The other day I was googling something and in the string of links was the name Sas. That rang a bell, as years ago I did a story about a guy called Koos Sas who was accused of murder and shot dead outside the dorp of Springbok after a manhunt in 1922. mikenicol.substack.com/p/sho…

A story idea: A man’s having a drink in a bar in a border town. Three guys come in, ask him if he’ll take them across the border. He says he can’t it’s too much of a risk to his business as a safari hunter. They leave and are gunned down mikenicol.substack.com/p/the…

Imagine the excitement when an email arrives from Paige Nick asking if she can interview me about the French edition of my novel Agents of the State published way back in 2016. Would we, I wondered, have this conversation in French? mikenicol.substack.com/p/i-s…

My MacPro died. I had to replace it. What I discovered: mikenicol.substack.com/p/a-t…

“Know the difference between generated and assisted. Grammar checks [...] outline assistance, and editorial feedback are AI-assisted. If you prompt an AI to write your chapter and publish what it produces, it is [...] AI-generated." - Whitney A Forster mikenicol.substack.com/p/ai-…

Flattering scams have been flooding into most writers’ in-boxes in the last year. They’re from people - or more likely bots - who sound as if they are experts on your writing. Be wary. mikenicol.substack.com/p/edi…

Ray Bradbury: “Many people hear voices when there is no one there. Some of them are called ‘mad’ and are shut up in rooms where they stare at the walls all day. Others are called writers and do pretty much the same thing.” mikenicol.substack.com/p/mid…

For a week and longer I’d been blocked - as in writer’s block. I suppose it has happened before but if so I have no residual trauma. So this was kinda disturbing. mikenicol.substack.com/p/cha…

What, I was beginning to wonder, has happened to hard-boiled crime fiction in English in South Africa? After taking off during the twenty-teens it seems to have slowed and gone cosy. We now have characters that could be the descendants of Miss Marple. mikenicol.substack.com/p/get…

I belong to that group of writers who write because they want to. We don’t see any sense in farming out work to an AI bot. That said, novelists have been warned to keep records of all their drafts so that they can prove they were the author. Read on: mikenicol.substack.com/p/som…

Having a WhatsApp account can often have its moments, as mine did with a message from a friend: "Your new book is on sale in Germany!" That’s Falls the Shadow, translated by the amazing Meredith Barth and published by the wonderful, btb Verlag. mikenicol.substack.com/p/mon…

A few evenings back I was invited to speak to a group of people who gather once a month to talk about books. They’re not a book club. They’re most adamant about that. Well, of course, any opportunity to talk about oneself has to be grabbed. mikenicol.substack.com/p/chi…

Last Saturday, the third instalment of Otherworld, the speculative fiction gathering, was held at Exclusive Books at the V&A Waterfront. It attracted a large audience of 100 people. For more, read on in my Substack and about a writing workshop: mikenicol.substack.com/p/oth…

Some days ago I was reading the Daily Maverick (as one does) when I came across an advert for Caryn Dolley’s new book, The Untouchables: Drug Lords, Dirty Cops, and South Africa’s Darkest Secrets. The Untouchables, hey, I thought, now that rings a bell. mikenicol.substack.com/p/of-…

Catalyst Publishers will soon be offering writing workshops and classes taught by their authors. They have asked me to run the first one beginning 5 August. This is a 5-week class called THE WRITER’S TOOLBOX Click below for the sign-up details. mikenicol.substack.com/p/get…

One of the fascinations with writing fiction is the sound track that runs - or echoes - behind the scenes. I had two characters from my Zara Dewane series about to face a confrontation when this music popped into my head: mikenicol.substack.com/p/tak…

A Substack dropped into my inbox a couple of days ago from my US publisher, Jessica Powers at Catalyst Press, titled ‘What should you do when your book receives a bad review?’ It’s the sort of Substack which resonates with all writers. mikenicol.substack.com/p/how…

It has got to the point where I have to say thank you to the many women who read fiction, because clearly not many men do. Maybe it has ever been thus, but certainly it is thusly now. mikenicol.substack.com/p/the…

The FynArts book events in Hermanus had sold-out sessions last week which is huge kudos to the assiduous Paige Nick (she of the recent novel, Book People) who got us all together. mikenicol.substack.com/p/sch…

A word to my fellow journalists and book reviewers to warn them about irresponsibly calling out suspected AI usage. Because it just might not be AI at all. And then we will have maligned the reputation of writers and their publishers. mikenicol.substack.com/p/i-w…