Write More with Simon K Jones

There are many ways of publishing your work, and we’re living in something of a golden age for author choice. My chosen route is to send out chapters in serial form, and I’m now fairly certain that for the last four years I’ve been doing it wrong . This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit simonkjones.substack.com/subscrib...

Earlier today I had a delightful chat with Tom Albrighton in which we both tried to not be grumpy about AI and mostly succeeded. I think? Tom’s been a copywriter for a couple of decades, and is someone I found hugely helpful back when I was starting out doing a lot of copywriting myself back in the day. More recently, he’s been especially vocal about the impact of AI on his area of work, and in 20...

Last week The Guardian published comments from Nigel Newton , chief executive of publisher Bloomsbury. “I think AI will probably help creativity, because it will enable the 8 billion people on the planet to get started on some creative area where they might have hesitated to take the first step…AI gets them going and writes the first paragraph, or first chapter, and gets them back in the zone.” Hm...

It’s increasingly hard to care about fiction on TV, with producers of the biggest shows doing everything they can to undermine their own stories. The seemingly inevitable push towards cultural irrelevance is driven by the insatiable hunger of streaming platforms, and all of the issues are entirely self-inflicted. As creators of and audiences for serial fiction, I think it’s worth poking at what’s...

Heroic characters tend to provide diminishing returns. We are often drawn to origin stories because they provide a built-in character arc, where development is part of the package. Once they have reached that apotheosis, going from ordinary person to hero, what then? Often the response is to ramp up the action and spectacle to ever-more absurd levels — and dwindling audience engagement. This is a...

What is Tales from the Triverse? There are so many more of you reading this newsletter now, or passing by on ways to parts unknown, that it’s time for a re-introduction. It's a gritty police procedural set in 1970s London, each case shining a light on the dark corners of society. Each story deals with a particular case and doesn't shy away from difficult topics. People trafficking, drug addiction,...

Sometimes a shortcut makes sense, but take too many of them and you might miss something along the route. Going for a walk isn’t always about reaching a destination — sometimes it’s about the walk itself. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit simonkjones.substack.com/subscribe

“I might have found my tribe.” EasterCon keynote, 2008 Read the news and it’s easy to think that publishing fiction is a waste of time; an indulgence in a world beset by so much horror. Is being a writer a luxury we can’t afford? WELL. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit simonkjones.substack.com/subscribe

I’ve produced a huge amount of written material over my life, and especially in the last decade since I started serialising stories every week. Hundreds of thousands of words of fiction and non-fiction, and that’s without counting copywriting in the day job. I’m confident in my writing voice. That’s not what I’m going to focus on as an example here. Instead, I’m considering my attempts to be a bet...

At a literature event programmed and produced by a bunch of teenagers last week, I found myself talking to a 16 year old about the challenge of judging your own work. “It’s really hard to know if what I’m writing is any good,” he lamented. “It’s basically impossible to know if anything is good until I put it in front of an audience.” He’s got a point. This is a public episode. If you'd like to dis...

Last week there was a bit of a fracas on Notes . By social media standards, having a bit of a tiff on Notes is a fairly gentle affair. While Twitter is arguing with Mecha Hitler and Bluesky is…doing whatever Bluesky is doing, a major scuffle on Notes is usually a back and forth about an obscure aspect of literature. In this case, it was about how many books per year a writer should read. The focus...

Choosing the point of view for your story is the big make-or-break decision. You have to figure this out ahead of time, because it directly affects every aspect of the text. It’s not really something you can decide upon while writing. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit simonkjones.substack.com/subscribe

My son was born towards the end of 2012, forcing me to acknowledge, perhaps for the first time, that I was going to die. Turns out, that's just what I needed. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit simonkjones.substack.com/subscribe

If we fiction writers got everything we wanted, what would that actually look like? This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit simonkjones.substack.com/subscribe

One of the great pleasures of the fiction community that has emerged on Substack, and in the newsletter space more generally, is its diversity of thought. Eleanor writes literary fiction, I write science fiction and fantasy. A typical literary festival would never think to program us on the same panel event, or in conversation, and yet here we are, having a good old natter about writing serials. T...

I first had the pleasure of interviewing Neill Cameron back in 2021, when I was hosting the Writing Life podcast for the National Centre for Writing. He’d just published a new book, Freddy Vs School , a spin-off from his long-running MEGA ROBO BROS comic. Zip forward to 2025 and he’s published many more books for young readers, including the final volume of MEGA ROBO BROS . Neill serialised that s...

When I was in the early stages of preproduction on Tales from the Triverse I ran into a problem. The serial is structured as crime fiction, with each storyline focusing on an investigation by the detectives. Sensible crime fiction writers set their novels in the real world, so that they can borrow from reality for their world building. Here's how I developed the setting without falling down rabbit...

This week I'm pondering word counts, prompted by the superb micro fiction work of Mata Haggis-Burridge in 'I Could Gobble You Up'. Read it here: https://open.substack.com/pub/matahaggisburridge/p/micro-fiction-i-could-just-gobble?r=3rwg&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=false This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus epi...

Bird by Bird is a book about writing that is also about its writer, Anne Lamott. It’s as much an autobiography as it is a writing guide, shifting back and forth throughout. By making it about the writing life , Anne gives context to everything else. It elevates the book from a list of useful tips to something far more impactful, moving and — yes — useful. On today's episode I'm joined by ZK Hardy...

This years is a big one for me, because I’m finally going to complete Tales from the Triverse, the weekly serial that I’ve been publishing since September 2021. By far the largest project I’ve ever attempted, the story is now over 330,000 words and would be a chunky 1000 page+ novel if it were printed. To celebrate where I’ve got to and where I’m headed, I thought I’d go back to the beginning with...

Apologies for the plumbing metaphor in the subject. Writing is an incredibly difficult thing to do, especially if you want to write consistently and to a not-entirely-rubbish quality. And sometimes, the words: they do not come. Today is all about tips for getting over that hump. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit si...

It’s been a while since I’ve written about AI in detail, largely because it’s overhyped and dull. There is value in keeping an eye on it, though, and I want to be open to new developments. So here we are. Dr Jeremy Silver's article on the Creative PEC Made with human intelligence badge Third Information Crisis on BBC A Love Letter to LA music video Behind the scenes This is a public episode. If yo...

Toady's episode is all about the differences between the novel and the serial. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit simonkjones.substack.com/subscribe

It’s not unknown for this newsletter to go off on various tangents, but the central core is always in the name: Write More . While I do occasionally stray into how to write good fiction, it’s not my focus. There are plenty of teachers and authors who are far better positioned than me to help you improve your writing, in terms of its artistic quality. There’s a missing piece of the puzzle, though....

On Saturday evening I had an impromptu conversation with Ben Wakeman and Eleanor Anstruther . We each read a piece of our writing, and then have a good old chat. Today’s video is a slightly edited and whittled-down version of that conversation. The readings: * An excerpt from ‘ The Writer ’ by me, from Tales from the Triverse . You can read the whole thing here . * An excerpt from In Judgment Of O...