Three blog posts. That was the extent of my writing week, three blog posts. Two were author interviews with excellent writers – Laura Besley about her debut flash fiction collection The Almost Mothers, and Nicola Cassidy about her third historical novel Adele, based on the life of Fred Astaire’s fascinating sister. I also entertained myself… Read More Book report, week 11: Porgy and Bess and Strout
My stats have bottomed out. That’s ok, you’re all busy queuing for toilet rolls at a safe distance or disinfecting the letterbox for the postman. I’m just trying to stick to my accountability experiment, which is, unsurprisingly, not going well. Writing is impossible at the moment when the world is so insane. How do we… Read More Book report, week 10: heart and hobbies
It’s been a poor writing week – there’s probably no need to explain why. I started with great intentions, using an idea by Cork writer Catherine Ryan Howard. To write her first drafts, she sets herself a daily goal of 1,250 words. She prints out a table with the goals and rewards herself by crossing… Read More Book report, week 9: charts and uncharted territory
I’m back to a slow canter through my MS, though finding it hard to concentrate with all that’s going on in the world at the moment. I keep rereading the same section, trying to pick up the thread again, and it feels so terribly plodding. But I don’t know if this part of the book… Read More Book report, week 8: hope and Hope
It’s been another disastrous writing week, unfortunately. I’m hoping that I will be able to return to full concentration soon, but it just isn’t possible at the moment. Whenever an idea pops into my head, I take notes, and my noticeboard is full of Post-Its for future use. Film research-wise, I watched Annie Get Your… Read More Book report, week 7: absence and Annie
I don’t have much of a report this week, I’m afraid. My mother had emergency surgery on Monday, her second major operation in four months, so my time has largely been spent at the hospital. Other than little snippets written in notebooks as and when they’ve come to me, I haven’t done much. A few… Read More Book report, week 6: health and hiatus
Classic films feature largely in my book. I wrote it drawing on old favourites of mine from memory – ie. using films that instinctively came to mind in connection with certain points of my plot. But I have to rewatch all of them in order to double check many details I’m hazy on, and to… Read More Book report, week 5: details and distraction
As expected, I’ve reached the uphill struggle point in the process. The more I wade through, the longer the list of things that need fixing and researching. Paradoxically, the closer I get to the end, the further away I feel from finishing the book. I know it’s a matter of perseverence, but it really does… Read More Book report, week 4: morale and manipulation
It’s been a frustrating week because, although I have put in a lot of hours, I don’t have a stellar word count to show for it. All the work has been in areas around it. My focus was threefold: Grant application For the first time I felt the confidence to apply for an Arts Council… Read More Book report, week 3: files and feedback
Surprisingly, I’ve had quite a productive week despite not being able to get that many man hours in. The main thing I’ve been focussed on is seeing where there are gaps in the story as I go through it. This has been easier than I expected, possibly because I have a bit more clarity than… Read More Book report, week 2: cowboys and corrections
Word herding 