Go beyond your remit

Dear readers,

With 100 Ways To Write Badly Well safely published and available to buy, I’m trying my hand at something new. For the most part, this blog has focused on the bad writing of fiction – implausible plot twists, awkward turns of phrase, unconvincing characters and so on. Meanwhile, non-fiction has got off all too lightly. It’s time to do something about that.

My new podcast, The History of Grob, is an attempt to tell the story of a fictional nation from the bronze age to the modern day and beyond. It will feature people, places and historical events which are entirely false, or at least significantly misrepresented.

I will post each episode on this blog as it is released, but you can also listen to it at Soundcloud or subscribe to the podcast on iTunes or via the xml feed.

I hope you enjoy the podcast and feel that it does justice to this blog’s tradition of ridiculous and flippant self-indulgence.

All the best,

Joel

Get published

Dear readers,

I am delighted to announce the publication of the book 100 Ways To Write Badly Well in both paperback and ebook. It’s a collection of some of the best bits of this blog along with a bunch of new pieces and it would make an excellent gift for any aspiring writer (even if that aspiring writer is yourself – go on, gift-wrap it and surprise yourself).

You can buy the paperback at nastylittlepress.org and the ebook at momentumbooks.com.au. The paperback is beautifully designed, has a great cover and would make a fine addition to any bookshelf, whereas the ebook is fantastic value and you can have it in your hands instantly. Personally, I think you should buy one copy of each, but I understand that I may be biased.

The book wouldn’t have been possible without the support and feedback that I’ve had from all of you since I started this blog, so I’d like to take this opportunity to offer my sincere and exhaustive thanks. With your help, what started out as a pointless, frustrated satire gradually became a genuine celebration of the art of bad writing. Still pointless, of course, but joyously so.

All the best,

Joel

Use illustrations to distract from your writing

Dear readers,

Springfields Horticultural Society, who originally commissioned by poem “Daffodils II: The Revenge” have further commissioned the wonderful MusaGrafica to illustrate the poem. Here it is...

(large version here)

All the best,

Joel

Judge a book by its cover

Dear readers,

Sometimes, terrible prose alone is not enough. Here are some invaluable resources for those of you wishing to get your writing the attention it deserves with a badly well designed cover:

http://causticcovercritic.blogspot.co.uk

and

http://www.goodshowsir.co.uk

All the best,

Joel

Emulate your heroes

Dear readers,

Apologies for my absence. On the upside, the How To Write Badly Well book is out in the next few weeks – details to follow. In the meantime, here is an article on one of the greatest practitioners of writing badly well that the world has ever known:

http://www.firstthings.com/article/2012/09/brilliantly-bad-books

(via Metafilter)

All the best,

Joel

Focus on the wrong details in love poetry

Write sequels to famous works of literature

Dangle your modifiers

Caked in dung and warm to the touch, Susie cleaned her horse's hooves with a careful precision. She stared out across the plains and wondered where Lorenzo was now. Long and hard, he had set out on a journey which could only lead to death. Wondering whose death it would be, an eagle wheeled across her vision as she sat, lost in thought. She stood up and patted her horse's flank, tail flicking away a cloud of flies. Four newly-cleaned hooves planted firmly on the ground, Susie hoisted herself up onto the animal's back and prepared to face the journey ahead, unpredictable and full of danger. She dug in her heels and the horse responded. With an enthusiastic whinny, she felt him find a comfortable rhythm and then, tired but determined, the miles flew away under her.

Dead or alive, she would find Lorenzo before he found her, cowering in some bar, most likely, like the worm he was - paint flaking, full of cheap beer and cheaper girls. Desperate and amoral, she would recruit whatever lowlifes she could find and, following her blindly, guide them to him. Smashed off their hinges, she would lead her hired guns through the saloon doors and, playing cards like a man with years left to live, she would see Lorenzo sitting there. Spitting hot metal, he would see her gun barrels flare for a moment and then, falling to the ground in a bullet-riddled heap, she would know that he was finally gone.