Author: johnrsermon

I’m a writer from Stockport, Manchester, England, who mainly enjoys writing short stories in the soft sci-fi genre. I do like writing in other genres, fantasy in particular, but I’ve settled on soft sci-fi because I enjoy adding fantastic things that could exist right now or in the near future. I’ve been writing in my spare time since around 2001 with varying degrees of discipline. I’m always looking for ways to improve myself and my writing, and I use my blog to showcase my writing and discuss things on my mind. Every so often I’ll talk about other things in my personal life (Football – I support Manchester United, Holidays, Food, amongst others). I enjoy writing short stories, but I have also finished a few novels and completed NaNoWriMo a couple of times. Writing makes me happy, and thankfully, I can’t see that changing any time soon. My interest in writing began when I took a Film Studies Course at College in 2001. One of the assignments was to create a character and give him or her a back story. I did this and got some good feedback from my tutor, and I loved the feeling of creating a character from scratch. My other interests include running and listening to rock and metal music whenever I’m running. I enjoy watching a wide range of films and TV to relax. The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly is my favourite film, and Arcane is my favourite TV show. My favourite authors are Giles Kristian, J.R.R Tolkien, JK Rowling, Bret Easton Ellis, Gareth L Powell, and Robert Lewis Stevenson. Thanks for reading. If you like the sound of the above, I’d be more than happy to discuss all manner of writing-related stuff. See my contact page for details.

You want another chapter?!

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So, like I said in my last post (Oh what to add in and what not to add in) I uploaded a short story to protagonize.com to see if I could get some feedback on it. Sure enough, one person gave the story 4.50 out of 5 rating which was awesome. But this one person also did something which got my head buzzing as well; they put a page marker on my story. This means that there awaiting the next chapter.

What next smeggin chapter?! It was only supposed to be a short story! Panic ensues as I throw things in the air and roll around on the floor. I could do with hoovering up this place?

However, out of this worry came more ideas. I’m currently in the planning stage of the next chapter of this story. It is a vampire-esque fable and I’d like to expand on that aspect first before the political side of the story. Maybe I should show how our hero and/or villain feeds with his new found powers?

As always, if you could have a read and give me your thoughts it would be most appreciated. The link is on my last post.

Oh what to add in and what not to add in.

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Going over my story is beginning to do two things.

One its allowing me to build on a story I’m proud of which I like but two it’s also having me rethink all parts of it and I’m beginning to worry it’ll never get finished. Though this is all part of the process I suppose. The main thing is how I can use the mountain of the title a lot more. Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Anyway, I’ve received some good feedback so far and I’ve also put another story up on the website progonize(which is awesome by the way). Take a look if you will and feel free to comment either there or on here.  The End Solution

Cheers

The book I’m working on.

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Ok. Best start as I mean to go on.

I’m currently working on a fantasy story about a small town thats at the foot of a huge mountain which itself has a dark forest at its foot. Bugbears live in this forest and will sometimes attempt to attack the townsfolk. They would succeed if not for the dedication of the hunters given the task of stopping them.

The story looks at the hunters themselves, five in total, who defend the townon a daily and nightly basis keeping the bugbears away. It also looks at their lives when they’re not hunting and the continued attempts by the Mayor (A very sleazy and smiley man with a slight pot belly and red cheeks. He dressed very brightly which usually included a yellow tartan waist coat and, unfortunately, a matching hat.) to make money out of the town for his well being and potentially, at the whole towns expense.

I’ve written in that the bugbears are scared of the humans, which is why they don’t attack more often. I’m not sure whether to have more hunters involved from the start or not as I’ve implied there’s an unknown number of bugbears in the forest.

Any thoughts would be appreciated. (but if they’re abusive then they won’t be)