BarryHutchison.com

For Halloween my son, Kyle, decided to dress up as a zombie. While I’m sure he would’ve been happy with a rubber mask, I was determined we were doing things properly.

One hour of make-up later, and this was the result…

Happy Halloween to you, dear reader, and thanks for stopping by the blog. I’m painfully aware that I should have updated long before now, but life has been extremely busy over the past few weeks and this is one of the few chances I’ve had to blog.

I wish I’d had time to write a suitable scary Halloween story to post here, but I didn’t. Sorry. Why not console yourself by reading over this 366 word short story which was deemed ‘too scary’ for Scholastic’s WOW!366 anthology book? I had to write another story – Monkey Magic – to go into the anthology, but if you want to read that you’ll have to go out and buy the book.

Anyway, I realised there’s something even more frightening I can do today – I can post pictures of my face!

Beltz & Gelberg, publishers of the German edition of Invisible Fiends, have decided they want to stick my face on the back cover of the books. A photograph of my face, I mean, not my actual face.

I was supposed to get some nice shots done at a graveyard by a photographer friend of mine, but the weather is too wild to do them, so t’other night I quickly took a couple myself, holding the camera at arm’s length and turning it to point at me. I took about 30 shots. 26 or so of them make me look like some kind of malformed, Quasimodo-type creature, but in a small handful I could almost be mistaken for human.

The question is, which do I send? Take a look at the pictures below and let me know which you think would work best on the back cover of a children’s horror series.

Photograph 1.

I'm going to rip your lungs out through your eyes

Photograph 2.

Whereas I won't

I should probably start by apologising for not posting much recently.  Oh, sure, I stuck up a deeply unsettling video of my face stuck onto the scarecrow from the Wizard of Oz, but that’s hardly quality content now, is it?

Actually, it’s probably better than 90% of the stuff on here, but let’s not dwell too much on that.

To be honest, the last month or so has been one big blur of dirty nappies, school visits, press interviews and sleepless nights. Oh, and some writing. Quite a lot of writing, actually, which is probably just as well considering what my job title is.

I visited a lot of schools in and around my home town, including my old school, Caol Primary. That was a very surreal, but utterly brilliant experience, and I left all the kids in the oldest class (Primary 7 in Scotland, no idea what it equates to in England and Wales) with proof copies of Mr Mumbles. I used to think the actual writing stuff was the best part of my job, but the more school visits I do the more I start to think maybe they’re the best bit about being a writer. It’s great to see kids getting excited about creating stories, and the ideas they come up with continue to amaze me.

Anyway, my visit to my old school caught the attention of a few newspapers and some of them ran articles on it, accompanied by the worst photographs of me I’ve ever seen in my life. Seriously, in these photos I look like the Elephant Man after a rather unfortunate accident with a high speed whisk. Definitely didn’t catch my best side.

Or maybe they did. God, that’s a worrying thought. Maybe “deformed Elephant Man” is a step up from my usual look. Cripes, I hope not.

Anyway, between the school visits and the hideousness I got a load of writing done. I’ve now finished and submitted the first proper draft of INVISIBLE FIENDS book 3.  It’s a big step up on the scary stakes and I’m almost certain I’ll be asked to tone it down in places. Still, it’s much better to go too far and have to pull back than not go far enough and always wonder if you could have gotten away with pushing it just a little bit more.

I had some other bits and bobs to write for Egmont after finishing book 3, but at the same time I was plotting out book 4. Now I’m VERY happy with the first three books in the IF series, but if book 4 comes out as good as the outline suggests it’s definitely going to be the best yet. It’s a big turning point in the series, and it’s completely different from any of the other five books. I’m excited about writing it, but a bit scared that I’ll muck it up at the same time. Still, that’s what rewrites are for.

That’s been about it. I’ve got plans to make another video blog, but finding time has been tricky so I haven’t got to it yet. I’ll do one as soon as I get a chance, honest.

Over at Mr Ripley’s Enchanted Books, his ‘Book Cover Wars’ competition has entered its third week. Each week, he posts four book covers and invites readers to vote for their favourite.  This week sees Mr Mumbles put in an appearance, and he’s up against some very strong competition.

To see the four competing covers and cast your vote for your favourite, scoot along to this page right here.