The Goings On of Icy

Tweet

I haven't really done many posts about myself for a while, I suppose in part because I can't think who'd be interested (well, that, and most people who read my blog follow me on Twitter so you get to hear my rants waffle on there). Still, I figured I should probably do some sort of update about what I'm getting up to at the moment.

First off, where the heck has the year gone? Can't quite believe it's October already. It just seems like yesterday that I was getting excited to go to Venice in July, and the whole summer stretched ahead of me like a season of promise and potential. Now it's nearly Halloween...

I finally bought a Kindle! I also got it a very cool Frankenstein cover. I'm currently reading Helen Howell's Jumping at Shadows on it, and it's so much easier reading off the e-ink screen that it is the screen on my Android. That'll make it so much easier taking books to and from work - plus it's lighter, so hopefully it'll make my bag lighter, and thus less stressful on my back. But isn't the cover cool?!

The second year of my teacher training course kicked off in a big way on Friday so I'll be devoting a lot of time to that between now and May. Between that, my day job, my PhD and editing on The Necromancer's Apprentice, I won't be taking on any new commitments until at least Easter or so! I expect to be rather busy over the coming months.

Speaking of my PhD, I'm currently working on my second 'big' chapter (my first being my literature review, in which I summed up which texts I'm planning to use in my discussion). This chapter is an overview of the horror genre within cinema, ranging from around 1910-1978. That's a lot of horror and I've only got about 8000 words in which to do it, so I'm finding keeping to the word limit to be a whole lot harder than the actual work. I'm reading some fascinating books so it's all very interesting, and I get to watch horror films and claim it's research. I've just finished writing the section on German Expressionism, which special emphasis on The Cabinet of Dr Caligari, Nosferatu and Der Golem, and I'm moving on to horror's "classic" age, in the 1930s. Many critics seem to think that one neatly leads on to the other, pointing to the move of Paul Leni to Hollywood in the 1920s, but to do so completely ignores the horror production within silent Hollywood, namely films such as Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde starring John Barrymore in 1923, or Lon Chaney's starring roles in The Hunchback of Notre Dame in 1923 and Phantom of the Opera in 1925. Madness, I tell you.

Anyway. Watching all of these classic horror films has me staring at the exceptionally beautiful leading ladies, and it's got me experimenting with my own image a tad. Behold! Me with curly hair, retro makeup, and a suitably vintage Photoshop treatment. I actually went out like this last night, my look complete with fake beauty spot, false eyelashes and suitably slinky black dress, but I can't help thinking it makes me stick out like a sore thumb in Newcastle. Still, it's a look I'm fascinated by, so I'll probably spend the rest of the year working on variations of it. In case you're interested, the makeup I used is a combination of Max Factor, No.7 and Soap & Glory.

I think that's enough waffle from me. What have you all been up to?

The Air of Resignation

Tweet

I'll be honest with you, I'm not really accustomed to blogging about myself as a person - I'm far more comfortable blogging about my writing career, or my ghost hunting exploits. What I do, I feel, is far more interesting than who I am. However, there are occasionally events in life that prove momentous enough to share, and I think this is one of them.

"The best thing I've written all year is by far my resignation."

On Monday, I handed in my notice. As of 6pm on 12 August, I will no longer be an administrative serf in an office-based fiefdom. Technically, considering I have been paid for my writing, I can call myself a professional writer, but I doubt I will feel comfortable applying such a label to myself. Instead, I will make the migration back to my Northern homeland from this lonely and sprawling capital city, where I'll begin a PhD in Film Studies in October. I'll be an academic!

I haven't really talked about my PhD yet, and I'm disinclined to until work gets underway, but I can say that I'll be exploring the representation of haunted spaces in contemporary horror cinema. It's quite nice that it dovetails so well with my interest in paranormal fiction, as well as my work with paranormal investigators in the north east of England (more on that in September). I've wanted to do a PhD for some years now but it was only late last year that I finally decided to get the ball rolling. After all, you can only complain about your lot in life for so long before it becomes a good idea to do something to change it.

There are also other things on the cards - there are some exciting developments that I will discuss when the time comes, and I will continue to post weekly free flash stories. I have The Guns of Retribution coming out in paperback with Pulp Press in late September (which you can already pre-order here), and I've got another e-book coming out to coincide with its release - I'm expanding and revising my Dead Man's Hand trilogy that appeared on my blog earlier in the year. There is also an intention to have a Parrots and Piracy collection done by the end of the year. I've just finished editing my Fowlis Westerby novel, and there will, in all likelihood, be more Vertigo City stories.

Still, I stand poised on the edge of a major change, and for once, I'm not wondering if I'll be able to manage, or cope. I'm wondering when exactly I can get stuck in.

You have been listening to a transmission by Icy Sedgwick. Signing off until next time...