This is the month of Heroika authors! Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome M Harold Page!
Where do you live and write from?
Edinburgh, Scotland.
Why do you write?
If I don’t, my head will explode! It’s just what I do.
When did you start writing?
As fetus, I scrawled stories on the inside of my mother’s womb! Seriously always and forever.
What genre(s) do you write?
I am published in Historical Fiction and Fantasy. I also write Space Opera.
What does your writing routine consist of?
Wake up. Get the kids to school. Write… remember to eat… write… fetch kids from school.
What do you feel are your strengths as a writer? How have you developed these qualities?
Apparently, my fight scenes trigger your mirror neurons. I also do a good plot.
How? By studying. I teach and fight Medieval Martial Arts and, in the past, spent a good lot of time working out how plot works.
Where do you find your inspiration? Do you put yourself in your stories?
The jumbled mess that is the inside of my head. Influences on Sky Tombs of the Earth Kings included time spent working on a collection of Industrial History photos, the 1935 Flash Gordon series, the works of Clark Ashton Smith, and my interest in how technology liberated women.
Outliner or improviser? Fast or slow writer?
False antithesis! I improvise my outlines until I can see the story, then I write it with great gusto. Normally I can do a book in 3-4 months.
Tell us about your latest book
Shieldwall: Barbarians! in which a young Jutish prince must lead his unreliable warband into the teeth of Attila the Hun’s invasion of Roman Gaul. There is a really very big battle at the end.
Storyteller Tools: Outline from vision to finished novel without losing the magic which pretty much does what it says on the tin. I wrote four novels to order in just over a year; this is how I did it.
Indie publishing or traditional publishing – and why?
Both. Indie is something I do between traditional gigs. I like traditional because I am a great fan of professional editors, plus somebody else worrying about the cover and marketing; I’d rather spend my time writing.
Any other projects in the pipeline?
A YA Space Opera entitled “I was a Teenage Space Mercenary”.
What is your goal as a writer and what are you doing to achieve it?
To live off my writing so that I can write more. In order to achieve this, I am writing more. Um.
What is the best piece of writing advice you’ve ever been given?
Author Janny Wurtz once told me to read a book called “Techniques of the Selling Author”. Though it related mostly to short stories, the effect was life changing.
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Author website: www.mharoldpage.com
Amazon Author Page: http://www.amazon.co.uk/M-Harold-Page/e/B00FLZP9VY
Foreworld Author Page: http://foreworld.com/the-authors/m-harold-page/
Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/MHaroldPage
Twitter: https://twitter.com/mharoldpage
I blog at heroic fiction magazine site: www.blackgate.com
Barbara G.Tarn - writer 