Author Q&A with Stewart Bint 

Author Q&A with Stewart Bint

Stewart Bint is semi-retired, focusing on his fiction, magazine editorials, and his own column in a monthly magazine. He is married to Sue, and has two grown-up children, Christopher and Charlotte.

Tells us about your writing/ published book(s)

My sixth book has just been published by Canadian publishing house, Dragon Moon Press. When God’s Wind Blows is a paranormal crime thriller with a COVID backdrop. It’s the sequel to my 2015 novel, In Shadows Waiting, and is set 38 and 39 years after the action in that story finishes. My other novels brought out by Dragon Moon are Timeshaft, which is a science fiction thriller, and The Jigsaw And The Fan – a comedy/satire ghost story. I’ve had two other books published by Next Chapter Publishing: Thunderlands, an eclectic collection of 21 short stories, and To Rise Again, a paranormal/horror thriller with a sci-fi twist set on the island of Jersey during the German occupation in World War ll and in 1983.

What do you do when you have writer’s block?

I get out hiking in the beautiful countryside surrounding the village where I live, often barefoot. Many a block has been purged, and plot issues unravelled while I’ve been deep in a woodland trail or open field. The secret to overcoming writers block is not to try and force it, but to be as calm and peaceful as possible. I find being at one with nature in this way does the trick.

How do you choose your book’s title(s)?

With great difficulty. I take ages to come up with absolutely the right titles, and indeed the right chapter titles, too. In these days of sound-bites I believe we’ve all become accustomed to needing something to grab our attention immediately, so I want my titles to do just that. I have a working title while I‘m writing each book, and only make a final decision based on the finished text. In Shadows Waiting is an actual phrase from that book, as is When God’s Wind Blows. The Jigsaw And The Fan are two similes described in the novel; To Rise Again refers to something rising phoenix-like in the story (spoilers prevent me from saying what); Timeshaft is the name of the time travel corridor; and Thunderlands is a reflection of a generic world where the short stories in that collection could take place.

 

What advice would you give to someone wanting to write their first book?

Just do it. Go for it, and persevere. If you don’t start the book, it will never be written. And if you don’t finish it, it will never get out there into the world.

 

Do you do research for your books? If so, what kind of research?

My latest book, When God’s Wind Blows, required considerable research, and took me four months. Even then, I still needed to make a few phone calls, and surf the internet regularly for additional information as I was writing. While it’s a work of fiction, many scenes required as much accuracy of the real world as possible, to nudge the unbelievable towards being believable. My research included interviews with a former police officer, three people who had been particularly ill with COVID and were still suffering with Long COVID, two hospital doctors – on a medical ward during COVID, and one on a COVID intensive care unit, a radio presenter, a climate activist, and a dear friend who told me about her out-of-body experience, which plays such a huge part in the story.

 

How do you fit writing into your everyday life?

I’m fortunate that writing is my everyday life now. I took early retirement from my role as a Public Relations writer in May 2021 to focus on this new book. So writing now takes priority over everything else, rather than the other way round.

How do you handle criticism?

As long as it’s constructive, I embrace it, especially if it comes from my editor. After all, we’re the writers, telling the story, but they’re the expert professionals when it comes to turning those stories into saleable commodities. And when readers review my books, as long as they explain why they don’t like something, I accept it with good grace. But don’t get me started on people who simply say “I didn’t like it,” without telling me why. Oh, and one reviewer of In Shadows Waiting gave it three stars, and said he’d marked it down because it was a genre he didn’t like, rather than anything to do with my writing.

Tell me about your current work

When God’s Wind Blows is a paranormal tale of love, insanity, and tragedy, of epic proportions. This sequel, set almost 40 years after the tragic events told in In Shadows Waiting, is a paranormal crime thriller with a COVID backdrop, showing how grief and love affect one man’s sanity. After a young couple are ruthlessly gunned down outside their home during the COVID pandemic, we weave our way through Simon Reynolds’ personal COVID nightmare, as he seeks answers about the mysterious blackouts he’s been plagued with since his sister died at the hands of a supernatural entity in 1982. Slowly but surely, paranormal events intertwine Simon’s Long COVID journey with the murders, unveiling a plot to terrorise the entire world.

Would you want your book made into a film?

Of course. Who wouldn’t? And I can let you into some exciting news. My sci-fi time travel novel, Timeshaft, may be turned into a television series. I’ve been approached by a TV scriptwriter who is currently working on it. If it comes to fruition there’ll be two seasons, each with six episodes. He’s currently written three episodes of season one. His idea is that casting will start towards the end of summer. Production will then be open to bids from companies such as Netflix, Prime Video, Channel 4 and ITV. If it gets taken up he anticipates most filming will be done in studios across the UK, predominantly in London.

 

Where can you find Stewart?

Website 

Twitter

You can find his new book here