Colin Mulhern

Quite odd that at the start of the year I decided to quit writing, and at the end I find myself in a stronger position than ever - certainly a situation I never would have imagined back in March. Personal stuff. There was a good deal of personal difficulty at the start of the year. My brother-in-law and friend for almost twenty years had been diagnosed with a brain tumour in August of 2016. He went through treatment and seemed to be doing very well, but as we moved into 2017 it was clear things weren't going well. At the same time, we were approaching March, which would mark the second anniversary of Matthew's death. On that particular day, and that particular time, I know where I should be, but that was also the date of a consultation for my brother-in-law. We thought it was just going to be a question of getting his pain under control, but ended up driving through to a palliative care hospice in Sunderland where he died a couple of weeks later. What shocked everyone was ...

Quick Buttercup update. Two weeks back, I met Steve from Maverick. Before he became a publisher, he used to have his own photography business, so he wanted to do some promo shots. We spent a stunning, but cold, Sunday morning flying around North East landmarks including The Angel of the North, some strange statues in South Shields, Stadium of Light and Penshaw Monument. The best shots are going to be used for press releases early next year, but this one makes me smile. When we went to the Angel, it was early so there weren't many people about. The same in South Shields. There were a few learner drivers in the car park of the Stadium of Light, but by the time we took this one, at Penshaw, there were people walking past giving us some strange looks while I staggered down the slope, zombie style. All part of the fun of being an author-superstar. On the illustration side, things are going well. The drawings are taking much longer than I thought. I draw directly onto a compute...

The book is written, I've done the pitch, made a sale and got a top agent to negotiate the contact. Now it's time for the real fun to begin. It's editing time! Working with an editor is very much like being back at school. You've done your best piece of work ever - and it must be good if you've got an agent and a publisher, right? Right, but that doesn't mean it's perfect. It's the editor's job to take a good script and make it even better.  Here's a screen shot of a page somewhere near the end of Buttercup. There are two colours of comment box because I've got two editors working on this.  No one writes a perfect script. Even Stephen King says that every writer needs and editor. That's simply because it's often impossible to see your own mistakes. Not just typos but continuity errors - someone out of breath in one scene, fine in the next. Wearing a yellow scarf on one page, a purple hat in the next. Also, because you...

I love hearing how other writers get things moving. While sitting here, reading a post on Facebook, I could look out and see my wheelie bin standing in the street. It's bin day so there's a few lined up next to the road. The windows are wide open and the translucent roller-blind with the butterflies, that is usually there as a thin, white barrier is up, because I've been washing our fabric sofas and the whole place stinks of washing up powder. The result is a perfect view of my wheelie bin. And although I know what is in there is really an old brown towel all wrinkled up from being stuffed in the top, from here it looks just like three fat human fingers poking out the top. Can't shake he need to go and double check.

I'm illustrating Buttercup Sunshine and the Deadly Undead Zombies of Dooooom! I'm very happy about this, but also a bit nervous. I had to pitch a load of doodles then rework Buttercup herself until I got something the editor thinks is heading in the right direction. The contract is still being finalised, so I can't say anything official just yet, but I have bought a new graphics tablet to illustrate directly onto my laptop. So just for fun, here's one of my early fine-liner sketches redrawn and coloured.

Originally, Buttercup Sunshine was just going to be a stand alone story in a series set in the same little town. I had an idea that something had happened to cause a degree of calamity to the town and thought it would be great to show that through different events. What I didn't expect was for Buttercup herself to become the star of the series. The publishing deal isn't signed as yet - contract negotiations take time, so while things got underway, I began thinking of what to write next. I had bounced a few ideas about, but they just didn't have the same edge. So, just for fun, I started a story with Buttercup walking back to town, having escaped from events that ended the first story. And the words began to flow. Around this time, Agent F asked if I had any ideas, or if possible, a detailed synopsis for a second book. Perfect timing - things were going well with Buttercup #2. A week later, I sent the full script. And then I sat waiting. Like I said, negotiating contra...

Things are moving with Buttercup. Don't want to tempt fate, so I'll steer clear of details. But I did get to work on a few illustrations to see if I could settle on a style for the internals. An editor may well want to use their own illustrator or have a particular style in mind, and that's fine. This was purely for my own entertainment. I had to go round the houses to find a style that suited the story. It took about a week. At one point, she was very refined with crisp, clean line work, bunches in her hair and a neck like ET - something between Disney and Manga. Far too refined, and very difficult to redraw in different scenes and situations. What I really want is something I can draw fast, the way I draw when I'm teaching or reading a story in class, but as far as my own finished artwork goes, I've always had this habit of developing things too far (if you have a look at the line work in the ARTWORK section of this site, you'll see what I mean - especially ...

I only sent my submission of Buttercup Sunshine... out on Tuesday. On Friday I got a nibble from one publisher showing interest and wanting to know more about me! Really, really happy about this because I only targeted four, but also because it's good to know that authors can submit directly and get a positive response. What's good about this is it means a writer can get the contract first, then the agent second. This sounds an upside down way of doing things, but getting the top agents is tough, so approaching them with a deal, rather than just a manuscript, stands you in a very attractive light. Colin Mulhern

I've just made my first unagented submission. It's only to a couple of publishers to test the water, but I'm fizzing. It's been so long since I sent something out on my own. The story is a 10,000 word chapter book aimed at younger readers, subtly titled: Buttercup Sunshine and the DEADLY UNDEAD ZOMBIES OF DOOOOM! It's probably the silliest thing I've written, but it was great fun. A huge change from the edgy YA stuff. Couldn't resist a scribble of the MC and one of the zombies as I see them. But I'd also like to leave it up to the editor, and see how they'd like this story presented.  So... fingers crossed.

I think I've reached a whole new level of nerdism. I've done a video blog on the quality of a paperback. But, somewhere out there is another equally nerdy writer desperate to know the quality of KDP paperbacks - are they actually any good? How long does the process take? Do they look like real papery paperbacks you find in bookshops. Hold onto your seats... it's a white knuckle ride on the crazy wild roller-coaster that is Kindle Direct Publishing.

Can a writer survive without a literary agent? A few weeks ago I decided to take a step back from the traditional route to publishing and cancel the contract with my agent. A bit of a leap of faith in one respect, and a bit scary in another, especially when you consider that many writers are desperate to get taken on by an agent. After all, if you want to get a manuscript in front of an editor with a major publisher, the only way to do it is via an agent, right? So why give up that chance? Short version: An agency is a business built on reputations. Agents build up a reputation with sales - rejections are set backs, so pitching a second or third book from a writer that an editor has already rejected is a bit of risk to that reputation. The agent works for the agency first, the writer second. In my time with my last agency, my first novel scored a contract (18 months later, the publisher had problems and the book didn't come out). However, after that I wrote two other books - ...

Have you ever seen those model houses with an old woman and an old man that come forward to tell the weather? The old woman means it's sunny and nice; the old man means it's stormy and cold. Today was my first day back at work after the break. I work in a primary school and I like it. Usually, I'd say I love it (especially Fridays - on Fridays I work in Reception and Nursery. I could write a load of posts on that alone). Today I was talking to a colleague about Christmas. She initially said she'd had a great Christmas, then added how it was, in fact, pretty bad. Grandparents and falls and broken hips and hospital. That sort of thing. So not really a great Christmas at all. I made a joke that people are inclined to say they've had a good Christmas because that's what people expect to hear, but actually, if you've had a shit holiday, it's good to have it acknowledged from those who understand, because Christmas is a pretty tough time for some. This...

Finally saw the movie. I read the book a couple of months ago and loved it. I first heard about it when it was shortlisted for the 2015 August Derleth award (alongside Station Eleven and that year's winner, the completely brilliant No One Gets Out Alive by Adam Nevill). It took me a long time to get round to it but it was worth the wait. I read a few early reviews that were quite severe, stating it was an original idea that fell into cliché territory once the main characters left the compound. I can understand the frustration because neither the original cover nor the blurb gave any indication that this was a zombie story. And as zombies are the the modern day luvvies of the horror world, this particular area is getting a tad tedious (but thank god the romantic vampires finally slipped away). There was a lot I loved about the book. More than anything, the detailed look at zombies at the physiological level. This approach, for me, means The Girl With All the Gifts does for zo...

Most writing guides focus on writing good scenes, getting the conflict and tension in there. A bit of detail to add colour and location, good dialogue. I'm going to put forward the argument for bad scenes - the stuff that gets cut. The problem with focusing on good scenes and top copy is the moment you write a dull scene, you have a good idea that it should be cut, so you cut. And you start again, which leads to frustration and the feeling that you're getting nowhere. I certainly feel that way. And then I read an article by a YA author who said she had to write nearly half a million words to get one particular novel right. If an average YA novel is 70,000 words then that's 430,000 words not needed. Does that mean they could be avoided? Well, it got me thinking to how I wrote Clash and Arabesque. Clash actually started as a very different book, something called Get Even, Get Girl, Get Lost, and the story of Kyle and Alex was really just the opening of the book. It wasn...