What happens on honeymoon stays on honeymoon – mostly.

However, I will admit to one thing.

On our amazingly wonderfultastic honeymoon I pretty much ate my own body weight in olive oil and bread.

So when I returned I decided on a couple of things.

1) Quit the gym*
2) Start running every day before work
3) Run every day until the end of April
4) Invest in kettlebells for home workout amazingness.

Now, roughly two weeks later, I am surprised to report that bar one Friday where my system said “Oi. Go out in the cold and wet now, moron, and there will be consequences“, 2.47/4 parts of this plan have pretty much gone off without a hitch.

I am not about to qualify for any kind of Olympics**, but I must say – this running nonsense makes me feel surprisingly good. Quite a lot of it is a holier-than-thou sneering at my fellow commuters, but still – it’s exercise, it’s working for me right now and that makes me feel quite good about myself.

Yay me.

In other news I’m slowly but surely building up writing speed again. Book 2 is now up to 62.000 words or thereabouts, and the road ahead is mostly clear. I’m getting a growing sense that I just need to finish this book, and that when I do finish it I have kind of maybe possibly a sense of what it is supposed to be, so I can tighten it up into some kind of shape. Screenplay #1 is being mulled over, with some level of edits needed; [stuff I can't talk about yet] is being worked on with reasonable success.

In short, there’s a sense of gathering strength and momentum these days. Maybe one should be taking more of these ‘holidays’ people speak of.

…naah.

Tutuloo,
Snorri

* counter-intuitive, but stay with me
** unless they’ve started competing in slow jogging for ageing writers

Three things today.

1) I’ll be doing an AMA over on /r/fantasy on August 8th. I am hugely excited about this already.

2) I’ll possibly be doing some writing at some point in the near future, of the pen variety. Lines at the bottom of typed-up documents may be involved. More on this as we go along.

3) I am aware that there are fans of comics. Like, fans. People who would adopt a grandmother to be able to sell her for a good/desirable comic book. For some reason I’ve never quite been one of them – I quite like Sandman, I enjoyed V for Vendetta but that’s kind of as far as it goes – but I could get behind this. I could get behind it but good.

Life, generally, consists of several things.

There’s stuff, which happens to us every day. We wake up. We do the necessaries. We smile, we laugh, we talk to people, we wish flaming death on people that annoy us on public transport.

Then, there’s Stuff. Stuff has a capital ‘S’, it’s written in bold (because it looks more important) and happens less frequently. Stuff might include ‘getting a job’, ‘getting dumped’, ‘meeting someone’, ‘getting fired’* and so on. Weightier things.

And then – there’s Full-blown proper once-in-a-lifetime EVENTS.

And one of them just happened to me.

Basically – I got married to the sometimes-mentioned Lady. Who is now, I suppose, Mrs. Lady**.

I won’t bore you with the details. The ceremony was lovely, the reception was awesome and then – we had a honeymoon.

Dear Reader, never in my life did I expect to have such a thing.

They are pretty amazing, don’t you know. We went to Italy and ate all their food.

This is us, all dressed up and ready to go to an incredible restaurant.

And now, the ‘Real World’ is all kinds of difficult to re-adjust to. I am particularly confused by the lack of invisible cleaning fairies and breakfast buffet leprechauns.

But, y’know.

Life – is good.

Tutuloo,
Mr. Snorri

* Okay, so that’s just two things, technically, and you on either side of them. But you get the gist. Besides, I’m sick and tired of picking up the slack for you around here all the time. You see where I’m going with this – you figure some out! Sheesh.
** Or whatever I decide her name is, for I am good with words. Probably not Madam Fartypants***, because that didn’t go down well at all.
*** Based entirely on fiction. We all know that Ladies do not do such things, and if they were to all that would be created would be a sweet, pink cloud smelling of strawberries.

His long, matted beard is clumped with  snow, and his eyes are wild.

In front of him, the inn has seen better days. In front of him another weary traveller shuffles towards a group of bearded men sitting by a fire.

The cry goes out from the huddled shapes around the hearth.

‘Door!’

‘Get the door!’

‘Close the damned door!’

The man in the doorway blinks, winces and steps in, kicking the mounting snow-drifts away. When he turns towards the hearth again, he looks confused. Tentatively, he moves towards the warmth.

“He’s… alive. I think,’ he says. ‘Although he doesn’t make much sense at the moment. He keeps starting stories with the same line. It’s always-’

‘NO! SHUT UP!’

‘Not again…’

Behind him, a frost-bitten man stumbles in.

So I’m a pretty rock’n roll guy, right? We know this.

How dangerous am I, I hear you ask? I’ll tell you how.

First there was this picture, courtesy of Gareth Morgan:

And what is the logical follow-up? If you’re me and awesome rhyming couplet Kolbrún Björt Sigfúsdóttir & Erlingur Grétar Einarsson, this is. We give you – Emo Shakespeare.

To be or not to be – oh, what is the point of it all?

Friends! Romans! Countrymen! …whatever.

I hate the Moor. He totally stole my frilly shirt look.

If music be the food of love, play deathmetal.

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day? I hate summer days. They mess up my snow white tan.

My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun. I think. I haven’t seen the sun in five years. FML.

Now is the winter of our discontent. Always.

Get thee to a nunnery! It’s so atmospheric.

My only love sprung from my only hate. Naturally.

Out, damned spot! Out, I say! …F**king dogs.

Is that a dagger I see before me? Oh damnit. I’m putting my boots on wrong.

What is this, sport? ’cause I don’t do sports.

O Romeo, Romeo? Wherefore art thou… oh, nevermind. Don’t Tell the Bride’s on.

All the world’s a stage. I want a refund.

Nothing comes of nothing. So why bother, really?

…and so on – and so on – and so on.

Okay. Fess up.

Who ate January?

It’s February now. I did not expect this to happen in another couple of months. But, as it is here one might as well make the best of it.

Her Ladyship has decamped from Base to go to Bristol, where two of our very closest and loveliest friends decided to go and get engaged*. She is in charge of giving hugs for the both of us – my work schedule and state of batteries did not allow for me to go traipse about having ‘fun’ and whatever you cool kids do.

Instead  I’ve been burning the candle at both ends doing fun film stuff, writing outside school hours and generally bringing myself to a state of knackeredness that is by all accounts fairly epic – the flat is cold, there is a blanket next to me on the sofa but I am actually too tired/lazy to pull it over me – which has led me to today’s events.

See, there’s a closing down sale thing at our local Blockbusters, and while I am loath to add things I kinda but don’t quite want to own to the aggressively pruned collection… I did fall prey to the confluence of man-alone-in-house + cheap films.

I have rented Iron Sky and John Carter.

Expect a report on both.

The tea leaves have been read, the eagle’s claws separated in the correct order and the cloud formations viewed through the appropriately dirty glasses.

Today’s book winner is the enigmatic but quotically generous

Mo.

An email informing Mo of the good news has been sent, and now – we wait.

In completely unrelated news, Jo Fletcher Books posted on their excellent Twitter feed that a proof of my novel has gone off to print. This means I may have an uncorrected bound copy in my hands soon. There are very few words that adequately convey the feelings – but they are plentiful and considerable.

In other news I will be winging my way up to Pinewood Studios tomorrow evening to meet an internationally renowned man of mystery. This has to do with a project, the details of which I am not at liberty to divulge just yet, but it is pretty darn cool.  

So in short, life is exciting round these here parts.  It’s going joyfully (but incredibly slowly) crash bang boom honk toot bang crash.
Much like a senior citizens’ marching band.

Remember to tip your waitresses and try the veal,

Snorri

I just discovered a funny thing. Demands from “life” and “reality” had been making me a progressively more tired and stressed-out monkey. Yesterday I managed to eke out 90 minutes in a café with a laptop to start up work on Book 2 – and the reversal in my mood was nigh-on comical.

Hooray for writing!

Also, there are some news on Swords coming up. When I am allowed to tell, I shall.

Toodles.

Right – the inaugural Sunday Book Swoop is now over, as the world is all out of Sunday. Next competition will start at midnight next Saturday GMT and last until noon Monday GMT.

There were 12 worthy contestants – Random.org supplied a random number (It’s kind of their thing) between 1 and 12, the number was 4, and so the winner is:

                                 Gunnar Ingi.

Well done, Sir – an email is winging your way with request for information (address, name, personal details, bank account, blood type – the usual).

Thanks for playing!
Tutuloo!

New year, new beginning -

New stuff on the blog!

I’ll give you a minute to catch your breath.

Because it’s January and I like you, my lovely readers, I have talked to my Benevolent Masters at JFB – and every Sunday in January I’ll be giving away a choice piece of writing, starting with:

Find me a thing not to love about this cover. Seriously. It is almost illegally badass.

Be warned – some of these reviews may mildly spoiler-alerty – but the sources are good.

“A solid first effort, with a great amount of potential. Looking forward to more.” – Jaym Gates, SF Signal

“…The Emperor’s Knife as a whole is a very impressive debut byMazarkis Williams, who immediately ranks among the year’s most exciting new fantasy authors.” – Robert Thompson, Fantasy Book Critic

“…overall, this is strongly recommended.” Nic Clarke, SFX

So what do I do to win me a sweet paperback with some knives and a hooded man and a truckload of awesome?

1) Click on the ‘leave a comment’.
2) Enter the name of your favourite story character. This has no bearing on the result – I’m just curious.
3) I select one comment at random – results are to be announced on Tuesday.

That’s it – enjoy!