It’s less than a week until I’ll be running a workshop at the Bournemouth Writing Festival. I’ll be sharing my experience of winning a publication contract with Bloodhound Books after entering a pitch competition for The Secret Life of Carolyn Russell. The workshop will include tips and hints for anyone wishing to develop skills in online pitching of a manuscript. The event is a new one on the Dorset writing scene and the programme has grown considerable since the inaugural year in 2023. I’m pleased to be delivering on Sunday 28 April 2024 alongside writing friends Paula Harmon and Alice Fowler. Do check out the full programme!
Cracking on with the writing
Ever since I received a publishing contract for my dual timeline mystery The Secret Life of Carolyn Russell, I’ve been slaving over a new manuscript. It seemed completely do-able to get this latest work-in-progress shipshape before the publication schedule for book number three arrives in 2023. In October, I had nothing near a complete draft. It seems to me I approach each new novel in a different way. For the current work, I kept losing the thread of what I was doing which made me turn back to the beginning and start again. During the early months, I wasn’t sure what the spine of the story was about. But I worked my way into it and discovered one of the themes to be coercive control. Phew! That was a relief. But writing has many layers and the next priority was to ensure the three viewpoint characters had distinct voices. This is when a little comedy crept in and I discovered one of the characters to be quite humorous. (As a rule of thumb, if the writing makes me chuckle, I assume others will find it funny too.)
I’ve worked as hard as I can to complete and edit the manuscript. The next stage involves sending it to five beta readers for feedback. During my last read through, I discovered I’d used the word with 655 times. That meant I needed to get the pruning sheers out and reduce the usage considerably. Other of my high frequency words include all, now and only. Thank goodness for the find and replace function.
I’m now settling into a few days away from writing. It’s my husband’s birthday today and with my adult children home for Christmas, we visited the I Grew Up in the 80s exhibition at Dorset Museum. We also treated ourselves to breakfast in the cafe. Here are a couple of photos:
Who remembers these? (The visit also acts as research for a story I’m developing set in the 1980s.)
I will be away from my computer for much the Christmas break. On 2 January, I’m heading off to Cambodia but I’ll be back in touch again afterwards. What plans do you have for the next few weeks?
Happy holidays everyone!
The joy of an itinerant life
I’m back in Dorchester after five and a half months away. Although the weather is autumnal, I’m still feeling the buzz of summer. We had a splendid time in London, renting a room from friends and travelling into town for visits to theatres and other venues. I enjoyed Witness for the Prosecution based on an Agatha Christie short story and staged in County Hall. My grandpa worked for the London County Council until retirement and it was great to be in a grand committee room and imagine he was once there.
The one musical I saw was Dear Evan Hansen about a young man who sells his soul to Facebook. I enjoyed the show where meaningful songs and ideas around redemption provide counterbalance to tragedy. Twice we went to Holland Park Opera where free shows were offered on the steps outside the building. Here’s a photo of two performers from the opera Little Women.
Our niece sang and played during Piano Friday nights at the Tabard Inn in Chiswick.
We also did a lot of walking in preparation for our trip from Porto to Santiago de Compostela at the beginning of September. It wasn’t a proper camino as we didn’t have enough time to cover the distance but with friends we walked 15 miles each day for one week (and took three train journeys). Here are some highlights.
It’s great coming home after an extended period away to see Dorset in a new light. I’m looking forward to what the autumn has to offer.
Almost a year in pictures
It’s time to thank you for following my blog during 2021 and to wish you all the very best for the coming year. As a way to wind up events, please find some photos of our travels since release from lockdown.
Our itinerant life continues in 2022 and I look forward to sharing more of our experiences with you. In the meantime, here’s wishing you and yours all the best for 2022.
Moving on
We are packing up our house, getting it ready to let it over the spring and summer. This will leave us free to wander about the UK and we’re aiming to spend time in Edinburgh and Cambridge. Meanwhile, we’re making the most of the things Dorset has to offer. At the weekend, we went on a 17km walk through the fields and here are some of the things we saw.
Dorset is a beautiful county. Did you spot the first bluebells? In the next couple of weeks there will be carpets of blue in the woodlands. It almost seems a pity to be leaving…
Cool new photography feature
I’ve just worked out how to use a slider to compare photos. Thrilled by this discovery, I wanted to share it with you immediately. The photo on the left is the view from my writing room yesterday and the right shows this morning.
It’s so much duller today but but I’m excited by the possibilities of this new feature. Watch this space as I try to improve my photography, and explore the benefits of WordPress further.