The Martial Art of Writing & Other Essays

“The thing about an art — and one of the things I love about both Kung Fu and writing — is that you’re never finished. No matter how good you get, no matter how much you achieve, you can always get better.”

In these essays, Alan Baxter—the author of cult horror hits like The Roo, the Eli Carver series, and the Australian Shadows Award-winners Crow Shine and Served Cold—explores the relationships between horror fiction, a writer’s craft and discipline, and the lessons brought to writing from his almost 40 years as a kung-fu practitioner and instructor.

Drawn from presentations, blog posts, and articles exploring his own process, The Martial Art of Writing features Baxter’s interrogation of the similarities between his kung fu and writing practices, the next steps that need to be taken when you realise your book is broken, writing killer fight scenes, embracing your darker impulses as a writer, and much more.

Whether you’re a fan of Baxter’s dark imagination looking to plumb the origins of his nightmarish fiction, or an aspiring writer with a penchant for action and dark themes, this chapbook provides a glimpse into the mind and processes of one of Australia’s most prominent writers of horror fiction.