http://www.matthewhillswebsite.co.uk Writing, copywriting and other stuff like that Wed, 24 Aug 2011 16:31:25 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en I’ve something in a real-life book from Metazen’s sister publisher Housefire. It’s a themed anthology called Nouns of Assemblage which collects sixty-three tiny stories written around collective nouns. I went with ‘army of caterpillars’. Who knows what my mother will make of mine but it’s definitely a story about a ... http://www.matthewhillswebsite.co.uk/2011/08/plug/ There was that time – you won’t remember – when this man knocked on the downstairs windows of the house. The curtains were drawn and I was in my underpants. I opened the curtains and the man was crying. He asked for my mum or dad. I got on with ... http://www.matthewhillswebsite.co.uk/2011/07/anecdotes/ I have a fear of doing that’s made worse by not doing, and solved only by doing some more. And it happens with writing more than anything else I can think of. Bear with. I bought a PlayStation 3 the other week. It’s a diverting machine. Since I got it, I’ve ploughed ... http://www.matthewhillswebsite.co.uk/2011/02/ps3/ Metazen published a weeny story I wrote. It’s called The Omelette, and it isn’t about mashed eggs. http://www.matthewhillswebsite.co.uk/2011/02/story/ I was in a band once. Probably most of us were. The long and short: I did a bad thing going to uni – we were pretty good. Most of us probably thought that, too. But anyway, and whatever. I’m still top pals with the lads I played with. One ... http://www.matthewhillswebsite.co.uk/2010/11/the-man-in-barcelona/ Here are the odds. It starts with thousands of us. Not ten, or a hundred, nor a creative writing class's worth. It's more like a legion, or several, with millions of words between us. It's not just you at it, either. It's me, and it's him down the road, her in ... http://www.matthewhillswebsite.co.uk/2010/09/odds/ I’m sorry. In the last six years, I called you a lot of naughty things. A bastard and a hack; some kind of pestilence and another sort of joke. I said you were the worst writer I’d read, oh, the worst by far. Happily, I threatened to set your point-of-sale stands ... http://www.matthewhillswebsite.co.uk/2010/09/dear-dan-brown/ Well, I'm chuffed to be hosting Chapter 17 of Caroline Smailes' brand new novel, Like Bees to Honey. Chuffed because Caroline's a full-blown champion; chuffed because it's ace to be part of a grand idea. So: if you've come here from the last chapter, a warm hello to you, and if ... http://www.matthewhillswebsite.co.uk/2010/05/like-bees-to-honey-chapter-17/ There was no way to prove -- actually prove, really prove -- that that man was me. The story was familiar -- I knew I had written it -- but that name on the paper still was not me. It was a symbol, a name. It was alien. And then ... http://www.matthewhillswebsite.co.uk/2010/05/youre-a-writer-and-nobody-really-cares/ I’m doing the Bupa Great Manchester Run to raise a bit of cash for the National Literacy Trust this Sunday. I hated running. Really. I bobble at the best of times, don't I; a bunch of pale meat with noodles for limbs. That’s why when I'm really motoring – which is ... http://www.matthewhillswebsite.co.uk/2010/05/manchester10/