Off to that London

Very excited about my trip to the big city tomorrow for the Messages / Your Messages launch. I have a to-do-list a mile long which has worrying things on it like - 'Pay Tax Bill' and 'Find out where this Covent Garden place is'.

I found this lovely picture of The Book on Sarah Salway's page - it's so very beautiful and so very purple.



It's available from Amazon and all proceeds go to the charity Kids Company

It's too late for me to take up the suggestion of wearing purple to match the book, I always plan well in advance what I am going to wear and cannot be moved on the subject (unless I discover a big stain down the front / can't do up the zip/ realise it makes me look like a frog).

I am reading my 'message' at the do and am third on - after published author Caroline Smailes!! I'm a wee bit nervous but I'm taking my step-sister along for support and she is going to make sure I don't succumb to the vodkas beforehand. Talking of which, it is the last day of my not-drinking month tomorrow but I think I may permit myself a premature tipple (or two) after I have read my piece, rather than waiting 'til midnight.

OK I've got a to-do list to deal with and it seems to have 'Polish boots and buy some nice tights' on it which both seem unlikely before I catch my train in the morning.

A carpet of books

The books are off the shelves and I can't see the living room floor anymore.

We had a lovely time last night making piles of As, Bs, Cs etc . So many 'H's (a shared student obsession with Robert Heinlein) and 'P's (Still love Terry Pratchett) and only one U (Barry Unsworth - Sacred Hunger which I read lying in a river in the Sumatran jungle while My Man was in bed being horribly ill for three days (I know this because while clearing the shelves I found my Indonesia holiday diary)).

Lots of the books sparked off memories of what we were doing when we read them and how obsessed we were with particular authors at certain times in our lives but would we ever read them again (see Heinlein).

The fiction was pretty easy to sort - alphabetical by author (although we got a bit tired towards the end and I've just found Charlotte Gray by Sebastian Faulks filed under 'G'.)

There was some debate over the definition of a 'classic' - We have a bookshelf that only fits Penguin Classics and I made a separate pile of these to which My Man added several other books which he also deemed to be classics (yes I too loved Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance and Graham Swift's Waterland - but they don't physically fit on the shelf!)

Biggest cause of discussion was the non-fiction. I have an extensive collection of Reference books, for my work, on the shelves above my desk. They are arranged in 'most used ones nearest to hand' order. The rest of the non-fiction is scattered haphazardly around the house.

In an attempt at order I made 3 broadly grouped piles of 'Arts and Social Sciencey stuff', 'Science and Nature and Machines' and 'Everything Else'. I went to make a cup of tea and came back to find thirty-six separate piles, labelled 'Environmental Ecology', 'Political Science', 'History-Modern', 'History-Medieval', 'Meteorology', 'Popular Science', 'Travel-Britiain', Travel-Abroad, 'Maps' etc, etc.

I trained and worked as a librarian years ago but never really got into the whole fine tuning of cataloguing (tending instead towards the, admittedly frustrating, 'it's a big blue book with silver writing on the spine - you know the one', approach.) It was one of the reasons for my career change (that and an offer to work as a gardener in Tuscany). Anyway, I think My Man missed his true vocation. I'll be getting him some Dewey Decimal stickers for his birthday.

Didn't find that missing library book but have tagged seven books that I am prepared to part with via Bookmooch. If you haven't already discovered this site its worth a look. Its seems a great way of exchanging books (and cheaper in the long run than Amazon Marketplace).

Now, where has he put Worms Eat My Garbage? I'm sure it should be at 631.875 (Composting), but as he is very fond of our friends in the wormery I had better check under 636.08 (Pets), where I have a horrible feeling I might also find Hugh Fearlessly Eats it All

(only joking Hugh we love you really).

This is MeMe

Just got back from a lovely weekend in Scarborough to find I had been tagged for my first ever meme, appropriately enough by Scarborough lass Karen.

The small print: Link to the person that tagged you. Post the rules on your blog. Share six non-important things/habits/quirks about yourself. Tag six random people at the end of your post by linking to their blogs. Let each random person know they have been tagged by leaving a comment on his/her website.

1. I was once a security guard on the Royal Yacht Britannia and had to search the Governor of the Bank of England’s briefcase. I wasn't allowed to step out from behind my desk because I was wearing Doc Martens boots, the only black shoes I owned

2. The eaves of our house are stacked with boxes of wool and felting fleece. I have two linen baskets and six bin liners filled with fabric and items of clothing that 'just need a bit of alteration'. Behind my desk there is a rag rug that I began two years ago. I sometimes feel haunted by my unfinished projects.

3. Whenever I write anything autobiographical my Nana turns up in it. She even features, thinly disguised, in my novel. She was an artist rather than a writer but she was a big influence on my creativity

4. I am overexcited by the prospect of spending the next couple of evenings with My Man taking all the books off our bookshelves and then putting them back again. The idea is to remind ourselves of which books we've got and where they are, find all those books that belong to other people and should really be returned, track down a couple of long overdue missing library books and eventually create some kind of order on the shelves so we won't have to go through the whole process again in the near future (I used to be a librarian and while I normally welcome randomness into my life I get very frustrated when I know I've got a particular book but just can't find it.)

5. I live in the hills miles away from both the east and west coast, but would love to live by the sea and eat fresh fish every day

6. I used to hold the record at school for the 100m sprint and raced at county level. I now run much more slowly over much longer distances, don't take part in races and hold no records whatsoever.

I've checked through all the blogs I read regularly and I don't think you've had this one Spiral Skies, so consider yourself tagged.

Introducing...

Eric.

He's my Pixie of Self Doubt (yes I know he looks friendly but there's a water pistol lurking in that bouquet). He lives under my desk and sometimes under my bed, he has even been known to lurk in the library (in the 'How to Write Properly' books section) and on trains (talking loudly into his mobile phone about 'wannabe writers who haven't got any original ideas and over use semi colons ;)

I had him locked in his box on Tuesday and had a blinder of a writing day. This included completing and sending off my first ever submission to Mslexia. Whether they like it or not it feels like an achievement to have done it.

Our writing group met in the evening and we had a guest writer, the playwright Linda Marshall-Griffiths (listen to her play broadcast on Radio Four last Friday under the name Jude Hughes). It was very generous of her to share her wealth of experience with us. She has such an obvious passion for writing that we couldn't help but be inspired. She did some workshop stuff with us that worked really well. So well that the next day I revisited what I had written, edited, tweaked etc and found I had - a poem! I'm not a great one for writing poetry, I tend to go all slushy and limp. But this one is different, it's actually quite edgy and creepy.

Eric managed to escape yesterday afternoon and told me with glee that my writing was irrelevant nonsensical chatter with no meaning or purpose. Not wanting to wallow in such feelings I distracted Eric with my poem (I have no expectations of being a poet so he can say what he likes about it) and did some sewing instead. I found a dress at the secondhand market in town that was so gorgeous - and only cost £4 -that I bought it even though it was two sizes too big. I spent last night tucking and turning, and voila! - a dress fit for a trip to the wine bar with my mates tonight. (Eric knows nothing of the cunning art of dressmaking so has no say in the matter).


Right Eric back in your box, I've just remembered some good things about my novel and need to get back to them before I forget.

A bridge too far

Lots of excitement this morning as the rivers that run through our little town threatened to overflow their banks. Much squealing in the coffee shop as we watched the water rise outside, followed by a race to the river to see it in close-up.

When we arrived we found policemen guarding the bridge, which was being washed by three foot high waves and had been declared unsafe. There were flashing lights and machinery on the other side, where in a an unflood-related incident a big blue lorry had managed to reverse itself into the river.

The local press were there of course interviewing all the key players, well me and my coffee mates actually.

"How has the flooding affected you today?"
"Well I was rather hoping to get to the library but the bridge has been closed off."
"Can I quote you on that?"

It was only afterwards that I had a chilling premonition of this week's front page: an apocalyptic photo of cars, beloved possessions and bedraggled kittens being washed downstream and the caption: "Local resident Sarah Dunnakey is cross that she couldn't get to the library."

And knowing my luck they'll spell my name right this time.

On a more literary note, I am enjoying dipping into The Assassins Cloak: an anthology of the world's greatest diarists. It was a present from my brother a couple of Christmas's ago and I've just got round to discovering how fab it is. For each day there are four or five brief entries from the diaries of all sorts of people - Pepys (of course), Andy Warhol, Kafka, Che Guevara, Adrian Mole (yes I know he's not real) and Mary Shelley, to name a few. Its fascinating stuff. Thanks bruv.

Also verdict is in from My Man on chapters 1 and 2 of omg - it's funny, makes complete sense and left him wanting more (a bit like me then!)

What a sweetheart, hem-hem I mean completely objective editor person. He also said there were too many names at one point, but "that was typical of a woman's book and men aren't interested in that sort of thing." I re-read, he was right (about the too many names), so I cut some of them out (some of them even started with the same letter - curses!), just in case women aren't interested in that sort of thing either.

Editing like a reader who wants to be a writer

Gosh this editing lark is hard work. I especially don't like it when I get to a paragraph that I have circled in red, with the words 'completely rewrite' in the margin. Not particularly helpful. I am feeling inspired however by Reading like a Writer by Francine Prose. She encourages you to read one word at a time, to appreciate the effort that has gone into choosing the right word. I am trying to apply this to my editing, which is possibly why it's taking me so bloomin' long.

What am I editing at this stage? (well I'm trying to reduce the number of times my heroine throws questions into the air for one.) I'm working on the first three chapters of my novel ,as yet untitled but with a crappy working title that I shall reduce for blogging purposes to omg. They are drafted but need to be seriously edited before I submit them to My Man for an early critique. I just want him to give me the answers to a few basic questions such as 'Does this make any sense at all? Have you got a clue what is going on? Have I lit the fuse yet? Have you already sussed the how, what and when of the 'bomb'? Is she still asking too many questions? Is this a really bad idea?

I want him to be totally honest (while bearing mind that I have PMT, a rotten cold and another 14 days to go before I can have a drink). Is this a worse idea than asking your partner to teach you to drive?

A new leaf

Or rather, a newsletter from Leaf Books. As cheery as ever it really brightened up this rainy morning. I really would recommend subscribing, for its sheer jolliness as well as its informative content.

Amongst other things it announced the new Leaf Microfiction comp, with a deadline of 31st May which leaves plenty of time to come up with some ideas.

After the initial joy of the above newsletter, a perusal of my favourite blogs and a new post on my own blog my day went all slow and sluggish. I spent nearly four hours not doing very much at all and not significantly adding to my word count. My Man responded to my post-lunchtime moan with one of his favourite solutions to most things -'Well go for a run then’. I knew it made sense and the rain had stopped, so go for a run I did. By the time I had reached the end of the street I had remembered that the central idea for my novel was ‘pretty damn good’(actually I think I used the less modest phrase ‘bloody brilliant’) and that yes I could carry it off, after half a mile my characters were spouting reams of dialogue in my head and by the time I got back I had to use my last few bars of energy to race to the computer and type it all in before it disappeared back into the running ether. Result - over 1,000 new words. I think there is a moral in there somewhere- something along the lines of ‘get the running bit done earlier in the day.’

I was thinking about the lovely Sylvia’s observation (see ‘quote of the week’) about self doubt. There is something about running that makes you believe in yourself again, as if by getting off your bum and moving your legs a bit more quickly than normal you have proved you are not a complete physical loss and it then transfers in your head to other aspects of your life. That’s how it works for me anyway. Anyone got any other examples of what works for you??