Q1. What is your favorite word? “Awesome”- I know I overuse it way too much, especially given I’m, y’know, English, but I don’t even care. Q2. What is your least favorite word? I know everyone probably says “Moist”, but it is a truly horrible word. Q3. How has social media helped your career? It’s a good way of having lots of interesting things directed your way regularly. Sometimes itR...

Q1. What is your favorite word? Kalashnikov. (Wonderfully onomatopoeic. One can hear the klunk-klunk/snick-snack of a magazine slapped into the receiver, and the slide chambering a round.) Military jargon has an almost erotic black poetry. Q2. What is your least favorite word? Deadline Q3. How has social media helped your career? Publishers urge authors to join Facebook and Twitter so they can build a loyal tribe. Neil Gaiman is cited a...

Q1. What is your favorite word? I struggle to have emotional attachments to specific words; it’s tricky to have an opinion on a word without accounting for all the meaning and context around it. That being said, I do have a soft spot for ‘tumultuous’. It’s one of those words which rolls around your mouth as you say it, like a wave crashing down and fading away. Q2. What is your least favorite word? Probably ̵...

Q1. What is your favorite word? I’ve always been a fan of the word ‘Doom’. I like the sinister, melodramatic ‘ooooo’. I also quite like ‘gloom’ and ‘loom’, but not so much ‘broom’. Q2. What is your least favorite word? Octogenarian’. I recently stumbled across it in a friend’s writing and, without knowing what it meant, assumed it was something medical. Perhaps a veterinarian, specialising in octopuses ...

Q1. What is your favorite word? Hope. In my personal life, real-life work and writing, there is one word that always crops up. My former work with the NHS typified this. I would see people going in for procedures and operations, knowing the odds were stacked against them, but there was always that look in their eyes that said ‘I’m going to beat this.’ It was the same with their families and friends waiting outside. T...

Q1. What is your favorite word? Yes. I thought about this all the way to school, and while standing the pouring rain doing road patrol duty … and I’m pretty sure my favorite word is yes. Today. Well, maybe this morning? Hmmm, tricky. Really, tough question. I was tempted to say ‘awesome’ or ‘absolutely’ but today feels like a yes day. 🙂 Q2. What is your least favorite word? Moist – I really d...

It is possible, though frankly improbable, that some may not be aware that The Glass Republic is a direct sequel to The City’s Son. Note well then this dire warning, herein may lie spoilers for those who have not as yet read book one. Proceed at your own peril. Pen’s life is all about secrets: the secret of the city’s spirits, deities and monsters her best friend Beth discovered, living just beyond the notice of modern...

Q1. What is your favorite word? Tea, as a question. My favourite Swedish word is juridiken, because I like to imagine lawyers in Stockholm yelling it as they throw fireballs at one another. Q2. What is your least favorite word? Quickly. For some reason everyone in my first drafts do things quickly. Global cull required. Also (and I’m cheating here) I hate it when I’m reading something and characters keep stepping forward. I ...

Q1. What is your favorite word? Disgruntled Q2. What is your least favorite word? Feisty Q3. How has social media helped your career? Social media is good for finding and talking to like-minded people, so helps with feeling inspired and motivated. One of the most important things it provides for me is a staff room or water cooler, as I work from home and so don’t get those normal office interactions. Information and advice is pass...

Q1. What is your favorite word? Currently ‘salmagundi Q2. What is your least favorite word? Get Q3. How has social media helped your career? Meeting people I wouldn’t have met under normal circumstances because I’m an anti-social fucker 😉 Q4. What would you say are the downsides to social media in your career?  I spend too much time tweeting instead of working! 😉 Q5. What profession other than your own would you...

Q1. What is your favorite word? Buttocks Q2. What is your least favorite word? Nice Q3. How has social media helped your career? It’s connected me to a huge group of terrific friends/acquaintances who just happen to be writers, reviewers and artists etc. These awesome folk love art, they love to share art and ideas about art. That leads to opportunities I might otherwise not have seen or known about. It’s a community, and fo...

Q1. What is your favorite word? Miasma Q2. What is your least favorite word? No Q3. How has social media helped your career? Through it, I have met like-minded writers who I would later go on to collaborate with, reviewers who kindly reviewed my work, fellow-readers who I could talk about books with. Writing can be a lonely profession. Having a world of potential friends at my fingertips has helped me through some very dark times. This ...

 Ulfar Thormodsson has spent two years travelling as envoy and bodyguard to his high-born cousin. They have one last stop – the walled town of Stenvik – before they can finally go home. Audun Arngrimsson works his forge and lives a secretive, solitary life. No one knows about his past, and he’d like to keep it that way. But the Old Gods have other ideas. The factions within Stenvik are about to come to blows, but a fa...