Writing

WINTERSTRIKE is about 8K in already, because I had to submit chapters with my outline, as is usual. Thus far, it's based on two short stories: THE AGE OF ICE, and LA MALCONTENTA (which appeared, I think, in Asimov's and Strange Horizons respectively). I didn't know whether the protagonists had anything to do with one another, but it seems that they do, in one of those odd 'aha' moments where your characters tell you things.

I have now begun writing from the POV of someone else, a reluctant alien pilot. How I write: I've done a fairly exhaustive outline, because I cannot afford in terms of time to go off the plot rails with this book. However, I've made very few notes. This seems to be one of those books that, in Graham Joyce's phrase, emerges out of smoke and lamplight: one learns about the world through writing it. Ideas are multiplying as I write (although it should be born in mind that since this is the same universe as BANNER and a couple of further short stories, I already know quite a lot about it).

I'm aiming at a steady 2K a day. I usually write a bit more, but not (generally speaking) more than 5K per day. I tend to write fast, and edit much later. I don't edit day by day and thus there is a need for the afore-mentioned outline, because books have gone wrong before now and I can't stand desperate attempts to fix them at a late stage.

Other writing: I am about to complete a short story set on Earth in this same universe, and suspect that there will be some bleed-over between that and the novel. Also, we've just done the final edit on PRECIOUS DRAGON, which goes to press very soon now.

On a wider note, the thoroughness of the W/S outline is a reflection of what has to happen generally. The last couple of years have been chaotic (for the new folk - a new relationship, the financial aftermath of T's divorce, a house move, serious injury on my part, my partner's diagnosis of and treatment for cancer, and moving the location of our business). Add to this the day-to-day stuff and it all adds up to potential chaos. We had a think about this last month and realised that, in effect, I'm still moving in. Gradually, over the course of this year, things have become a lot more organised* as I've worked out ways of more effective time-management in a new situation, and this is a continuing trend.

*Unless one adds Cat to the mix, of course. A wild and random card!

Diary of...

I know that there will be people on the f-list who are familiar with this, but in a second hand bookshop on Friday I found a cheap copy of E M Delafield's DIARY OF A PROVINCIAL LADY. I've not read this before, although my mother has a copy.

It was written in 1930 and serialised - a kind of between-the-wars Bridget Jones, only funnier (BJ annoyed me, it must be said). The PL, who is not named, lives in Devon, is married with 2 kids and a non-communicative husband, has several disastrous animals and keeps getting overdraft statements from the bank, which means that she has to sneak out and pawn things. She's also an aspiring writer and gets to go up to London occasionally and attend literary bashes, which are pretty similar to the sort of things we have now. At one, she meets a serious young man in horn-rimmed spectacles who has written a modern novel. Afterwards, her hostess takes her aside and hisses 'DID you manage to talk to him about perversion? He's really terribly amusing about it.' Alas, all anyone talks to the PL about is stag-hunting, since she lives in the country.

It reads almost exactly like someone's LJ - the contemporary equivalent, I suppose. There are obvious differences- the PL has servants, like most people of her class at the time, but the kind of maids who react with smouldering disapproval if asked to do something unusual, like bring tea for late guests, and who flounce off the next morning. The PL's small daughter, meanwhile, specialises in learning swear words.

It's written in a very dry, wry and sometimes frankly acid manner. Highly recommended.