Work on Bethany Rose has kept me busy, as I’m on the last three or four thousand words now. The total word count will run over my intended 100,000 words but as I’ve already decided to delete one minor character completely that’s not an issue. This is only the first draft, of course; there’s a lot of work to be done yet, editing and polishing. Some people balk at this aspect of writing but I thoroughly enjoy it.

I’ve enjoyed writing Bethany’s story. Her character’s an interesting mixture of contradictions; sensitive but strong, creative but practical, and incredibly brave in the face of awful circumstances. She’s a very different person from Tamsin, that’s for sure. But I won’t say too much about her publicly for now.

I’ve also been enjoying our two chickens. In the spring, Mum began talking about having two pet chickens. She gave it some thought, and by early summer they were in residence in her small garden. Richard laughed and told her we’d have them by Xmas. Well he was right, and here they are.

Cute little characters they are, too, with amusing habits and quizzical expressions. They’re not in the least bothered by our dogs. Actually, Ygraine has already lost interest. Emily is more inquisitive, though, having discovered that these new residents produce mini footballs - eggs to you and me.

Richard’s famous. Really, he is. Check him out on You Tube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V3RJ9RA2fk8

...Another year, that is. And yikes what a chilly start! I'm wearing four layers and I'm still cold.

Stew for tonight's dinner--which I'm not looking forward to as I loathe stew, but there was little else I could do with the mountain goat which was supposed to have been lamb. Lamb?!! A howling chainsaw would have struggled to make an indent on that thing. Bleeeurch!! Here's hoping my culinary efforts can render it tolerable.



Tamsin is finished; all edits done. Unless a publisher wants any changes to be made, it will now remain as it is for all time. The final full-stop is in place. And the word-count now stands at 85,000 words, which is only 1,000 less than on the previous draft.

Now I'll begin editing Rowan, which I'm looking forward to doing, actually. Plus there are two short stories on the back-boiler, and I need to start thinking about what to do with Bethany Rose, as last year I wrote 50,000 words of that before admitting that I hated the plot and should have gone with the original idea.

I've got two pairs of socks on, and some leg warmers, and my feet are still freezing! It's a hazard of sitting in front of this computer for too long. Anyway, editing work on Tamsin continues, and chapter 12 brings the total word count so far to 33,250.

This afternoon I'll be dodging rain showers to go to the village. We need a few bits for the kitchen, and as I'll be seeing friends tomorrow there's a small present to find. There has been no snow here at all, despite the gloom-laden weather forecasts on TV! Fancy them shutting schools yesterday, just for an inch or so of snow. As a child, my friends and I walked the mile to junior school through knee-deep drifts of snow, and then home again later (at the usual time) - every winter. Softies!

(Am I now turning into Victor Meldrew? Will my next statement be a lament about having coped with twelve hours down the coal pit before walking over the ice-bound hills in bare feet to do another twelve hours in t'owd cotton factory before walking home again to have real bread and butter for tea? Hmmm, I think not.)

When my old computer died, it took several chapters of Tamsin with it; chapters which I'd already edited so this means I had to do them again. I'd prefer not to have to repeat work but sometimes you just have to get on with a job! I've now finished the tenth, which brings me back up-to-date.

I also lost a Fantasy story which I'd been working on for two weeks already, and which also meant I missed the submission deadline for the anthology I was aiming it towards. I like the story, Turning Tides, which was about the annihilation of Druids on Anglesey, so I will re-write it ASAP and aim it at a magazine.

Richard had one of his many migraines yesterday. He suffers from them a lot. So, he spent most of yesterday morning in bed. Emily kept him company, not being one to willingly forego a warm spot. Later he took the dogs out for a walk, and Emily arrived home with the collar of her woolly coat half hanging off. Truely she hates the thing!

I've been reading a strange little tale by Andrzej Sapkowski called The Last Wish, which draws on popular folk and fairy tales while adding an individualistic slant of the author's own. An unusual novel, certainly.

Richard and I went to a performance of Sleeping Beauty staged by the English National Ballet. I've lost count of how many times I've seen this ballet, but I was able to watch some dancers whose work is new to me--such as Asta Bazevicute as Princess Aurora, and James Forbat who was very good as Prince Desire.

I was sitting next to a lady in her 50's who'd come to the ballet on her own as none of her friends like it. She had wanted to be a ballet dancer as a child but her mother had made her have piano lessons instead. Now she does Arabian dance, purely for fun, which totally scandalises her mother. Good for her!!

The 5,000-word Sci-Fi story, School, arrived safely at its prospective publisher. The response time will be around one month, apparently, which is rather good compared to most places.

I've now begun a Fantasy story, no title as yet, set in Celtic Britain. I nearly accidentally deleted two days work on it! Oops. I'm sure this cough medicine is tinkering with my brain... The deadline for this is close; December 1st, in fact. I really don't like cutting things that fine but sometimes there's no option.

I've been giving Tamsin a final edit. I've just finished chapter 10 (28,600 words total so far). There really isn't much more that I can do with this story, so after this last once-ever, that's it, (unless a publisher/editor disagrees, of course.) I haven't changed much at all, so far, beyond polishing the odd phrase and putting some small chapters together to make a bigger one to improve flow. Beyond this, it would be change for the sake of change, or death-by-editing.

Despite this morning’s torrential downpour, I headed into the village to attend to some business and browse the sales. All I wanted was a new black blouse, an evening-type style. I came back with two books, which is entirely typical of me. I always was the world’s most hopeless clothes shopper. I need a pet Gok.

Anyway, as I’ve put Bethany Rose on hold while I contemplate the shredder, I’ve been busy editing Tamsin, which I’ve not even looked at for a while. So far I’ve edited up to chapter 7. This is the last time I’ll edit this MS, unless a publisher wants a specific change. Otherwise I’ll be tweaking for the sake of tweaking.

Richard and I have begun watching a series called Blood Ties starring Christina Cox, Kyle Schmid and Dylan Neal. It’s based on books by Tanya Huff, and the two episodes we’ve seen have been enjoyable. Richard said he much prefers it to Buffy as it’s far more adult and gritty, and the characters seem more believable.

Lately, he’s been working his way through a Marx Brothers boxed set of films, and last night he watched an ancient Buster Keaton silent film while I finished reading a biography of a rather interesting fellow—lion trainer, bar-room pianist, author and independent thinker (and doer).

And I’ve done a bit more to the oil portrait which I’ve been working on for a while, too. There’s not much more to do to it now—a few almost-transparent pale touches on the skin, and that’s all.

An overcast but pleasant day; the dogs took me for a walk along the beach, possibly because they'd heard me muttering under my breath once too often.

I've been writing a synopsis for Rowan and polishing the existing one for Tamsin. How can 300 words (or thereabouts) manage to be so fiddly? I'm now at the stage where I can't even "see" what I've written, I've been staring at the same two bits of A4 paper for so long. Days, even.

Gardening has kept me busy, too. I've opened up one of our compost bins and spread the new soil along one of the borders, mowed the lawn and done rather a lot of weeding. The eco-friendly weed-killer bought to annihilate a patch of nettles seems to have encouraged it to grow faster than ever. It’s right at the entrance to the Grove, too, so if people enter that area they risk getting stung as they brush passed.

Have I mentioned the Grove before? I forget… Picture a circular lawn, which has the four quarters marked out by “standing stones” (actually, they’re more like crouching lumps of red sandstone but let’s not get too pedantic here). To get inside, a person has to first walk along a narrow path which enters the Grove from the west. There are various symbolic plants growing around the circular lawn. And no, the nettle clump isn’t one of these.


Beside the entrance to the Grove.

my beloved swing!
Originally uploaded by __Adele__.

Here's an old photo of me as a child. I spent hours on end on this swing, loving the feeling of nearly flying! I wanted wings of my own, so I could let go of the ropes and zoom up to the cloudy sky and beyond....

This morning I emailed a copy of Shell Boy as a submission to a competition called Oceans of Stories currently being run by Liverpool John Moore's Uni and Edge Hill College. Winning pieces are to be read at Hemmingway's Cafe in Liverpool on May 9th.

I've just pegged out a huge pile of laundry. Was that wise? I'm already having second thoughts, as the sky has rapidly turned an ominous charcoal shade. It rained non-stop all yesterday. Here's hoping the weather will be better on Monday, as Sylvia (gelertandbess) will be here with the intention of visiting Hilbre Island. (See edit)

Tamsin has just been returned from a prospective literary agent, with a standard thanks-but-no-thanks letter. So I've taken another look at the opening chapters of the novel and, with the phrase "Murder your darlings!" ringing in my ears, have decided to edit down two chapters into one. This will tighten the pace. If I can find fault with it, you can bet someone else certainly will. Honestly, I've totally lost count of how many times I've re-written the start of this novel.

Last night we watched Beowulf, the version which Neil Gaiman co-wrote. At first the animated reminded me of Shrek, which is not complimentary, but then the story caught my interest - and certainly I loved the symbolism woven throughout the plot and imagery.

Edit:- We now have torrential rain and hail stones! *chuckles*

I applied new sealant round the bath. Now, in the advert, it looks so easy; a tidy flow of sealant smoothly emerges from the tube, and in no time at all a perfect job is done. Does it work like that in real life? Bah! The pesky stuff comes out in great blobs or not at all. I ended up using a small artist’s palette knife to get the gloopy stuff to go in the right place. And now some bits have peeled up already. Humph!!!

Yesterday’s unrelenting rain encouraged me to stick close to the computer and continue working on The Reluctant Monk. It stands at 884 words at the moment, though I’ll probably tweak the text two or three times yet. The story gives some previously unknown (unknown by me, too!) background information about my main Bad Guy, who features in my novel, Tamsin.

In the afternoon, I began working on a second short story, also intended for the Oxton ghost tours project. I was going to have one the of main characters as heavily tattooed, then I remembered our microscopic budget and the possibility that it might be raining on the night of its performance – an actor with dissolving fake tattoos might look a bit silly! Plus I’d given him a curly black 18th c. wig, which the prop department might not be able to find. So I scrapped that idea, and offered impressions of appearance rather than specifics, and what began to emerge was Spanish Jones, a Welsh privateer (or pirate, in plain language). The Dee Estuary was notorious for piracy, at one time. I have no idea how that story is going to finish yet. I’ll find out when I write it!

This morning I completed the final draft of Tamsin, approximately one year after writing its first draft. I need to tweak a few typos, but that aside, this 86,500-word MS is ready to be submitted to prospective agents/publishers. I honestly can't think of anything to add or subtract from the story as it now stands. A publisher's editor may disagree, of course, but I'll cross that bridge when I reach it.

You are invited to join in with a debate about TV viewing here: http://2e0dtoeric.livejournal.com/5536.html

Read a beautiful poem about Alexander the Great and Bagoas here: http://rothalion.livejournal.com/49459.html

This morning, the synopsis and first three chapters of Tamsin were emailed to the submissions department of a prospective publisher. All I have to do now is wait for half a century until someone deigns to read it!

I’m still waiting to hear back from another prospective publisher regarding A Wirral Otherkin Trilogy, which is a trio of short Dark Fantasy/Folklore stories.

The 3000-word Seagull Inn is currently undergoing tweaking and polishing, in preparation for submission to an anthology, (deadline April 15th).

And I’m still recovering from the biggest chocolate and vanilla ice-cream sundae, with chopped nuts and brandy snaps and runny chocolate drizzles that I’ve ever encountered! Slimming it wasn’t, but scrumptious it most definitely was. Neither I nor Mum could finish the entire dessert. Poor Richard could only look on, over the expanse of plain apple pie which he’d chosen.

This was yesterday, in the Waterside Inn in Leigh, which stands beside the Manchester Ship Canal, the historical waterway which joins Manchester to Liverpool and the Irish Sea. Back in the Victorian era of wealthy cotton mills and coal mines, this canal provided a vital route for import and export. Now it’s used mainly for tourism. The mills stand empty, unless they’ve already been converted into luxury apartments. The coal mines were closed during the Thatcher years. And Leigh, like many mining towns, never really recovered from the loss of traditional industries. Many shops are empty or derelict – yet the entrance to Pennington Park glowed yellow with cheerful daffodils, and the gnarled old magnolia trees holding aloft their stately pink and white blooms stand as a testament to tenacious local pride.

“Taste this,” he said, poking the thin drizzle of sauce zigzagging over his plate. He did not look happy.

“Hmm, apple pie and cough medicine. Interesting combination.”

“What’s yours like?” He peered across the table, over the top of the tea pot.

I scowled at the ugly square white plate sat before me, on which rested a thin, sunken floppy brown wedge. “Stale chocolate cake softened with cheap diluted sherry then warmed up.” I, too, had been presented with a miserable whisker of zigzagging cream.

Look, chefs, if I order pudding I want pudding, and not someone else’s idea of a break in an anorexic’s diet, ok? And what’s with the miserly drizzles? Humph!

The main meal had been pleasant but the portions meagre. I’d had to paddle through my korma to find any chicken, and I’d seen bigger stock cubes than his salmon steak. To top this, the place possessed all the aesthetic charm of a school dining hall – think N-O-I-S-E plus a constant flow of people pushing past us.

So, having grown tired of shouting at each other across the table in order to hear our conversation, we went somewhere much louder instead! *chuckles* It had been quite some time since I was last in The Swan Inn on Wood Street, but it’s not changed much – a few different pictures on the walls, and they’ve improved the restrooms, (cue dodgy accent impersonation –“Oh maa gaaaad, I’m sounding so American already!”) So we perched on familiar wonky wooden stools while happily being deafened by Van Halen and Free and the likes. Clearly it’s the same jukebox, except with a few Marilyn Manson and growly-stuff updates.

Anyhooow, shortly before 9pm we strolled next-door to the FACT Café, which was to be the venue for the Word Is They Say (WITS) literary event. The café forms one part of a much larger cinema complex, or so I gathered. It’s very spacious and modern and echoing; all hard flat shiny surfaces – but they make a fine cappuccino. Well, it has to be said that the turn-out wasn’t great, but those who had come along seemed to enjoy themselves. Certainly no-one wandered off – always a good sign!

The performances began with four folk/blues songs by Rob Clarke, who accompanied himself on an acoustic guitar. Following this came readings by several writers, including Aidan Pilkington-Burrows, Paul McDermott, Robert Carlisle, David Bateman and organiser Amanda DeAngeles. (That’s possibly not the full list, but being more interested in listening than playing good journo, I forgot to take notes.) Oh, and I went on fourth, when I read aloud the first chapter of Tamsin.

Monday night saw us at the Empire Theatre in Liverpool for a performance of Swan Lake by the Russian Classical Ballet Theatre. The role of Odette/Odile was danced by Nadezhda Schepachiova. Odette was danced well, but Odile needed much more vivacity than it was given. It is the contrast of characters which gives this twin role its purpose. Vladimir Statnii as Prince Siegfried and Ghenadii Badika as Baron von Rothbart also needed more power in their movements, though otherwise they danced elegantly. Evghenii Tkach as the court jester performed some delightfully controlled athletic jumps.

The corps de ballet was, unfortunately, weak. The spectacle of the swans’ dances relies heavily on the perfection of timing, of the exact synchronicity of all the dancers' movements. This was sloppy. (And don’t tell me this can’t be done – I’ve seen it done!) Also, I don’t expect to twice see dancers narrowly avoid collision, or to have to scuttle quickly into the correct alignment. Perhaps they were used to a different size of stage. Certainly the orchestra’s own sense of rhythm would not have helped the dancers; the pace of the Neapolitan Dance went completely haywire. To the dancers’ credit, they managed to maintain dignity.

In ballet, it is not enough to move fluidly with lyrical gestures. Energy, power and emotional expression are also required. Swan Lake devoid of real passion was a sadly lacklustre affair.

And per-leeze ditch the duck on a scateboard which trundled across the rear of the stage....!

Ah, the heady days of summer are definitely behind us now. Taken earlier in the year, this photo shows the very first of the strawberries grown in our garden – our dog helped harvest much of the remaining crop. We’d wondered why the fruits were so sparse. Ygraine’s pink chin handed us a clue.

I have just learned that a friend of mine, who is in her eighties, is recovering from a stroke which temporarily rendered her unable to speak. Peggy’s doctor has told her that her heart could give up at any time, but then she’s already been living with that idea for the two decades that I’ve known her. Her speech seemed fully recovered when we were talking over the telephone. The stroke has damaged one arm and one side of her face, she told me. The stress of waiting for the immanent death of her long-time friend and mentor isn’t helping her condition. Some of you may remember me posting a few poems written by West Cheshire Lad, which is one of the pseudonyms used by the gentleman in question. Well, he is currently – so Peggy told me – in very poor shape, being given blood transfusions every three weeks and being kept alive by various tubes and medical aid. Each time his health takes a turn for the worse, so does hers.

I’ve just finished editing chapter twenty-three of Tamsin. I keep describing this as the second draft though this is hardly accurate, as some parts of the MS have been re-written several times already. Let’s keep things simply by describing this as the second complete draft. So anyway, progress with this is steadily continuing.

Here's a photo of the rose, clematis and honeysuckle trellis before it collapsed under the weight of flowers and foliage.

I’m still coughing and struggling to breathe, despite having completed the course of prescribed tablets. A return visit to the doctor may well be in order… This bronchial infection saps so much energy.

The good news is that I’ve been making steady progress with my editorial red pen, which means I’m now at the half-way point with Tamsin. I have been reading through the MS and editing in long-hand. Once that’s done, then I’ll read through it again and make changes on the computer then re-print the MS. In effect, that should be two re-writes for the price of one.

I thoroughly enjoyed reading Arthur Golden’s Memoirs of a Geisha. I haven’t seen the film yet, though my beloved picked it up cheaply on DVD earlier this week. The novel is a page-turner, certainly, and portrays a way of life about which I know almost nothing. Japanese culture as whole is unfamiliar to me, though I’ve a real liking for some of their traditional ink and water landscape paintings, such as those by Sesshu, Sesson and Shubon. I first encountered those well over a decade ago at an exhibition of Oriental art staged in Windermere.

The weather has acquired a distinctly autumnal edge at last! The quality of light today is lovely; the curly leaves of the contorted hazel tree have bright highlights of pale yellow-green set against sage and brown shadows. Don’t you just love this time of the year, with its changing colours and swiftly-shifting moods?

Laurell K Hamilton talks about her novels and offers advice to writers here:-
http://www.barnesandnoble.com/writers/writerdetails.asp?z=y&cid=1021632#interview

There’s an interesting blog entry about the process of novel writing here:-
http://douglas-clegg.livejournal.com/57446.html

Speaking of writing, I’ve added an extra chapter to Tamsin which seems to smooth out a ‘bump’ in the flow of the novel. Chapter thirteen, which follows on from this will, require a radical re-write, so once I’ve posted this LJ update that’s what I’ll be working on today.

We enjoyed a lovely trip to Chester on Monday. The River Dee had flooded the lower level of the river walk, but I have seen the waters higher on rare occasions. A gorgeous swan came to say hello to me. What beautiful creatures they are; and though to describe them as regal might be an unforgivable cliché, this word truly does belong to these magnificent birds. They can be surprisingly fierce – apparently their wings can break a man’s leg – and yet if you’ve ever watched one sailing along with cygnets hitching a ride on their backs then you’d know how tender they can be also.

We lunched in The Slug and Lettuce, which was rather pleasant, before having a wander round the old city. I bought some rather snazzy stiletto boots. I’ll admit to a fondness for boots… And once we’d wound our way down to the swollen river, we naturally went to our favourite Blue Moon Café for tea and cake – and they do make the most fluffy yummy cakes imaginable!

Chester is easily one of my favourite places. The energy of the place just feels right, somehow.

My mother and sister Evelyn came to visit, too. We had dinner at The Queen Anne in Oxton whose décor was lovely inside. What really caught my eye was the tasteful barn conversion to one side of the pub, though – huge windows, sandstone walls, with a small courtyard in front. I’d love something like that!

Lee and Lyn have just returned from a trip to Cyprus, which they enjoyed. Lee said everything was very expensive, though; they were charged $9 for two coffees and ice-creams.

Hmm, I’ve just noticed that this post is mostly about food. Spot the girl who’s on a diet.

You know the feeling of having too many jobs to fit into too few hours? I know, I know… keep calm, prioritise and deal with one thing at a time. No problem; I can do that. I just wish the number of minutes within any given hour would stretch a little.

I’ve been editing Tamsin, and have reached one of the chapters which requires a major re-write. Guess who’s run out of yellow printing ink. The cyan is almost out, too. If any of the three coloured cartridges run out then the printer won’t work at all, even for all-black text. That’s my only gripe with the machine, as otherwise it’s proved itself to be smooth-running. So, at some point soon I need to take an hour’s bus ride into Birkenhead for supplies. I’d intended to do this today but I need to walk into the village for a few groceries – and to find Siberian Pine Nut Oil.

My father’s condition continues to decline. My brother Eric told me that when he’d visited Dad, he seemed completely immobile and his eyes were rolling in his head like a blind man. One of the nurses told Eric she was amazed by Dad’s tenacity. So are we all, actually – but it seems such a long, long, cruel death. Who knows how much he’s aware of? To think of him lying there, trapped within his steadily declining body tears at my heart.

A young climbing jasmine needs planting by the patio trellis. There’s a huge amount of weeding to be done throughout the garden. Earlier this week I continued tidying the front garden, cutting back the willow tree and Berberis thunbergii hedge, a slow task due to its vicious two-inch thorns – which are the reason I chose it for hedging!

Oh, I bought some cream trousers… The shops seem crammed with the most hideous skirts imaginable – huge floor-sweepers with big, clumsy appliqué junk randomly plonked all over them. Long skirts tend make me look like a 5’ 2” garden gnome.

There’re various on-going writing projects - a short story I need to finish by the weekend, and another anthology whose deadline for submissions is at the end of October. Three poems were sent to a local magazine just last week, too. I’m already playing around with a few ideas for the third novel in the series, though before I even write one word of that I fully intend to finish Tamsin and Cry for Innocence first. I’m seriously tempted to change Cry for…’s title, so that the series would have its titles after the name of the main character of each book. And I need to firmly prod (I’ve already tried gently prod) a certain well-known magazine who bought an article last November and have yet to pay me for it. Grrrr…!

And on top of that, I’m in the very early stages of setting up a new business venture - my own line of tattoo designs! Last night saw me surrounded by mounds of my sketch books and photographs of pottery, sketched caricatures, symbols from diverse sources, Celtic knots, ancient tribal sigils etc.

Last night I was chased through a city by Godzilla. In retaliation, I stole its eggs and made omelette. Pick on me at your peril.

Why does submitting to the attentions of a dental hygienist inspire me with the overwhelming urge to devour inordinate quantities of sticky, gooey, caramel-laced chocolate the very second I’m through the surgery door? It is an act of infantile defiance, no doubt, which declares immediate rebellion against any puritanical tendencies designed to inspire the maintenance of creamy white, freshly polished toothy-pegs.

And, anyway, I walked up the hill. That’s bound to burn off a few of the calories gained.

My friend Sylvia has nice teeth. No really, she does. I noticed this on her latest promo photos, where she’s posed with one of her movie-cameras hoisted onto her shoulder as if in readiness for the film she’s going to shoot next spring. She has a warm smile and lovely white, even teeth.

Anyway, onto other things…

The second monthly newsletter for my Yahoo! was posted today, and only later did I realise that not one of the links worked. It’s hardly the end of the world, but a nuisance nonetheless. Maybe I should release an emergency update (ha! some “emergency”!!) which contains functioning links.

Remember me mentioning the short piece I’d written for Riverside Writers recent meeting, which was called The Four Seasons? Well, that has now been submitted to an anthology competition being run by http://www.writerscafe.org/ Actually, if you toddle over there and feed my name into the search-for-writers facility, you’ll be able to read some of my poetry, which I may well add to when I have the time.

Meanwhile, work continues on editing Tamsin - and also I’ve been wondering how I’m going to re-write Cry for Innocence as at least half of that needs changing. I may change the title, too, so that each of the series is named after the main character. Ah well, time will tell.

I do hope I don’t entice people into a somnambular trance when I write about writing… I have visions of readers’ eyes glazing over as their hands reach for the scroll button. Oh well, I am the way I am – if you don’t like it, hit ‘delete’.

The final chapter, #34, of Tamsin has just been finished to first draft. This leaves the epilogue to do, which shouldn’t take long.

The heat last night was unbearable. Apparently we’d just experienced the hottest July in Britain since 1911. It was not an enjoyable experience. Intense sun always makes me feel awful at the best of times – headachy, limp, very lethargic – but by 1.30pm yesterday I fell sound asleep and didn’t wake up again until 5.30pm.

Perhaps this extra sleep was fortunate as our dog kept us awake for most of the night. She is terrified of thunder storms! She alternates between hiding under the bed where she pants frantically and howls, to leaping onto the bed and trying to hide underneath my arm. Having a hyperventilating terrier shoving her nose down your ear is not conducive to sleep.

Here’s a photo of some of my hand-made pottery, nestling amongst the lavender which is spilling over our garden path.

I finally finished tweaking The Club, and so this 3000-word piece was emailed to Dark Moon Press yesterday for consideration for inclusion in their forthcoming anthology of vampire fiction. The first draft of this story was written around two years ago but I wasn’t happy with some aspects of it. For very similar reasons, writing Tamsin ground to a complete halt for a while. The whole issue of blood-drinking vampires irritated me. Not only was I bored with the theme but it seemed increasingly silly. My fiction is laced with metaphysics, and the disparity between this and the stereotypical gore-chomping imagery had grown so wide that the one simply could not tolerate the other. Consequently, my writing ground to a halt. I could not move forward with it until I had resolved this issue.

Exactly how this resolution was arrived at is not something I’ll reveal. Suffice to say that The Club has been re-drafted and Tamsin has only the final chapter and the epilogue yet to be written. All I have to do now is edit it, sell it, promote it….. *groans* Ah, well - onwards ever onwards!!! *chuckles*

I’ve had an idea. Don’t all gasp. I’m aiming to write a piece of short fiction each month, at least for the next year. These short pieces will complement or echo the novels. Some of the characters from the novels will be in the short pieces, which will be intended either for publication separately or collated into book-form. I’ve no working title as yet. I’ve found myself interested by several series which portray a complete pantheon of characters, whose lives intertwine, who might refer to the same event but from a very different view point. This is something I intend to incorporate. I’ll let you know how this project develops.

Oh, before I go – my poor mother almost got struck by lightening last night! She’d stepped beneath the covered pergola to watch the heavy thunder storm. She reached towards an old Lloyd Loom chair just as a small arc of lightening flashed through the corrugated plastic roof and hit the very same chair. She was knocked off her feet but is quite unhurt. How’s that for fortuitous timing?