Author Archives: Felicity Banks Books

S#55: Make Music

Imagine the scene: You’re at school camp and have eaten the food, but you and your friends are all still at the table, nursing your orange cordials and wondering how best to mess with the teachers without leaving your chairs. Someone starts tapping out a rhythm on their upturned cup. They teach the person nextContinue reading “S#55: Make Music”

Advice for Beginning Novelists

I’ve decided to start posting writing advice whenever I feel like it. Here’s the beginning: 1. Successful writers generally make around $10,000 a year (see #2). 2. Around 1 in 10,000 slushpile manuscripts get published (at a conference recently, I discovered that a large publisher hadn’t accepted a single slushpile book in three years –Continue reading “Advice for Beginning Novelists”

S#61: Wake-Up Call

In accordance with the laws of awesome, I just changed the wake-up alarm on my phone to Beethoven. Just one more way to make sure I wake up confused. Eeeeexcellent. On Friday I’ll be launching my steampunk twittertale “Zeppelin Jack and the Deadly Dueller”, AND Steampunk Earth Day for 30 October (similar to Earth Hour,Continue reading “S#61: Wake-Up Call”

#50: No plans

I think you all know, at least in theoretical terms, how awesome today’s awesomeness is. I’m not doing anything today. I’m not going to work. I’m not seeing anyone (unless it happens spontaneously). I’m not doing any exercise. I’m not even cooking dinner (I have leftovers prepped). It’s startlingly complicated to prepare for a dayContinue reading “#50: No plans”

S#100: Hug someone

This one’s definitely recommended for playing along at home. Hugging and eating chocolate do have similarly relaxing results, so yay for that. In writing terms, this week has been thrillingly exciting. No, nothing actually happened. This is the writing life we’re talking about. The high-octane action adventure began as I received an email from PublisherContinue reading “S#100: Hug someone”

How much do YOU love the internet?

Ubergeeks John Scalzi and Wil Weaton have done something wonderful. This: Other than writing stuff themselves, they had various other (in)famous people contribute, plus they ran a competition (based on the picture). Which I didn’t win. The book itself is, technically, free. You can go read it at http://unicornpegasuskitten.com/. But since the whole point ofContinue reading “How much do YOU love the internet?”

#103: Hug the Internet

If I ever want to REALLY waste time, there are two places I love – tvtropes and cracked. Warning: NOT suitable for children (but probably okay for most young adults – a lot of very unpleasant things get mentioned, especially on cracked, and some rather MA stuff is shown on occassion). Warning: You will be sucked into aContinue reading “#103: Hug the Internet”

S#34: Krieg up your wallet

It was steffmetal.com that inspired the project of awesomeness you see before you. Which is interesting, since Steff Metal is primarily a heavy metal blog, and this. . . isn’t. However. Here we are. To this day, I’m not entirely sure what krieg is. (Perhaps, given my musical taste, that’s the point.) But I haveContinue reading “S#34: Krieg up your wallet”

“Killer Robot Cat” story so far

1 My new cat Fi finally arrived. It’s amazingly cute and fluffy considering how long it took me and the house PC to put together. Fi has a bell (even though it’s programmed not to hunt), so when it fell down the stairs just now I heard, “Tinkle, thump, fizz.” All good. Fi fetched aContinue reading ““Killer Robot Cat” story so far”

#200: Documentary

I’m still working my way through Ben’s suggestions of awesomeness. I’ve chosen to interpret this one as requiring any visual media – not necessarily film. So I have created the following two pictures, which I call: “The Writing Life”. It really tells you everything about my daily life. 1. Morning. 2. Afternoon/Evening. In other news,Continue reading “#200: Documentary”

#40: Steal Flowers

If there’s anything this blog has taught me, it’s that crime is awesome*. Technically, this item on my pre-existing list read “pick flowers” but since I own exactly 0 flowers at present (some of my plants are dead, and some. . . sleeping), I chose theft once more. I’m still recovering from schmoozing in MelbourneContinue reading “#40: Steal Flowers”

S#40 and #82 – Silly hats for the deaf

s#40 is to learn sign language. #82 is to wear a silly hat. There are a lot of different sign languages, so I learnt the Australian sign alphabet. The vowels are the easiest – you just touch your right index finger to each finger of your left hand – “A” is the thumb, “E” isContinue reading “S#40 and #82 – Silly hats for the deaf”

#75: Leave lights/heater on

My “study” is located in the corner of our (large) living room. In Summer or Winter, I try to take my laptop to our (much smaller) bedroom to save on heating and cooling. Yesterday I glanced over my entire 66,000 word realist novel (in case Publisher K requests it this week, which is fairly likely),Continue reading “#75: Leave lights/heater on”