Chesham Literary Festival

In this episode Jon Bickley and Raven Dane discuss revising and rewriting. Is you first thought your best thought? Can a friend be an editor? Should a publisher charge a fee?Raven Dane is an award winning novelist and her books are available on Amazon.Jon Bickley is a poet and his books are available from Amazon.The Chesham Literary Festival runs an annual poetry competition and many public events including the Mindful Verses workshops. www.cheshamliteraryfestival.netwww.invisiblefolk.com

In this episode presenter Jon Bickley and award winning novelist Raven Dane talk about writer's block and how to overcome it and good habits.How often should you write? How many words a day? Good habits make good books.www.cheshamliteraryfestival.netwww.invisiblefolk.com

In this episode Jon Bickley 9presenter) talks to Raven Dane (award winning novelist) about the author's voice, how to discover and develop yours and how your friends can help you.www.invisiblefolk.comwww.cheshamliteraryfestival.net

In this episode Jon Bickley (presenter) and Raven Dane (novelist) talk about how to write a scene. A novel is made up of a succession of scenes and if they are well written it makes for a great book. If they are unsuccessful then the reader stops reading. Hear how award winning novelist Raven Dane creates compelling scenes and how she keeps her readers reading. www.cheshamliteraryfestival.netwww.invisiblefolk.com

In this episode Jon Bickley and Raven Dame discuss how to build the world of your novel. What colour are the mountains? How are lakes formed? and what sound do lamp posts make? Raven gives examples of the research that contributes to her gripping stories.www.cheshamliteraryfestival.net

In this episode Jon Bickley (host) and Raven Dane (novelist) discus how to structure a story. How do you decide where to begin? How do you get from one stage to the next? How do you conclude your story? All this and more.www.cheshamliteraryfestival.net

In this episode host Jon Bickley and novelist Raven Dane discuss how to create characters.This is the second in a series of 9 podcasts in which Jon and Raven discuss different aspects of writing a novel. Make sure you subscribe to get them all.You can find out more about the Chesham Literary Festival by going to www.cheshamliteraryfestival.net Go to Telos Publishing to find some of Raven's books.This podcast is piblished by Invisible Folk www.invisiblefolk.com

This is the first episode in a new series aimed at all fiction writers. Raven Dane is an award winning novelist and with host Jon Bickley they discuss where ideas come from and what to do with them when they arrive.Raven Dane is a UK based, award winning author of dark fantasy, horror, alternative history, science fiction, folk horror and steampunk novels. Her first books were the critically acclaimed Legacy of the Dark Kind series, Blood Tears, Blood Lament and Blood Alliance. These were followed by a High Fantasy spoof, The Unwise Woman of Fuggis Mire. (With zero influence from Sir Terry Pratchett. Raven's comedy comes from her love of Monty Python and Blackadder.)Her steampunk novels so far are Cyrus Darian and the Technomicron, winner of the prestigious Victorian Steampunk Society's Best Novel award in 2012 and the sequel Cyrus Darian and the Ghastly Horde. The third in the series, Cyrus Darian and The Wicked Wraith was published in July, 2019. All the Cyrus Darian books are now with Telos Publishing.Raven has had a great many short stories published, including one in a celebration of forty years of the British Fantasy Society and in international horror anthologies including Dean Drinkel's trilogy Tres Librorum Prohibitorum, Tales from the Lake 2 published by Crystal Lake and an anthology of woman horror writers, edited by Billie Sue Mosiman entitled Fright Mare...Women Write Horror.This anthology was in a shortlist of three for a Stoker award in 2017. Raven is a regular contributor to Phantasmagoria Magazine and to the Gruesome Grotesques anthologies edited by Trevor Kennedy. She was signed up by Telos to be the first author published in their new Moonrise imprint with her collection of macabre Victorian and Steampunk short stories, entitled Absinthe and Arsenic, published in autumn 2013. Death's Dark Wings, an alternative history/ supernatural novel set in 1066 was published by Telos in spring 2015.As an obsessive Dr Who fangirl since the very first episode, Raven was delighted to have collaborated on the script of a film released on DVD, The Daemons of Devil's End. She was excited to get an acting role in the film which stars Damaris Hayman. Raven also worked on the novelisation of the film.Raven has appeared on two lists of top women horror writers , published to celebrate February's Women in Horror Month, 2013.Raven's spooky novella, The Bane of Bailgate was published in August 2018, written as a tribute to the enthusiastic steampunk movement and the huge, four day celebration A Weekend at the Asylum in Old Lincoln. She has a well received novella set in a chaotic, dystopian distant future published in November 2019. House of Wrax is with Demain Publishing.An enthusiastic fan of Dave Jeffrey's work, including his bleak but brilliant A Quiet Apocalypse series , Raven was delighted and honoured to have a short story in his international anthology set in his world entitled A Silent Dystopia. Though not a crime writer, her story in a charity anthology, Criminal Pursuits, Crime Through Time, entitled The Way of All Flesh was longlisted for a short story award by the prestigious Crime Writers Association in 2022. . In 2024, Telos Publishing brought out her new folk horror novel, Drwg Stones set in the Atomic Age of the late 1940s/1950s and set in a small, British seaside village on the edge of the beautiful, wild fells of the Lake District. She has a new folk horror book coming out in November 2025, called Bailfire and Brimstone set in Scotland during the dark reign of James Ist. Raven also has a non genre, 'holiday read' novel to be published in 2025, And...Action! under a pseudonym. The novel is set in 2003 and set in the dramatic international build up of a fictional novel becoming adapted to a blockbuster feature film and based on her own experience working with film horses in the UK. She is currently working on a dark fantasy novel set in Cyrus Darian's alternative Victorian London, a prequel to her Legacy of the Dark Kind series, entitled Blood of Kings and will be working in collaboration with Dave Jeffrey to bring out another book in the AQA universe.All Raven's work including stories in anthologies are available on Amazon UK and USA

This is the final podcast in the How to write a poem series presented by Ben Batten with Jon Bickley hosting.In this episode Ben presents 50 points you might want to consider when writing poetry. it is a useful checklist and a jumping off point for discussion and some new ideas.

This is episode 8 in a series of 9.I this edition Ben Batten takes a look at some short forms of poetry such as the haiku and the limerick. There is inspiration and there is instruction for your own writing so grab a pencil and paper and dive in.

In episode 7 Ben tells us about the Ballad and Jon gives examples of the folk process in song. This is how to tell a story in poetic form. https://www.facebook.com/CheshamLiteraryFestival/https://invisiblefolk.com/

In this episode Ben Batten introduces us to the sonnet. What is it, how do you make one and what does it sound like?This is the latest in a series designed to educate, challenge and inspire you to write.Let us know how you get on.

In this episode Ben Batten talks about figurative speech. He tells us about similes and metaphors.Ben's latest collection is called Sol and Jon's most recent publication is called Solstice. Both are available from Amazon.https://www.facebook.com/CheshamLiteraryFestivalwww.invisiblefolk.com

In this episode Ben Batten talks about rhyme and Jon interrupts.This is part 4 in a series of 9. We hope that you will find this series a practical guide to improving your poetry writing. You will hear poems you might not have heard before and hear ways in which you can try new things that will stretch your writing. https://www.facebook.com/CheshamLiteraryFestivalwww.invisiblefolk.com

In this episode Ben Batten talks about how to build a line of poetry.This is the third in a series of talks that build to make a complete course in poetry writing.www.invisiblefolk.com

Ben Batten continues with his series on How to Write a Poem. In this episode he talks about Free Verse. We hope that you will learn a thing or two and be inspired to write your own poem.This episode is presented by, and often inerupted by, Jon BickleyIf you want to learn more about Chesham Literary Festival seach for our Facebook page where you will also find the rules for our poetry competition.

Ben Batten has written several books of poetry and had a long career as an English teacher. He is well placed to inspire and instruct beginners and experienced writers alike.This is the first of a series so make sure you subscribe to get each one as it is published.Jon Bickley has also written several books of poetry and some of them can be found on Amazon.