Calum P. Cameron
Lindsay Thomson interviews Calum P Cameron, Edinburgh native and author of the Mediochre Q Seth series. A self-confessed 'massive nerd', he writes whenever he is not busy studying at the University of Aberdeen.
Edinburgh as an inspiring city
Edinburgh is a city with a lot of history. You can see it in the buildings and the streets. In some places you can see the layers. And, honestly, I didn't realise how fully I'd internalised the local stories as a child until I found myself at university reflexively correcting a Glaswegian on the details of Burke and Hare from memory with the same rapidity as if they'd mispronounced a common word or made a mistake in basic arithmetic. All three of my thus-far published novels take place largely in Edinburgh and revolve around mostly Edinburgh-based people.
Ambitions for a career in writing
I just want to keep people entertained and make a positive difference to the sum total of diversity and originality in the world. And it'd be nice if I could get my work sufficiently ingrained in the culture that one or two people would read some of it even after I'm dead. If my writing could eventually help inspire some positive real-world social change or something, that'd be super rad. If I could somehow get an actual real-world income from it, well, that's pretty much the pipe dream.
Becoming a writer
I think I decided to try to become a published writer when I was around fifteen, after being told by multiple independent people that one day I could be. The first time I decided to become a person who frequently voluntarily writes things in their spare time, I was in primary school. I had a friend with whom I spend virtually all my free time at school, exchanging stories and ideas. It just felt like these were things that I ought to write down, I guess.
The challenges of writing
Finding points on the day when I, as an individual who is expected to justify his value to society through the medium of work-hours in return for being allowed to eat, have both time and energy left over for writing. Capitalism, basically. The hardest thing about writing is Capitalism.
Tips on getting through writers block
I'm still working that out for myself. Reading other works that capture your mind in a similar way to how you want your work to capture other minds is something that often works for me. Or finding something else that's easier to write and doing that for a while, like the psychological equivalent of crop rotation.
Edinburgh as an inspiring city
Edinburgh is a city with a lot of history. You can see it in the buildings and the streets. In some places you can see the layers. And, honestly, I didn't realise how fully I'd internalised the local stories as a child until I found myself at university reflexively correcting a Glaswegian on the details of Burke and Hare from memory with the same rapidity as if they'd mispronounced a common word or made a mistake in basic arithmetic. All three of my thus-far published novels take place largely in Edinburgh and revolve around mostly Edinburgh-based people.
Ambitions for a career in writing
I just want to keep people entertained and make a positive difference to the sum total of diversity and originality in the world. And it'd be nice if I could get my work sufficiently ingrained in the culture that one or two people would read some of it even after I'm dead. If my writing could eventually help inspire some positive real-world social change or something, that'd be super rad. If I could somehow get an actual real-world income from it, well, that's pretty much the pipe dream.
Becoming a writer
I think I decided to try to become a published writer when I was around fifteen, after being told by multiple independent people that one day I could be. The first time I decided to become a person who frequently voluntarily writes things in their spare time, I was in primary school. I had a friend with whom I spend virtually all my free time at school, exchanging stories and ideas. It just felt like these were things that I ought to write down, I guess.
The challenges of writing
Finding points on the day when I, as an individual who is expected to justify his value to society through the medium of work-hours in return for being allowed to eat, have both time and energy left over for writing. Capitalism, basically. The hardest thing about writing is Capitalism.
Tips on getting through writers block
I'm still working that out for myself. Reading other works that capture your mind in a similar way to how you want your work to capture other minds is something that often works for me. Or finding something else that's easier to write and doing that for a while, like the psychological equivalent of crop rotation.