Ask the Author: Leslie Garland
Answered Questions (18)
Leslie Garland
It is a nice thought Teri, and thanks for it. However, I think it unlikely as I am the first in my family to 'get into writing' and, I don't know of any who emigrated in the 1960s. Let's just keep this between us?
Leslie Garland
Hi JR Gibson,
I don't do review swaps.
I don't do review swaps.
Leslie Garland
Sorry Catherine, I can't help you. I know I have had and aslo others have had trouble with covers, particularly if you wish to change them. All I can suggest is contact Goodreads Support. I got my covers sorted eventually and so no doubt, you will as well, but it is not easy. Best of luck.
Leslie Garland
Hi Mehmet,
My apologies for replying to your question so late - no excuses except that I am not very good at checking these things.
Yes, I qualified as an engineer and practiced as same for a few years. Whether that helps one's writing I don't know. It certainly makes one conscious that the story has to logically 'fit together', that there should not be unintended loose ends, etc. I have been on Goodreads for several years now and still don't understand how to do various tasks. Unfortunately too much modern software is badly designed, being designed by the geek for the geek rather for Joe Punter who has no idea, and Goodreads is no exception! I don't think I would classify myself as an 'experienced author'. Yes, I have written a few books and yes, I am still writing. How many does one have to write and/or how long does one have to have written for to become 'experienced'? If you wish to click the 'friends' button, by all means do.
Kind reagds, Leslie
My apologies for replying to your question so late - no excuses except that I am not very good at checking these things.
Yes, I qualified as an engineer and practiced as same for a few years. Whether that helps one's writing I don't know. It certainly makes one conscious that the story has to logically 'fit together', that there should not be unintended loose ends, etc. I have been on Goodreads for several years now and still don't understand how to do various tasks. Unfortunately too much modern software is badly designed, being designed by the geek for the geek rather for Joe Punter who has no idea, and Goodreads is no exception! I don't think I would classify myself as an 'experienced author'. Yes, I have written a few books and yes, I am still writing. How many does one have to write and/or how long does one have to have written for to become 'experienced'? If you wish to click the 'friends' button, by all means do.
Kind reagds, Leslie
Leslie Garland
No.
Apparently this is too short, so I am writing this text to pad things out a bit. Enjoy!
Apparently this is too short, so I am writing this text to pad things out a bit. Enjoy!
Leslie Garland
This year? We are into September now and as I remember September is the first month of autumn. If we are talking of summer 2020, that's a way off now, ask me nearer the time.
Leslie Garland
Another opportunity this coming weekend when "The Bat" is available for FREE from Amazon. If you decide to take it, I hope you enjoy!
Leslie Garland
Thanks for making contact. (I am hoping you are not thinking of exchange reviews, because that is a definite no, no for me.) As for reading each others' books, who knows? If you want to sample one of mine, "The Crow" is on a free promotion this coming weekend (7 & 8 July) and two others "The White Hart" and "The Bat" are on a $£0.99 deal at the same time. Best wishes.
Leslie Garland
Charlotte, You have asked once and I have declined. I don't do trades and neither does Amazon. No, I don't have enough reviews. I am as sure as I can be that I won't enjoy your book immensely - we all have our own tastes. Finding reviewers is a pain, but there will some out there somewhere. Just keep at it. Best of luck.
Leslie Garland
Ah! Not telling you that! All authors draw on their own experiences to a greater or lesser extent. Let's face it, that is all we have got. Even our imaginations are shaped by them. One has to start somewhere and our experiences in and of life are the fundamental building blocks to our stories.
Leslie Garland
Can't help Pralash. I am with Amazon, but I wouldn't like to say it's the best as I don't know enough about all of them. What I can say is that Amazon is not in the least bit helpful regarding reviews as each of its sites are treated as seperate individual sites and so reviews posted on one site cannot be read on any other - so much for their claim about marketing your books around the world!
Best of luck.
Best of luck.
Leslie Garland
Hi Charlotte, Yes, I do, but right at present I am very busy marketing my own - my "The Little Dog" is on a free download today (31 March). Can I also suggest that trying to market your work in this way (on my page) might be forwned upon by the "Goodreads powers that be", so I wouldn't make a habit of it! Best of luck.
Leslie Garland
I am hardly in a position to give give advice to new writers, having only published four stories to date! But for what it is worth, I would advise go for it! Even if the whole thing goes nowhere, at least you will have had a go, whereas if you don't try you'll be stuck with that nagging “if only,” “I wish I had,” “why didn't I?”, etc. Better to have tried and failed than not tried at all. But who knows, your stories may be a raging success, so give it a go!
Leslie Garland
Right now, here in Britain, we are having a debate - though it is more of a silly slanging match! - about whether we should stay in or leave the EU. But who is telling the truth? Unfortunately for us voters nothing is black and white and yet we are having to choose on the basis of the dodgy “facts” that are being presented to us. Just great!
Is there a parallel with religion? Should we opt to stay with it, or leave it? And what are the facts, what is the truth? I thought it might be worth having a look at exploring the truth, or otherwise, of our religion using a story as a foil. Quite deliberately I modelled at least part of it on Genesis, with my innocent narrator starting out in his Garden of Eden and, following the arrival of a new teacher at his school and then some stuffed animal exhibits which it turned out weren't quite as dead as they appeared, gradually waking up to the fact that there is evil out there in the real world and having to decide who is good and who is not, and which version of events to believe in, and hence what is true and what is not?
Right now I am putting the finishing touches to it and hope it won't be too long before it is published. Of course I am not going tell you either how the story ends, or what conclusions our narrator draws! I hope you won't have too long to wait.
Is there a parallel with religion? Should we opt to stay with it, or leave it? And what are the facts, what is the truth? I thought it might be worth having a look at exploring the truth, or otherwise, of our religion using a story as a foil. Quite deliberately I modelled at least part of it on Genesis, with my innocent narrator starting out in his Garden of Eden and, following the arrival of a new teacher at his school and then some stuffed animal exhibits which it turned out weren't quite as dead as they appeared, gradually waking up to the fact that there is evil out there in the real world and having to decide who is good and who is not, and which version of events to believe in, and hence what is true and what is not?
Right now I am putting the finishing touches to it and hope it won't be too long before it is published. Of course I am not going tell you either how the story ends, or what conclusions our narrator draws! I hope you won't have too long to wait.
Leslie Garland
This is a difficult one. It is one thing to have an idea, another to turn it into a story and yet another to get down to the nitty-gritty of the actual writing. This last part is for me the hardest bit - the getting of one's ideas down on to paper - well, on to the hard drive, but you know what I mean! - and I confess there are days when I am not the least bit interested. But as to what inspires me? I suppose it is the desire to see one's idea created, see it become real?
Leslie Garland
The fun and satisfaction of having created something completely new, that wouldn't have existed if one hadn't written it.
Leslie Garland
I find ideas come at the most surprising times and when least expected, but one must give them time to germinate. So my solution is to give the project a break and work on something else, something entirely different and then one day the blockage clears. Well, this approach has worked up until now!
Leslie Garland
Right at this moment I am in the middle - well, actually I have just started Chapter 3! - of a tale entitled "The Ghost Moth". This tale takes the form of two stories running in parallel, one set in the medieval past and one set in the present. In the earlier story we learn about a young novice monk and of the conflict he had between his faith, as practised in the monastery he attended, and his desire to be a normal man and have a relationship with a woman, though unfortunately for him nothing is normal. In the contemporary story the father, Kevin, tells of a family visit to a strange local landmark and how on the way there the family met a woman who warned them of the nature of the place. As we learn more about the young monk's story, so we also learn that Kevin's young son becomes ill and has to be rushed to hospital. Is the past connected to the present and if so …..... ?
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