I'm very excited to share that the book I've written is now being sold in Singapore! It was a painstaking writing process, and even more so during the editing process (I did *not* edit my own book—I could hardly look at it after I was done writing. But I wish I had, because...... but …
Creative block?
Ever find yourself in a state of creative stagnancy? In a state where all you do is stare at a blank screen/canvas and nothing comes out of you besides a salt-and-vinegar-chips-flavoured burp? If you've never had the pleasure of experiencing that dark hole (literally—cause the blank canvas can certainly drain you dry), you're lucky. I've …
Showdown: Writer vs Editor
Some days, that's my reaction. I'm angrily, frustratedly, despairingly screaming in my head (or sometimes at the loquat tree in the backyard)—NEVER AGAIN!!! Some days, some editors drive me up the wall with edits that have nothing to do with the writing or the story, but everything to do with personal preference. And then there are …
True Singapore Ghost Stories
It's no secret that I'm a firm believer in literature/the arts being able to shape society and create a collective identity/forge a collective bond. It's also no secret that I'm a big fan of horror literature, and even more so of Singaporean (Singapore pride!) horror literature. As a kid growing up, my friends and I …
Getting published
As a writer (and for many researchers and academics as well), getting your work published is one of the biggest goals we have (next to earning enough from our work to keep us going). But why is it so hard to get published? Often, publishers and commissioning editors have a specific work in mind, and …
Last call for submissions!
Of reverse sexism and moving backwards
A (not so) long, long time ago, I was proofreading the final copy of a magazine (I won’t name it, for obvious reasons) as a favour, and I was happily going about my business until one of the articles (purportedly written by a self-professed “feminist”) made me want to cover my face with my hands …
Writing for different purposes
Being a good writer in a particular genre, on a particular medium, does not necessarily mean that we're able to transpose that same writing ability and apply it to different media. To put it in no-nonsense terms... different media require different styles of writing! While writing an academic/research paper more often than not requires rather long …
What do writers need from editors?
So I recently had a conversation with another writer friend of mine, and we went into a rant-like discussion about what writers really need from editors. Because trust me, though the two have to work very closely with each other, there's a lot—a lot—of tension, especially when it comes to creative differences. So I've come up …
Of course we need editors!
So in response to my previous blog post wondering whether we need editors in this technology-infused world... YES, WE DO. (As you can also tell from the title of this blog post...) But why do we need editors when Word has spell-check and most modern phones have auto-correct? The answer is: this and this. As we …
Geraldine Stallard 