Nanowrimo again

No, I don't like it, I think it's a silly idea.  The whole idea of competitive writing, like competitive baking, is symbolic to me of what is wrong with British society!  The idea of 1.9 m people writing a half-formed novel is horrifying.   Of course they won't all finish, of course a few of them will be genuinely good, but those that are completed, how many will be sloshing about in the self-published doldrums.  So why would I possibly want to participate?

The answer is simple, I am very stuck with the new book, and the idea of writing 50,000 words in a month and getting critical mass was appealing... I thought that if I wrote the Bertha strand of the book as a stand alone story I might see where things were going.   It would also force me to write first and research afterwards.  Research is a problem - I wanted to see what happened technically, found a website and was reading about Bertha's children... mistake!  Anyway,  I started on Tuesday, and by yesterday I had 6,500 words, and was well-pleased, some interesting characters and a sex scene...

So it is working, and it's given me a deadline, and I do love a deadline!  Also, I want to get it finished before the 30th November - because there's a lot of Christmas stuff that has to happen just before Advent - not least writing the advent calendar for Facebook.

Now the great new project is starting up - and that's going to keep things interesting, I may even forget about the other lovely book, sitting with an agent.   Sigh.

Ghost in the Machine

Sometimes, you plunge along, rather uninspired, but you do it anyway.   Sometimes you just say something to someone and unleash a deluge.

I've just unleashed a deluge of stories - from a man I know slightly - and now I have undertaken to ghostwrite his book... weird.  I wonder if it will get anywhere.  He is incredibly excited about it, while I am feeling my usual jaded self.  He is 55 and has done a lot of drug-related activities and a lot of illegal stuff.  I foresee problems, but I also am faintly excited, since I think I have a latter day Howard Marks on my hands.

The reason he is excited is because he is currently unemployed and full time carer for his Dad, so his life is pretty dull, and he has been thinking about writing up his adventures for some years, so I seem like a gift from heaven.   I also know that Mark and others will sigh and throw their hands up and say "It's another Tony!" "You and your lame ducks!"

I just hope he's got enough material for a book - we need 50k at least.  I am hoping I can write this alongside my other projects.  I expect so, it's basically editing, so shouldn't interfere.

Blurb

A first few trial blurbs (I reckon it's best to start early) as I'm already finding it difficult to explain what the story is.


A sinister church and three driven, passionate women, linked across 1500 years

A mysterious church, three haunted women, linked across the centuries

It was a church like no other - and it linked three women's struggles for fulfilment across the centuries

The isolated church with a sinister message three women struggle to breaks its hold over them.


A church with a message - and three women's struggles to break its grip on them.

Adela, Bertha and Constance: each has her own struggle, for love, recognition and a family. They are linked across 1500 years by the tiny church that the locals call "The Devil's Chapel".

Research

I thought I could just get going, but yesterday told me differently.

Stupid really, an A-level in Medieval history and 6 weeks studying the Dark Ages at degree level (before I switched to Classics) do not equip you to write a multi-stranded historical novel without a bit of extra work.  I started with 1910 - a period I am happy and familiar with due to my research on The Ash Grove.  Then I stopped,.   I need to write the three different strands independently and then cut them into each other - I think.  But logically I should start with 1910 and the story of Dorothy's research (actually maybe I'm going to call her Constance)   But I start doing my own research, and I'm drawn to the historical periods, rather than trying to understand the history of female scholarship and women's role in the Society of Antiquaries,.   Next week I am going to the Antiquaries' library I think, to get on with it.

Yesterday I felt stupidly stuck, but an hour's reading of a book about Romanesque sculpture this morning has filled me with ideas again.   I am off to buy a bookstand for the desk - so I can take notes onto the laptop.  Why haven't I had one before?

This is a Barfrestone capital formed as a double-bodied dragon - a fairly typical "grotesque" illustration, which as I observed at the time, seem to mimic designs seen in medieval manuscripts.  This has been confirmed this morning.   I also discovered the that masons' lodge was under the direction of a church official, the Prior of  ChristChurch (the Cathedral monastery) so that adds a whole different dimension of tension and conflict and the need for concealment - good stuff.

The new term begins!

I have started writing the Devil's Chapel - and I am delighted that I have 4,000 words of an actual beginning... I have re-used some of the MR James type text I wrote in March, but in a more concise, dynamic way.  I think I will write the three stories independently and then intercut them and edit and add foreshadowings and so on later.  I have even thought of a plot twist.

Today I felt very ill, so I didn't do much, but I edited and read up notes and thought and tried to induce in myself a medieval/dark ages mindset.  Tricky.

The autumn campaign

It  has been several months now, well actually over a year, since I found myself in the midst of writing a book.  It isn’t lack of ideas, perhaps it’s the anxiety that I am not “doing it right” and that I have no way of understanding how to “correct” myself.  Is that it?   I think really it is “what’s the point?” and the realisation that the books I am writing are not what the market wants, however well written and excellent they are.  And of course as time goes on one begins to think how they might be re-worked and made even more excellent. Perhaps the fact of having written 4 novels in 7 years seemed a bit overwhelming and maybe my brain needs a rest, but frankly I think it is discouragement rather than anything else.  The reason I feel able to write now is because there is interest in one of my books.   

Since the spring, well, since about May, when the energy I first had for The Devil’s Chapel petered out, I have done no real writing.  I messed about with the OAMFD idea and then lost interest.  I fiddled with a few ideas, wrote a few sketches, but nothing caught fire.  I have had endless ideas for work, but nothing that really grabs me.  TDC is listed as this autumn’s project and I think it’s a good one.  I just hope I that this lassitude doesn’t extend beyond our trip to Naples.

It really is quite depressing not writing, however domestic life has been rather demanding over the last few months, and I hate the idea of writing during the summer holidays.  However, all this will change soon I expect, there will be no "summer holidays" to speak of now that Finn has left school, and we can choose where and when to go away.  I will miss the summer holidays - a six week period of feeling at liberty to enjoy oneself, even if one doesn't have the funds to enjoy it completely, or that they are supplemented by AirBnB which requires a certain amount of work.

The feeling of "the autumn term" has always been one that I've liked.  I've postponed it a bit this year, with our trip to Napoli - but when I come back I will be ready for lots of good new things.

All Change

Several things have happened.

Firstly, an enlightened agent has asked for a full read of the book formerly known as The Malice of Fairies
He is still reading it, I will not worry about it until October.

Secondly, I decided not to go to "The Festival of Writing" because the actual cost was £490 plus train fares and taxis and was just too much.  Also my gut was telling me not to go, and the fact that an agent was having a full read was enough to console me.

Thirdly, I decided that even if the agent turned down the book, I would not self-publish in the autumn.  This came about in a conversation with Tara, she said "your heart's not in it" and this is true, it's always been a sort of desperate measure... something I felt I must do to earn some money and justify my existence.

The upshot of these three things is that I have, miraculously, felt I can write again, that it's worthwhile.  I started to look at all my notes on the triple story book (working title The Devil's Chapel) which I started thinking about and researching and writing after my trip to Barfrestone Church at Easter.  I was delighted to find I had the beginnings of a good structure and some nice ideas about what women have wanted throughout the ages.  I'm excited.  I hope I can do it justice, marry it together and make it moving..

I intend to base the carvings on those at Barfrestone, but not to use them literally.  I don't want to get stuck, my ideas about continuing Woden worship are a little weird, but not impossible.  So I want to extrapolate from that.