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Archives for September, 2013
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Charles Darwin’s House
Charles Darwin's study (Photo credit: greencoatboy) Today I visited Down House, the home of Charles Darwin. It was an amazing visit. Before I went I was a little worried that it was going to be a bit boring for the kids, and that the youngest (a mere 16 months old) was going to be real trouble. However it was fantastic. The house had a room upstairs converted for kids to play with stuff, including replicas of the sorts of toys rich middle class Victorian kids would have played with. The little one really liked the toy bugs, running about in the garden and trying to play with the exhibits (a number of which were OK for touching). The case of South American birds on the upstairs landing also went down well with both of them. My older kid really got…
Rosie Giraud – Perfects Character Profile
Rosie Giraud is the third character from Perfects (taster excerpt available for free on smashwords). She's probably the next most major player in Perfects. Rosie Giraud Rosie has just turned twenty and is another of the genetically modified Hephaestus children. Like the other characters from Perfects she grew up in Dawkins House (born 2029, left there 2046). She is Charlie’s second in command and the link person for the cell. Physical Description Rosie Giraud is an attractive young woman of average height and a relatively slim build, although with an understated hourglass figure (you have no doubt about hips, waist and bust, but none of it is especially prominent). Her complexion is very pale olive, with has light brown eyes and long tightly waved hair. Rosie's hair is a mixture of light brown and blonde with hints of ginger. Her skin is very clear…
Character Profile – Pandora Calypso
This is the second of the character profiles from the Exodus series. Meet Pandora Calypso, the second of the two main characters in the series. Pandora Calypso Pandora is another of the unknown number of Hephaestus children, a product of their genetic research. She was born to a surrogate mother (a Hephaestus employee) and raised in the care of Hephaestus in a children’s home in Cambridge full of other Hephaestus children. Until the scandal broke she was totally unaware that she was different from any other child. Being academically excellent and unwilling to simply accept received wisdom she was fast tracked for her citizenship examination. Once declared legally an adult (by passing the citizenship exam) she was left to fend for herself in a shared house in Cambridge. She got involved in Charlie's group that were smuggling genetically modified people…
Character Profile – Charlie Semaj
I thought people might be interested in some of the character notes I made when writing the Exodus series. Not all of these are completely publishable, as they have spoilers for unpublished episodes, but I'll post up what is visible over the next few days. Here is Charlie Semaj, the first character we meet. Charlie Semaj Charlie Semaj is one of the early children that were genetically modified by Hephaestus Genetics. He was born to a surrogate mother in Cambridge in 2025 and grew up in the children’s home there, leaving it to attend University College London in 2043 where he studied Genetics for a year. When the scandal broke and Hephaestus went bust Charlie lost the funding for his univeristy place and had to drop out having only completed his first year. (more…)
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Writing Routines
This is inspired as a short piece from a question on the A215 (Creative writing) student forum about what discipline people apply to their writing. I write as part of my work, although mostly not for publication these days (I've had posts in the past where some of my output was made public). The last public work I did was a guest blog entry for the Government Digital Service on Learning from Service Assessments. On the other hand I also write for my own enjoyment, and lots of that is made public, mainly blog entries here, although I also write fiction and have published some of the Exodus Series recently. I joined in National Novel Writing Month last year (it runs every November - affectionately known as NaNoWriMo to its participants). That challenge of writing 50k words in a month got me…