As usually happens as I approach the end of the year I’m beginning to take stock of my accomplishments over the last twelve months. And, as usual, I find I’ve come up rather short of the goals I’d set myself.
I gave myself 23 New Year’s Resolutions for this year and entered them all into BigLifeDiary (henceforth referred to as BLD) along with potential Life Score Points (LSPs). (This is something that no one should ever be proud of – in fact just knowing what I’m talking about here should make you feel vaguely ashamed of yourself)
I shall now go through the list and see how I’ve done.
Write every day – Woeful. I haven’t entered a score in BLD for since 8th February, and yet I’ve accrued -332 LSPs.
Finish “The Motley Life of Edison Swift“ – Well I have started it, so not an abject failure. But I have only written the first 2 chapters. And the second chapter is garbage.
Finish “The Book of Lies” – I have done nothing with this since 2014’s NaNoWriMo
Finish “Sunnyside Manor” – It was a long shot that I’d even get to this, and lo and behold I didn’t
Finish “The Boy Who Solved the Centurion Code” – See 4.
Finish “The Smiths” – See 5.
Eat Sensibly – I think I started out well this year and did lose about a stone and a half. However, my more recent diet has been comedic in its unhealthiness.
Get weight down to 13 stone – HAhahahahahahahahahahhahaha hahaha ahahhahahahahhhahhaahahahahhhahaha.
Read a serious article from Time, EDGE, New Scientist or National Geographic every week – How hard could this have been? Too hard.
Read a novel every week – This I may have come close to doing. But it’s a bit of a cheat to have it on the list. And I haven’t reviewed and rated them on BLD so I have no record of my reading exploits.
Read a non-fiction book every week – Hopeless.
Run 500 miles a year – I did try for a week or so, but to average 10 miles a week is going to be hard…
Learn conversational Greek – I did listen to a lot of audio lessons but it appears my mind may not be compatible with Greek.
Do something interesting with the familyat least once a month – I may have come close to achieving this, but again I haven’t recorded what I’ve done.
Win the Prem at Lings – This is quite a specific resolution and incomprehensible to anyone unlucky enough to be reading this who doesn’t know me well. But it just means I have to win the top league at my local squash club. I used to do it regularly, but the standard has improved exponentially and now I’m lucky to even get into that league… So, for once, I can honestly say that I tried my hardest to accomplish this.
Ride 2500 miles a year – I hardly even tried with this. I probably rode 50 miles in total. 10 of them up Mont Ventoux.
Go to the gym every week – I did join a different gym in order to encourage my better half. So now I am a member of two gyms, when in reality I only need the facilities of 4% of one gym.
Do exercises before showering – This was simple. Do a few press ups and sit ups before I have my shower whenever I had it during the day. I was really good for almost 6 months, but inexplicably stopped. And never restarted.
Don’t play computer games or unduly procrastinate on the Internet before I’ve done reasonably well with this list – This year I have bought an XBox One and a PS4. I’m on level 2015 of Candy Crush and I have an awesome village in Clash of Clans. So you tell me… Success?
Make a daily (realistic) TODO list every day. And attempt to do the things on it – This is good advice, but I have found that I’m much better at making lists than I am at doing stuff.
Cook more – Again, this started pretty well, but recently I’ve been mostly eating takeaways…
Work harder at Superchips – This is a bit moot now that I don’t work there full time, and I can say I’m definitely more efficient with my time when working.
Do not not do something that I should and can do at the time – Or don’t put off til tomorrow what you can do today. I have tried and I know this will give me more time in the long run, but I guess I’m just lazy…
So, I have done… poorly.
However, with this new blog post in over a year comes a new plan. I have a new calendar app which allows me to break the day down into a timetable like I had at school. So hopefully a more rigorous approach to time management might remind me to do what I should be doing and nudge me in the right direction.
E.L. Doctorow – We’re both looking in the same direction! (But his forehead is too big)
“Writing a novel is like driving a car at night. You can see only as far as your headlights, but you can make the whole trip that way.” — E.L. Doctorow
With that in mind, I started this year’s NaNoWriMo. I had a quick look at a map, decided on a destination and set off.
To begin with I was trundling along a wide dual-carriageway. I kept to the inside lane as there were a lot of NaNoWriMo drivers speeding past me, some of them churning out word counts that led me to believe their cars were powered by rockets rather than an internal combustion engine. But I was not worried, I had a good idea of where I was going.
After the intial fuel of optimism had begun to run out, I turned off the main road and found a service station where I filled up with determination. I set off into the night again and joined a nice country road, easily wide enough for two juggernauts to pass. I drove on, perhaps even faster than before, and a real belief began to swell up inside me.
Then, as I approached a critical juncture, it began to rain and the range of my headlights reduced to barely more than a few metres. They began to pick out plot-holes in the road and I felt isolated by the darkness. I took a few turns and ended up bouncing along a single lane track with no idea where I was.
I crawled onwards, barely moving, sensing that if I went too far in the wrong direction I’d ruin the journey so far.
I pulled the map out of the glove compartment and tried to work out where I’d gone wrong. I traced my finger along the dual carriageway and found the fuel station where I’d filled up. But from there it was difficult to make out. Huge blobs of concept seemed to be obscuring the details, making it almost impossible to work out how to proceed.
I pulled out a set of pens and neatly, perhaps over dramatically, highlighted the route I’d taken so far. Taking out any slight wobbles there might have been on the original journey and adding a couple of detours which hopefully will improve it.
Unfortunately, I’m still there. Stuck in this field of despondency. In front of me the road, such as it is, disappears into a quagmire. To either side are thick hedgerows which seem to offer no way through. The only way to continue seems to be to retrace my steps, but that’s not in keeping with the ideology of NaNoWriMo.
I pull out another, smaller map and begin to plan another journey. This one is more of a ramble that I can walk all the way round in a morning. Yes. I can see the route of this one much more clearly.
Now I’ve finished my wander, hopefully I’ll put the keys back into the ignition and the car will burst into life. Perhaps a bridge has been built over the swamp, or a tractor has made a hole in the hedge, or…
There is a beautiful valley nestling in the foothills of some faraway mountains. Waterfalls cascade down from the alpine forests that overlook the spectacular crags. The silver river meanders past orchards and lush green meadows, leading eventually to a tiny, picturesque village called, let’s say, Rimbleflimpleton.
The villagers are a happy bunch. None of them are rich, but no one wants for anything because there is enough of everything to go around and each family has a specific job to do. The Smiths do all the blacksmithing, the Bakers do all the baking, the Coopers do something or other, and the Shepherds look after all the sheep.
They were a nice family, but nobody really liked Mr Shepherd. At the village meetings he would always want to talk about things that nobody else was bothered about. They might want to organise the summer festival, while he would argue that the festival money should be spent on a higher wall around the fountain. If they wanted to upgrade the Christmas lights for the enormous tree they had every year, he would try to convince them to improve the electrical wiring. And so on.
It was the same at home. All the children in the village had huge climbing frames in their back gardens. All except young Peter Shepherd. The only toy he was allowed to play with was a woollen blanket and that was taken off him when his father found him trying to make a swing with it.
“It’s just too dangerous, Peter. You could end up strangling yourself.” His father had said.
The only time Peter was allowed to do anything unsupervised was when he was carrying out his duties looking after the sheep. Out in the Lower Pasture he was far enough away from the village for his father not to know what he was doing. Sometimes his friends would come out and they’d play football. Other times he’d just run around blindly, enjoying the mindless danger of not looking where he was going. He’d often fall over and roll down the hillside. He couldn’t help laughing when he did that.
“Dad? Can I take the sheep into the Middle Pasture tomorrow? The sheep haven’t got much fresh grass left on the Lower Pasture. I think…”
Mr Shepherd’s face turned an ashen white. “No! You must never go into the Middle Pasture. It’s dangerous there because that’s where the Badgerwocky lives. And it’ll hear the sheep and come and eat you.”
“Oh. Right. OK.” Peter said.
The next day when Peter was supposed to be watching the sheep, his friends came out to play football. And while they were playing three of the fattest sheep wandered out of the Lower Pasture.
A while after his friends had gone home, he noticed the missing sheep. They had left an easy trail to follow because they were so fat. Peter realised immediately that they’d escaped to the Middle Pasture where the Badgerwocky lived.
Peter was frightened. He didn’t know what to do. He would be in serious trouble if he went back to the village without the three fattest sheep but, on the other hand, he didn’t want to be eaten by a monster.
After a few minutes he decided to climb the tallest tree where he’d be able to see into the Middle Pasture. He clambered up, hauling himself from branch to branch. He’d never been allowed to climb a tree before because his father had told him it was very, very dangerous.
When he got to near the top, he looked to the north and saw the Middle Pasture. He had expected to see burned bushes where the Badgerwocky had breathed its fiery breath and huge gouges in the ground where it had raked its terrible claws.
But it was not like that. It looked beautiful. Lovely long grass swayed beneath some little apple trees. A stream trickled down from the Upper Pasture, babbling through the meadowsweet and daisies. And three sheep grazed in the centre, untroubled and peaceful.
Peter watched. He expected a tornado of whirling claws and gnashing teeth to hurtle across the meadow and devour the sheep, but nothing happened. Peter waited for a while. Still nothing happened.
Eventually he climbed down the tree and crept into the Middle Pasture. The sun was beginning to touch the high mountains surrounding the valley, and the shadows were lengthening. It suddenly occurred to him that perhaps the Badgerwocky only came out at night.
Each of his footsteps seemed to echo around the valley, ricocheting off the high cliffs like a gunshot. Surely, if the Badgerwocky was anywhere near by it would come swooping down and gobble him up.
But still nothing came.
When he reached the stupid sheep they greeted him with loud bleats of happiness. He tried to quieten them down and herd them back to the Lower Pasture. Reluctantly, noisily and slowly the sheep made their way back.
Peter was dripping with sweat when they finally set foot back onto the short grass of the Lower Pasture even though the night was turning cool. He rounded the rest of the flock up and hurried back to the village.
It was almost fully dark by the time he got back. His friends saw him first and ran up to meet him.
“Where have you been?”
Peter was so relieved to be back he could barely speak.
“Three of the sheep wandered up onto the Middle Pasture and I had to rescue them.”
“Rescue them?” Gregory said. “Rescue them from what?”
“From the Badgerwocky! It lives there and it eats people.”
There was a moment’s silence and then his friends burst out laughing.
“There’s no such thing as a Badgerwocky. It’s just an old wives’ tale.”
Peter was glad it was dark because his face flushed bright red. He felt so stupid. Now he was safe within the village the idea that a flaming eyed monster prowled the Middle Pasture seemed utter mimsy.
That evening, Peter and his father had a row.
“Why did you tell me that I’d get eaten by the stupid Badgerwocky?”
“It was for your own good, Peter. The Middle Pasture is too far from the village. If something bad did happen you wouldn’t be able to get back.”
“Yes, I would. It’s not that far.”
It took a while, but Peter forgave his father for telling fibs and over the next few weeks he took the sheep regularly up onto the Middle Pasture to graze. They loved the greener grass and buttercups and clover, and got bigger and fatter than ever.
“Dad?” He asked. “Can I take the sheep onto the Upper Pasture tomorrow? There’s loads of clover and forbs in there.”
“No! You must never go into the Upper Pasture. It’s dangerous because that’s where the Fruggalo lives. And it’ll hear the sheep and come and eat you.”
“Really?”
Mr Shepherd nodded solemnly. “Yes.”
So, a few more weeks went by until Peter fell asleep on a sunny afternoon and the three fat sheep wandered out of the Middle Pasture, up the rocky path and into the Upper Pasture. When he woke up, Peter realised what had happened and climbed the tallest tree to see if he could spot the errant sheep.
Sure enough, they were munching their peaceful way through mounds of the most succulent looking grass and forbs Peter had ever seen. He watched for a while, waiting for the Fruggalo to bound across the field and rend the animals apart with its terrible tusks, claws, teeth and jaws, but nothing happened. He waited for a while. Still nothing happened.
Once again Peter clambered down the tree and crept into the Upper Pasture. His footsteps seemed to make even more noise this time and he had to creep further. The three fat sheep carried on eating when he got to them and it took all his shepherding powers to convince them to come back down with him. He was shaking with unspent adrenaline when they reached the flock and he wasted no time hurrying them all back to the village.
His friends met him on the main street.
“Peter! You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
“Oh, I think I have.” He panted. He was exhausted from rushing home. “I had to rescue the three fattest sheep from the Upper Pasture where the Fruggalo lives.”
“The Fruggalo?” Gregory said.
“Yes!”
“Peter, don’t you know? There’s no such thing as a Fruggalo.”
That evening, Peter and his father had another row.
“Why did you tell me that I’d get eaten by the stupid Fruggalo?”
“It was for your own good, Peter. The Upper Pasture is too far from the village. If something bad did happen you wouldn’t be able to get back.”
“Yes, I would. It’s not that far.”
Peter forgave his father after a while and before long he was herding the sheep between all three Pastures. They’d have breakfast in the Lower, lunch in the Middle and then dinner in the Upper. And they all got really fat.
In the Upper Pasture there was a trail that led into the Deeping Woods and although it was quite dark beneath the canopy of trees Peter could see the most beautiful cowslip growing there.
“Dad?” He asked that evening. “Can I take the sheep into the Deeping Woods tomorrow? There’s…”
“No!” Mr Shepherd roared, his face livid. “You must promise me that you will never go into that accursed wood.”
Peter snorted.
“Promise me, son. Please. Never go in there. There are Wolves.”
Peter nodded. “OK, Dad. You know best.”
The very next day Peter went straight past the Lower Pasture where the sheep wanted to eat their breakfast, and then straight past the Middle Pasture where the sheep wanted to have their lunch, and then straight past the Upper Pasture and into the Deeping Woods.
“There!” He said to his sheep. “Eat all the cowslips and clover and forbs that you like. This surely must be the tastiest breakfast you’ve ever had!”
“It certainly is!” The King of the Wolves said, as his pack tore into the sheep. “And you look like the tastiest morsel of them all.”
This is an excerpt from my NaNoWriMo effort “The Book of Lies”. I’m currently on 8387 words and I should have written about 16,666 by now.
Any thoughts, encouragements or comments are always welcome.
Before the Church sold the Old Rectory, the last person to live there in an official capacity was Reverend Woolsey. He died in 1913 and legend has it that the house and its history are what killed him.
It has always boasted a reputation for ghostly goings on. Stories of the Lonely Nun and the Headless Coachman have haunted Rothwell for centuries. Woolsey, in a bravely ironic effort to convince his parishioners that ghosts didn’t really exist, was the first and last person to research the phenomena that blighted the house.
The rectory itself dates back to the late eighteenth century and is built in the grounds of an old Benedictine monastery. Less than a mile to the north, in Rushmede Woods, you can find the ruins of what used to be a nunnery.
In the Middle Ages monasteries and nunneries were popular with parents who had to feed too many children and so often the novices didn’t really want to be cloistered inside these walls of faith and silence. And there was the terrible temptation having a group of likeminded but oppositely sexed people almost within earshot.
In those days the rules against fraternisation between the young novices were draconian and the punishments harsh beyond reasonable measure. A monk caught having romantic liaisons with a nun could be hanged while the nun would be “sent away for her own good”. It was common knowledge that being “sent away” meant drowning in the pond using the old ducking stool. Anyone found guilty of aiding and abetting the lovers would be sentenced to death by beheading.
Despite these threats and bafflements human nature sometimes wins out. And it never won out more tragically than in the case of young Martha Godwin.
Martha was of good stock, from a rich family which had close ties to the crown. She was the eldest daughter, which implies that she chose to become a nun, rather than being forced.
Reverend Woolsey uncovered two more pieces of information pertaining to Martha.
The first was her death on 31st October 1506 – the day before her twenty-first birthday. The entry in the parish records describes in grisly detail how she was found “drooned and blyted in ye old fishe pond.” Somewhat chillingly, it is marked as an accidental death.
A few days later, she was named as a “base fornicatrix” in the execution records describing the beheading of the coachman Jack Tally.
Reverend Woolsey discovered and pieced together all these facts and came up with a convincing narrative.
Martha came to the nunnery of her own free will, but before long had fallen in love with one of the Benedictine novices. He remains nameless in the court and parish documents. It’s impossible to know how long this love blossomed in secret, but it seems obvious that eventually, with the help of the local coachman, plans were made to flee from their respective cloisters and start a new life together.
Why and how these plans went awry is also a mystery, but Woolsey gives two explanations for the failure. The first is bad luck or just poor planning. The lovers were discovered and brought swiftly to the justice of the day. In his notes, he dismisses this as unlikely, due to the “continued nature of the supernatural effects perceived at dusk”. This is particularly striking given his initial, sceptical reason for his research.
The second explanation he gives is more unpleasant. Perhaps, because the monk is nameless, he reported his affair to his superiors and they set a trap for the hapless nun and the coachman. Woolsey seems to favour this because it fits with the sinister aspect of the apparition which roams near the pond every Halloween. A young nun wanders aimlessly around and around the pond. It seems fearful of the water, yet fascinated. Gradually it grows more agitated until it begins to moan its anguish into the night.
“Betrayer!” This is the only clear word amidst a babble of a thousand others that carry on the wind, sometimes as far as the house, sometimes further. It is said that if a man hears that voice on All Saints Eve he shall not live to see the morning.
The Reverend Woolsey was found dead in the bedroom that overlooks the pond on the 1st November 1913. His doors had to be broken down because they were locked from the inside and he had placed heavy furniture against them.
This is an excerpt from my NaNoWriMo effort “The Book of Lies”. I’m currently on 4200 words and I should have written about 8000 by now.
Any thoughts, encouragements or comments are always welcome.
I’ll just have a quick look to see how many pre-orders there are for “Entering the Weave”. And I’ll refresh the page a couple of seconds after I’ve arrived just in case someone has ordered one in the few seconds it took me to read the number.
At home, on my way to the bedroom or the bathroom or sometimes for no reason at all, I’ll detour into the study and have a quick look. At work, sitting in front of the computer all day, it’s hard to keep the checking down to once every ten minutes.
I have determined that this must stop. But it’s hard. And it’s made harder by the fact that I should be actively trying to promote it. With one half of my brain I’m dreaming up schemes to fool people into buying it. With the other I’m now trying to not think about it.
So, I need something to divert my attention. Some thing or things that will use my entire brain and be just as exciting as checking my progress of pre-orders…
Here is my plan. This month, October, I’m going to finish “Charlie’s Worries”. Then in November I’m going to try and break my record in NaNoWriMo. (I wrote 661 words out of the required 50,000 so it shouldn’t be hard) I’ll write “The Book of Lies”. Then in December and January I’ll get as much of “The Motley Life of Edison Swift” onto paper as possible.
During this time I shall only allow myself one hour of social media promotion and pre-order checking of “Entering the Weave” at 7pm every day.
There were a number of reasons that I started to keep this blog:
To practice this writing thing as often as possible; to give me an outlet where I didn’t need to concentrate on characterisation or plots.
To record and document my progress towards getting published, as a history for me and any other aspiring author.
To motivate myself by transforming each rejection from a personal slight into a mere statistic.
Recently, I’ve been busy.
“That’s no excuse. Writers write. You can’t publish a blank sheet of paper.”
I know. I know. I know.
But I have been busy. And I’ve still been fairly productive in the writing department, so shut your face.
I’ve now had a soul destroying 29 rejections for “The Clockwork Butterfly” and 3 submissions have timed out following an email asking me to assume the worst after a period of time. The last rejection I got was 10 days ago and so I’m beginning to assume the worst for the rest of them as well seeing as though the longest one has been out there for 91 days now…
The status of submissions for “The Clockwork Butterfly”. Notice how much procrastination has been involved automatically working out the little subtables and graph at the bottom…
Still. Nevermind. I’ve almost got Charlie’s Worries to a point where I can start submitting it, so I’ll be able to go through the whole heart rending process again. (It really helps that it’s only about 30,000 words long, rather than 150,000)
I entered Hot Key Unlocked and managed to write about 2,000 relevant words, following the brief laid out by the rules of the competition. Although I’d been thinking a lot about the plot I only put fingers to keyboard on the Sunday it had to be submitted. Of course, I knew I wouldn’t win. I’ve never written anything sexy or spicy before and found it hard to find the balance I wanted. In the end, though, I was pleased with what I produced and as the days went by I’d fooled myself into thinking that I might win.
I didn’t.
And I was disproportionately disappointed by this. After a day or so, after realising that I’d actually entered it to test my focus, rather than become the new Barbara Cartland (or more probably Dame Sally Markham) , I got things back into perspective and saw it for what it was: a good exercise and excellent writing practice.
Next up is NaNoWriMo and I’ve got a nicely absurd idea for this. I need to remember that this is another exercise to work my writing muscle and not necessarily an attempt to create a novel fit for publication. I want to try and have fun with it.
So, by the end of November I should be ready to start my next project “The Motley Life of Edison Swift”
For me, one of the hardest things about writing a story is keeping the plot under control.
Most authors seem to be able to construct a nice, orderly line which connects each scene and pushes the plot sensibly towards its resolution. When I try to do it, I feel like I’m wrestling with an uncooperative python. Whole new characters and concepts erupt from the page like pirates, hijacking my meticulously planned narrative and steering it wildly off course.
“Aha! Simon-lad! You weren’t be expectin’ a dragon to raise its head there now, were ye?” This literary usurper even has a pirate voice.
“No. Of course not. There aren’t any dragons in this story. It’s about an accountant.”
“There be dragons now! Deal with it, landlubber.”
This can be fun and I know it’s led to some good ideas – I sometimes feel like I’m discovering the story for the first time, rather than distilling the thoughts that have been clogging me up all day.
But it means that I don’t tell the exact story that I set out to tell.
I tried to write “The Clockwork Butterfly” as a simple, linear (although obviously incredibly exciting) fantasy story. Six years later it turns out that it includes a massively complex time travelling paradox (and Vikings and vuryl and the Carnival Umbretico) that will require at least seven more huge tomes to explain. It certainly, to my mind, makes the novel richer and more interesting, but it bears only passing resemblance to what I imagined when I started.
“Charlie’s Worries” seems to be taking a similar diversion at the moment too. I was thinking about this problem yesterday morning and I decided that I would use the upcoming NaNoWriMo to exercise my focussing muscle. After a few moments thought though I realised that this wouldn’t be appropriate really. NaNoWriMo celebrates the wild flights of fancy that come and encourages the writer to be as free as possible. It would be counter-productive to impose any self-imposed constraints.
So I shrugged and forgot about it for a bit.
Later, while trying to match various agents with their twitter accounts, I came across a link to Hot Key Unlocked. A writing competition sort of thing? A competition where I’m given a strict outline to work to? A competition that is absolutely what I would not usually write?
This is surely too much of a coincidence. This is the perfect opportunity to test my focus. To write the first 2,000 words of a 20,000 word novella about romance and love and sexy stuff will test me to the limit.
It’s got to be submitted by 13th October. So I’m going to give it a go.
