We all know I get frustrated and annoyed when books are lack lustre because the author has decided nothing needs to make sense and their readers will read it anyway. It’s awesome for both them and their readers. If that’s what gets you sales then, go hard.
That sounds a lot less stressful than the way I write.
It also sounds horrendous to me. Imagine just making shit up left, right, and centre with no regard to how physics works or how life works?

The reason I get annoyed is because I ruined reading for myself by being an author who likes to know things. I like to know how things work. I like to ask questions. I like to get out of my chair and go see something or do something that makes what I really do easier – because it’s coming from knowledge not thin air.
I like to be able to sit down and watch a fight scene play out in my mind then zoom in and look at the ages, height, fitness level, ability of the opponents. It makes sense to me. I have gotten up close and personal to an MMA fight, that was for my benefit. (I was on the mat making notes, walking around the fighters, looking at various holds and whatnot.)
I’m very nosy.
Very.
You know what they say about curiosity and cats! (I might be running low on lives.)
I don’t just go through customs and security at airports, I watch everything. All of it. So that when I get to a place I can make notes, I do. If I see something out of the ordinary, it’s filed away, because you never know.

I’m not just a passenger on a train. I’m counting how many people are glued to their phones and have zero situational awareness. I’m watching that person that seems to be out of place. (Hopefully, not as creepily as that sounded, but maybe.) I’m interested in what is happening around me. Interactions of all sorts are filed away in my mind because it’s interesting and useful. And you never know.

So maybe I need to stick to authors I know do a great job of life and when they make shit up – they make it make sense. More Margot Kinberg, more James Paterson, more Michael Connelly, and more Lee Child … you get the idea. (Chuck some Barry Eisler in the mix as well.)

I shall be less reliant of “blurbs” and star ratings because they are no help whatsoever, most of the time.

My reading time doesn’t need to be spent wondering what the fuck the characters are doing and being annoyed by the story. 🙂

What my notebook looked like today.