie-Quest-Novel, so if you hear me mention ZoQuNo, you’ll know ( Read more... )

Highlander's Book Reviews have just reviewed "Conjure". And quite liked it, which is always nice.

Read the review here!

Woo hoo!

A couple more reviews for “Conjure” this week, from paying customers - and both of them, I’m very happy to say, are positive. Firstly, Jamie - my fan from Tasmania - emailed me and wrote:

"The book's a fine achievement, Mark. It moves along at a crisp pace, has characters the reader can care about, and a nice climax."That was very nice - then Kim ( Read more... )