Hûw Steer writes SF&F

The Fire Within was an experiment. I spend so much time working with children that I thought I’d try writing for them as well, and that book was the result: a daft little adventure about wizardry and barbeque and growing up. It’s had a few readers, including some of the kids I wrote it for. But it was an experiment, and its pages could do with a bit more attention, I think. Or maybe not its…

It has been an Admin Week for me in terms of writing. I haven’t really had the brain-space to do anything else, not really because of any Big Tasks but mostly because said brain has been melting out of my skull all week thanks to the ongoing doom of our planet’s climate and the fact that the cold tap in my shower isn’t working. But despite my laptop threatening to overheat constantly, I managed…

A while ago, I saw an announcement that Disney was making a new TV series out of the Animorphs books by K.A. Applegate (and her husband Michael Grant). You may remember these, if you’re of my vintage; 5 teenagers and their alien friend fight an alien invasion by shapeshifting into various animals. I certainly did. I read the post, and I thought: “huh. I enjoyed those as a kid. Weren’t they…

Ok, it wasn’t a finished novel, but still. The depths of my memory stick truly know no bounds. I have a lot of unfinished projects. Most of them are at least nominally ‘short’ stories; just ideas I got started with and never quite reached a conclusion on. (Usually because I just start writing without an ending in mind, and thus can often get myself into at least a mental corner if not an actual…

Being an author is both a blessing and a curse when it comes to role-playing games. Stuff like Dungeons and Dragons, or – for the purposes of this particular post – Shadowrun; anything where you yourself need to play a character. I have spoken before about how my own DnD character is so easy for me to act out and fun for me to think up backstory for that I’ve started writing some pretty hefty…

This week, I was reunited with an old friend. By which I mean I reunited myself with an old friend. When I was 8 years old, my birthday present was a PlayStation 2. The wee little slimline version; a box about the size of a slim hardback book. It was small. It had a staggering memory capacity of… well, it actually had a memory of 0 at the time, because my parents didn’t realise that the memory…

It’s time for another big re-read, and I have just the series in mind. I love the Discworld. I love everything Terry Pratchett’s written, really, as I’ve mentioned in passing a few times on this blog. The writing advice the man himself gave me, many years ago, is something that I have held close to my heart since the moment I decided to start doing this author thing properly. And I have read…

Firstly, go listen to/watch me on BOOKED from earlier this week! There is actually some context for this post. Honest. I have tried, as best I can, to keep everything I’ve ever written. Not every word I’ve ever set down on paper, obviously, but every story, every half-started idea, everything creative I’ve ever done is, pretty much, somewhere within easy reach of me right now. I have an old…

Now while Muggins here may have not shared the link on this blog in time for you to watch it live, behold: a year later, I have once again appeared on Saffron Asteria’s BOOKED podcast, which is an excellent thing full of excellent authors talking largely about books but frequently, as I’ve now gathered, about the Wombles. This time it was live, which was exciting and, thanks to my Internet…

Please, step into my office. I was going to save this post for a little while as the space isn’t quite finished, but given my background has already appeared on one podcast (RDG Books’ Relax and Chat) and will be on another (BOOKED) tomorrow, it felt like it was out of the bag already. Therefore, welcome to my new workspace/lair/weird corner of weird stuff. You will note, of course, that this…

I don’t think I realised how tired I’ve been, these last few weeks, until I fell asleep at my desk in the middle of the afternoon while trying to write this blog. The last few weeks have been a lot, as I’ve mentioned a few times. Quite possibly the most stressful weeks of my life, in all honesty. But at this point, we have a roof over our heads that actually belongs to us and a bed to keel over…

From the comfort of my new office/corner of the front room, I have been recorded while talking to people and I will not be stopped from doing it again! Rod Gilley is a very lovely horror writer and the big cheese of RDG Books; press, editing service, and more besides; and has a long series of interviews with authors and our ilk in the form of Relax and Chat – which I have now been on! It was a…

It should come at no surprise that I really liked World Book Day as a kid. You got to go to school in a silly costume, you got to expose how terribly obsessed with reading and with books you were in the process, and you got special books into the bargain. What’s not to love? I don’t think any ‘special day of the year’ of my childhood was quite as tailored to me as World Book Day. And it was…

I’m not going to bore you all with more talk about the flat until I have something more to show than many piles of boxes and all the holes my dad drilled in my freshly painted wall when failing to mount the new TV. Also we’re not actually moved in ourselves yet, that’s tomorrow. I think I might do an anthology… novel… thing. I don’t mean just a collection of short stories – though I certainly…