In this time of lockdown, one of the interesting things to note is what sorts of activities have become popular and what sorts of products are getting increased sales. And as far as I can tell, from both first and second hand evidence, one of these is jigsaw puzzles. The second hand evidence I’m basing

Zeitgeist – I love that word. I love that aura of European sophistication that it evokes (especially given that I’m as un-European-y sophisticated as you can get). I love the literal translation as well – time ghost. It summons up all sorts of images in the mind – like some sort of white shade holding

In the process of what passes for my career, I’ve had the good fortune to undertake a number of personality assessments. You know the ones, where you’re asked to fill out a questionnaire and then you get put into a little box that describes exactly who you are.

It’s one of the great cliches of fantasy writing. Crossing from the light side to the dark side – when a character who had previously seemed like the paragon of righteousness has a sudden change of perspective and becomes instead a paragon of evil – the classic example being the fall of Anakin Skywalker to

One of the most commonly heard cliches you hear relating to writing is that writing a novel is a marathon not a sprint. The fact that it’s totally correct doesn’t make it any less of a cliche. But that fact that it’s a cliche doesn’t mean it should be denied either.