Did you know that the act of reading is a collaborative act? When I write a story, I’m writing a journey. I’m laying down the paving slabs, planting the trees, building the houses. I’m colouring the sky. Making it rain. But it’s the reader that walks this path. It’s the reader who steps into the…
Tag: caroline hardaker poetry
7 top tips – how to find your unique writing voice
When setting out on your writing journey, one of the key essential ways to create unique and memorable stories is to find your own writing voice.
But what does ‘writing voice’ really mean, and how can you find yours?
My words for 2025
Happy New Year, everyone! 2024 was a mixed bag (feel free to read my honest review of 2024 and it’s ups and many downs here). 2025 is as yet a bit of a question mark. BUT, I do have plans. Big plans. The current ‘WIP’ This is my Sea Book, the one I’ve been teasing…
An honest review of 2024
The ups and downs of my 2024.
The Gabriela Houston Project
I’ve been on The Gabriela Houston Project!
Granite Noir 2024: Unsettling, Unnerving, Sublime
This week, I’m winging my way to Aberdeen to take part in a panel at Granite Noir 2024. Exploring the ‘Unsettling, Unnerving, [and] Sublime’, we’ll be talking bodies, weirdness, and the dark, twisty things at the heart of creepy storytelling. Here’s the event description: Three writers whose books leave you with that brilliant creeped out…
Current WIP – Faeries & Goblins
As scheduled as ever, a week or two after finishing the final draft of my third novel in August 2023, I began my next project. My baby daughter! The last few months have been a whirlwind of giggles, milk, sibling politics, and baby poop. But I also spent December yearning for the next story; drawing…
JOURNAL #26 – The next thing
Here I am again. At the beginning of a new story. Not just a new book to write, but a new fictional world to inhabit for a year or two. And I can’t decide. I’ve long wanted to do something with the sea. For years, I’ve drifted back to tales of selkies, mermaids, abandoned lighthouses….
Gods and Monsters
This extraordinary, thrilling, soaring anthology has been gracing bookshop shelves since September now, and I’ve not had nearly enough time to shout about it. Ana Sampson produces exceptional books. I have several! And of course it’s wonderful to be in a poetry collection illustrated by my now long-time-collaborator, Chris Riddell! Gods and Monsters is a…
Journal #25 – Bumblebee jasper
In my last post, I wrote about how the last couple of months had been a time of transformation. Wrapping up novels, house renovations, body changes, and a new baby.
Even one of those is enough to send your head in a spin. But all of them together? That’s true disorientation.
So what life chapter am I in now?
Caroline Hardaker Author 