"Be my fwend..."

I'll admit I don't get this whole 'social networking website' craze that's going on. I mean, what could be more anti-social than sitting in front of a computer screen all day?

And yet, everyone's at it. Me included. Although God alone knows why. I really don't want to read your shitty blog and read about how depressed you are, or how amazing this new band you've only just discovered is. I don't care if your cat's just torn your favourite wank mag to shreds, nor do I give two big bags of bollocks about your current mood or what you're up to at this exact moment in time. I don't want to sign your wall, I don't want to be forced to listen to whatever tedium you use as your profile song and I can't be arsed to look at the photographs of you in your bikini... Well, ok, maybe we can talk about that last one...

What I want out of those social networking sites is to, you know, network socially, but it seems that the only people who actually do that are people who post pictures of themselves in their underwear, or people looking for pictures of people in their underwear. It actually baffles me when I hear about people meeting, chatting and pulling on MySpace; all I ever seem to get in my inbox is 'friend requests' from bands I've never heard of and probably never will again.

I wonder if it's all because I refuse to post photographs of myself in my underwear...

There be ROBOTS!!

I am a happy bunny.

Yes, I am.

I've just met my second 'professional' deadline for Accent UK's 2008 anthology ROBOTS, due for release in February (but you should be able to pre-order it through Previews in December). The book - and it is a book - is a 180[-ish] page graphic novel featuring work from Dwight L. McPhereson, Leah Moore & John Reppion, Leonie Moore, Matt Timson and Frazer Irving. Oh, and me.

I was lucky enough to entice the incredibly talented Bryan Coyle into providing the artwork, and he's supplied pages that can only be described as 'jaw dropping.' I think the strip more than holds its own against the others in the book, but, of course, the readers will have to be the judge of that...

Officially Gutted

You'd think rejections would get easier as time goes on.

I managed to make a semi-successful pitch to Abaddon Books for a new line of novels they're publishing next year. They liked my [second] pitch enough to actually ask me for a sample chapter and a chapter breakdown - which absolutely floored me - but that was as far as it got. I received the rejection e-mail yesterday.

It's pretty crushing coming so close and then losing out like that (I mean, I'd like to think that I came close to actually getting the gig, but for all I know, it might've been immediately laughed into the rejection pile), and, at the minute, I feel more depressed than I have in a long time.

Yeah, I can remind myself that it was only a 'work for hire' novel and I should be concentrating on things that would give me more 'credibility' as a writer (like my own novel, using my own characters and settings), but the truth of it is, I really got into the character and the storyline I had worked out; I even had a mini-manifesto worked out about what I wanted to do with it, moving it away from the bog-standard po-faced fantasy nonsense and actually make it fun.

More importantly, though, I was hoping this could lead to something...better. I could finally justify calling myself a 'writer', and I would actually get paid for it.

Of course there'll be more opportunities, and there's bound to be loads that I can actually go out and make for myself, but at the minute I feel like I've been treading water for so long and not getting anywhere.

You can read the pitch here.