Category Archives: Personal development

The stories we tell

It shouldn’t have worked but it did – 14 writers spending a weekend together with the goal of planning a collective novel. There may not even be any precedent for it. Common sense says that, if not actual fisticuffs, there … Continue reading

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Music and silence

I have two piles of books beside my bed. On top of one is A Book of Silence. On top of the other is The Big Music. I’m reading the first, the second has just arrived. Their juxtaposition is serendipitous, … Continue reading

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Spell-binding

Extraordinary things happen on Dark Angels courses. That is because the people who come on them are extraordinary. In truth, everyone is extraordinary if only given the chance to be him or herself. And that is perhaps the most unfathomable … Continue reading

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Swedish angels

Something extraordinary happens on Dark Angels courses. People who don’t even think of themselves as writers discover that the simplest of words have a power to connect beyond their wildest imaginings. And the connections they make are not only with … Continue reading

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Reading matters

A circular from the Society of Authors dropped into my inbox yesterday morning. Although the theme was not a new one, I stopped and read it carefully. The Society of Authors is the unaffiliated trade union that represents around 9,000 … Continue reading

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Getting traction

On Monday I’m driving up to the writers’ centre at Moniack Mhor, in Inverness-shire, to run a Dark Angels course. There are several reasons why I’m particularly looking forward to it. Firstly, I missed not being involved in the Advanced … Continue reading

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