Get On With It

The trick to writing a novel is, as I have discovered, and as Monty Python illustrates, just to:




This possibly seems basic, and I had a better post on the subject planned before I had some limoncello with lunch (hmm, syrupy lemony goodness; hmm, destruction of brain cells) but basically - to write a book you need to write the book.  The first draft will be crappy and bad, there will be plot lines that vanish and characters that act inconsistently, the structure will be woolly/nonexistent, but you need to get on with it until there is some sort of story in place.  The language might be repetitive, you might (MIGHT) have characters repeatedly feeling things in their stomachs or you might over use the word 'just' because it is just so easy to do so, but it needs to get written.  That is what the first draft is for.


You need to work at it rather than watch TV, or read fanfic, or waste hours on TV Tropes*, or all the other things that the mindsuck of the internet provides for your pleasure, sitting there open while you look at the writing document whose word count does not appear to be growing, which obviously has nothing to do with you.  You need to be prepared for the first draft to suck like nothing has ever sucked before, because buried amidst all of that craptastic prose is something that can be fixed and turned into the novel you have in your head.  The perfect novel that you had in mind when you first faced the blank page and started writing.

This mindset is what has bumped my word count from 7K to 21K since Monday, even though most of those words are wrong, even though I'm going to have to go back and redo this whole thing repeatedly, and even though I have no idea where the middle of the novel is going.  Even though it sucks and I'm not 100% sure I'm going to be able to fashion it into anything remotely readable.  Because I will have written something - and, at the end of the day, that is what matters.

And to prove that my MA supervisor was right and I can't be serious without undercutting it somehow:



* This happened on Friday.  I lost hours.  But I do now have spoilers for Criminal Minds s5 which = yay, as I was not happy with my DVDs for ending where they did with s4.  Want s5 on DVD or for Living to reshow it right naow, if only for Hotch doing what I now know he does while passing the Despair Event Horizon.


And the formatting on this entry is screwed, even though I've tried to fix it.  Blast.

"I'm in shock - look, I have a blanket"

I was going to attempt to write an in depth, thoughtful post on planning/outlining versus winging it/praying it all holds together, but that will take time and I managed to slice my left index finger with a bread knife yesterday* so typing is hard/painful. So, instead, some (short) random:

- The fabulous Stephanie Perkins is doing a giveaway on her blog for her novel, Anna and the French Kiss (link is to the UK Amazon page, because you can get it from there). Even though I have pre-ordered, I am still after a free copy, hence this promo of the giveaway (could that be put any more bluntly? Ah well).

- I have written more of my book, though that is going to slow down owing to painful finger/my stupidity.

- Mark Reads Harry Potter is made of awesome. Partly because it just is, but mostly because he hasn't read the books before and he doesn't know many spoilers so it's a bit like going back to when you first read them - with the added joy/pain of someone loving characters you know JKR is going to kill without the knowledge of their fate.

- Also awesome: picspam from BBC's Sherlock. I had not known Benedict Cumberbatch was so pretty until this aired. I did however know that Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss were creative gods.

* Why yes I am a clumsy idiot who would make Bella Swann fear for my safety - well, maybe not that bad, but it was still an act of stupidity.

Bad lazy type (for which I blame others)

I won NaNo, yay! I have done nothing since then - er, boo! Yes, boo me. Turns out changing the sort of scrappy, caffeine-fuelled, muddled draft I created during NaNo takes some doing, especially when subsequent thinking makes you want to change the entire plot, add POVs, alter subplots, mess about with what I thought were fixed ideas - generally rip the entire thing to pieces and then stare at the remains with hollow eyes while clutching a glass of wine and wondering how it happened.

Have been procrastinating like crazy, pondering such important issues as

1) should I start a book blog? My thoughts on books I like tend to be confined to "it was awesome/lovely/I can't put it down even though I've finished it" and on those I hate along the lines of blistering rants ending in "how did this get published?!?!? How!?!?!"

2) should I get a livejournal? This is purely for the usage of pretty icons

3) moving to London - actually, this was an important issue

TV has not helped. Yes, it is entirely the TV's fault that I have been watching that when I should have been writing. But there has been new Doctor Who! And Sherlock, which was unbelievably good. I think I blame Stephen Moffat for this, as he was responsible for both of these.

Basically: I have been a lazy procrastinating type, and all that needs to change. That is my Half Year Resolution.

Achievement = smugness

I won NaNo! For the first time ever, I have won NaNo! Yay, go me, etcetera.

Off to recover.

"such a fanciful, troublesome creature"

Watched the first episode of the new Emma on iPlayer last night. Still not sure what I think. It's beautifully shot, the actors are good, the music is nice, and there are bits that are very close to Emma but...I'm just not sure. For the first ten minutes I was getting annoyed and texting a friend who had recommended I watch it, because I a) couldn't work out why Knightley was narrating* and b) wasn't sure why they were presenting it as if Emma, Frank Churchill and Jane Fairfax were all entwined by destiny OMG. I half-expected an evil sorcerer to turn up and curse them or for a dragon to start spouting about how they were, er, three sides of the same coin (I may have watched too much Merlin).

Once I got past the opening ten minutes and on to the part that is actually the book it improved. I did think Emma's taking up of Harriet Smith suggested that she found her more than just platonically attractive, and there were occasions when Emma looked ready to strangle her, but otherwise that was done quite well. The whole thing with Mr Elton is greatly improved knowing he is Justin from The League of Gentlemen. And Johnny Lee Miller wasn't as gratingly bad as Mr Knightley as I was expecting (I based my prior opinion solely upon the film of Mansfield Park).

I will watch ep2, but I'm still not sure how I feel about the whole thing. I am, however, hoping that we get Mrs Elton riding a donkey. I want to see that.

Other points:

- Mr Elton's hair is as well styled as his counterpart in Clueless, so it turns out there was hair gel in Regency England.

- When Mr Weston said he always carried a spare umbrella in Spring weather I imagined him lurking down country lanes waiting for unsuspecting young women to be caught in sudden rain showers.

* I know he's always watched over Emma and is very aware of what she does, but that got interpreted as slightly creepy in my head.

50 'new' books in 2009

Challenge I set myself at the beginning of the year: to read 50 books I'd never read before. As the list below shows, I have fallen far of this target (and I have two and a half months to catch up, right...). I have read over 50 books, but some of those are of the leisurely, comfort, repeat read type and I don't count those; that's me being lazy.

01. Lord John and the Hand of Devils - Diana Gabaldon*

02. Twilight - Stephenie Meyer

03. Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist - Rachel Cohn & David Levithan

04. Naomi and Eli's No Kiss List - Rachel Cohn & David Levithan

05. The Thursday Kidnapping - Antonia Forest

06. The No 1 Ladies' Detective Agency - Alexander McCall Smith

07. Gingerbread - Rachel Cohn

08. Shrimp - Rachel Cohn

09. Cupcake - Rachel Cohn

10. Homicide: A Year on the Killing Streets - David Simon

11. The House That Jack Built - Guy Adams**

12. Into the Silence - Sarah Pinborough**

13. Bay of the Dead - Mark Morris**

14. Silverfin - Charlie Higson

15. My Family and Other Disasters - Lucy Mangan

16. Death in a White Tie - Ngaio Marsh

17. Artists in Crime - Ngaio Marsh

18. Hopscotch & Handbags - Lucy Mangan

19. And Then There Were None - Agatha Christie***

20. Silksinger - Laini Taylor

21. Consequences - assorted but James Moran = dude**

22. Lips Touch - Laini Taylor

23. Private - Keep Out! - Gwen Grant

24. Peril at End House - Agatha Christie

25. Ballet Shoes - Noel Streatfeild

26. The Big Four - Agatha Christie

(updated 17/10/09)

I am not even halfway through. I may review some of these, though. As another form of procrastination.

EDIT 17/10: over halfway through. Hurrah.

* Although the only short story in this collection I hadn't read before was 'Lord John and the Haunted Soldier'

** Yes, these are Torchwood tie in books. Yes, I admit to reading those. Yes, I am pissed off about the events of 3.4.

*** I actually read my mum's copy, which has the original title and the most politically incorrect cover I've ever seen.

Book addiction

Goodreads is far too addictive, could easily waste hours on there adding books (like all my Terry Pratchetts, which I've just done) or playing the trivia game (which shows that I've gleaned a good working knowledge of books I've never read - how to blag your way through an English degree).

But then I get wondering about some books which I'm not adding, or books which I should add as some sort of "well, I *own* it even if I haven't *read* it" - on this list stick almost everything that's won the Booker in the last fifteen years, a ton of literary stuff I picked up in 3 for 2s or second hand shops (why yes I will try some Ishiguro if it's £1.50). Also other books which I should have read, either because they're classics or because they formed part of the curriculum at schools I didn't go to, or because all my friends have read them. And then I stare at my bookshelves and wonder how much stuff lurks behind the double stacking which I'd love to read but which I don't get to.

This is rambling. And yet another way to avoid getting on with The Novel of Doom (as it has now been renamed; may leave it like that, it's catchy). Have to restart whole thing from beginning, change plot, add new character, kill off a character mid-book rather than pre-book and generally look towards NaNo as a time to work on a shiny new thing. But then by about November 15th I'll be wanting another shiny new thing to work on because I'm getting annoyed with NaNo Project. Ah, fickleness.

Was going to avoid posting a video, but (slight swearing):