Unless you’re fortunate enough to be independently wealthy, you’re probably going to have to get some form of day job to support your writing efforts. But what kind of job best suits a writer, and how do you balance its demands with the demands of your creative life?

Part time

You may consider part time work, in order to have as much free time as possible to devote to your next novel. But can you afford to work part time, or do you have a mortgage and four kids to support?

Freelance

You may decide to try working freelance, but beware: finding clients and completing projects will eat into your free time and, if you’re not careful, you may find yourself working longer hours than you would in an office.

Full time

A full time job will probably pay better than part time or freelance, and it’ll come with better benefits, such as health insurance and a pension. The regular salary will pay your bills and mean you won’t have to rely on your writing in order to make money, thereby taking some of the pressure off and giving you time to rewrite and edit your stories until you’re 100% happy with the, rather than rushing them out of the door because you’re desperate for whatever income they can generate. On the downside, long hours and a daily commute leave little time for actual writing, and if you want to start racking up serious word counts you may have to give up little luxuries such as watching TV and sleeping.

Level of engagement

Do you take a repetitive manual job that bores the pants off you, giving you time to think about your writing; or one that challenges you but leaves you too exhausted to pick up a pen in the evenings? Somehow, you need to find a balance. A boring job quickly becomes soul destroying, whereas a demanding job will drain your energy and creativity.

Some dos and don’ts

Assuming you find the right day job for your needs, you’re still going to have to find ways to juggle its demands with your desire to write. To help you, I present this list of dos and don’ts:

• Don’t write at work unless you’re really sure you can get away with it. And if you do, don’t use the PC on your office desk. Don’t leave any traces of your extra-curricular activity. Getting paid while you write may seem like a win-win situation, but its hard to mask the drop in productivity and concentration that will result; and if you get caught printing out your 400 page opus on the company’s printer, you’re going to find yourself in a whole heap of trouble.

• Do keep the story ticking over in the back of your mind. Think about it on the bus, or while you’re waiting for the photocopier. Let your unconcious mind pick away at the plot while your conscious mind gets on with putting bread on the table. Many writers will tell you that they have their best ideas while busy doing other things.

• Do keep a notebook handy. Keep one in your pocket or bag. If you have a sudden flash of inspiration, you can jot it down. If you hear a snatch of dialogue on the Tube, or want to record the way the sun shines in through the office window, you can scribble it down in note form and write it up properly in your lunch break.

• Don’t try to do too much. Accept the fact that you’ll be tired when you come home from work. Make sure you factor in some relaxation time, or you’re going to get too tired and your writing and work will both end up suffering. Not to mention your health.

• Do make time to write. In a previous post, I discussed my top 3 ways to make the most of your free time in order to increase the time you have available for writing. If you’d like to read the post (and I think you should), the link is here.

• Do keep plugging away. Stick to it and you’ll get there eventually. If you have a dream, work hard at it each and every day. Take small, positive steps. Don’t end up as one of those people who look back in later life and wish they’d tried harder.

Now that the first draft of The Recollection has been completed, I’m turning my attention to other projects for a few days. The past couple of months have been a whirlwind of writing, and now I have to step back from the book and let the dust settle. The temptation is to dive right in and start editing straight away, but I know that I need to get some objective distance before I start tinkering with it. Therefore, I’m going to spend this week developing other projects, such as writing notes towards the next book, and hopefully coming up with a short story or two.

As of five minutes ago, I’ve completed the first draft of The Recollection.

• 80,000 words
• 46 chapters and an epilogue.

Tonight, I’m going to celebrate. I’ve cracked open the gin. It’s been a hard slog. It’s been exhilaration and heartbreak all the way. I couldn’t have done it without the support of my most excellent wife.

There were times I was sure I’d never finish, and times my fingers hurt because I couldn’t move them fast enough to keep up with the story unfolding in my head. But now it’s done, the hard part’s out of the way. Everything after this is polishing; editing; refining.

And of course, there’s the possibility of sequels…

On his Muskets and Monsters website, Matt F.W. Curran gives Silversands one of its best reviews so far:

… I admit to feeling a little nervous about reading Gareth L. Powell’s debut novel, Silversands, especially in light of his first collection of fiction, The Last Reef. In my opinion, The Last Reef was the best and most exciting short story SF collection in recent years (and you can read my review of it here) and one of the few collections I still go back to even now (amongst them Hope by James Lovegrove and Barker’s Books of Blood).

So when Silversands was announced I was excited, nervous yes, but excited. I mean, what delights could the writer construct over the course of a novel? Could it match the dizzying heights and imaginations of The Last Reef?

Silversands’ universe requires little introduction; the science fiction tropes within the story are familiar without being unoriginal. There is no plodding back-story to labour over and it keeps that sense of wonder that all good science fiction has. This has its own advantages as we get into the plot from the off and the story rattles along at a good pace. Powell’s writing skills are explicit and direct, creating mood and character through economical prose and without exposition. Each scene is lovingly created and you can tell the writer is enjoying his craft here.

The world building is gritty, frontier SF at its best, with the feel of a society not far away from implosion which adds it’s own sense of tension, while the action is also typically dazzling and dynamic – it has its pulpy moments but nothing that the great SF writers such as Harrison or Asimov would be worried about. It’s utterly compelling, and there’s a feeling of crescendo, of sub-plots merging for a big bang somewhere down the line …

… this is a thoroughly accomplished piece of writing; not one I’d class as a ‘novel’ (novella, probably, and something that could form the back bone of a collection someway down the line), but I’m glad it’s been published and published lovingly (beautifully bound with a great cover) by Pendragon Press. I’m not sure I’ll return to it as much as the well-thumbed Last Reef, but Silversands sits proudly on my bookshelf with other acclaimed genre authors (Dick, Bradbury, Baxter, Banks etc)…

…And you know, Gareth L. Powell doesn’t look out of place amongst them.

Read the original post here.

On 6 October William Gibson, the author of Neuromancer and Zero History, will be appearing at the Watershed in Bristol, as part of the city’s Festival of Ideas, and I have tickets to see him! This is a big deal for me, as the freewheeling spirit of Gibson’s short story collection Burning Chrome was one of the inspirations for my short story The Last Reef, which helped me break into Interzone and led in turn to the publication of my first short story collection, The Last Reef and Other Stories.

I have set up a Facebook page for my novel The Recollection.

Click here to visit the page.

The new issue of Interzone contains reviews of my novel, Silversands, and the Conflicts anthology, to which I contributed a short story.

In his review of Conflicts, Ian Sales writes:

“Gareth L. Powell provides the highlight of the anthology: ‘Fallout’, a near-future story set in a Bristol depopulated after the crash of an alien craft, and ensuing nuclear fallout, years before.”

Reviewing Silversands, Paul Cockburn writes:

“It’s to Powell’s credit that, rapidly though this particular plot thickens, we nevertheless learn to care about his main characters and [Spoilers!] the deaths of some come as genuine, dramatic knocks. This is because, while neither a particularly flashy nor overly stylish writer, Powell is a master when it comes to using small details to give us a sense of the whole person … in many respects Silversands is an excellent debut.”

I’ve just posted my third (and probably final) guest article of the week over on the Futurismic blog, discussing the role of escapism in science fiction movies.

Click here to read ‘Guilty Pleasures’.

Where do you stand on the issue of advertising in books? See my second post of the week for Futurismic:

Click here to read ‘Advertising In Books’

I’ve posted my first guest post of the week over at Futurismic.

Click here to read ‘Stick Fighting’.