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?
I’m now getting back into a regular writing routine after a happy and very sociable summer. The winner of the Dorchester Literary Festival Writing Prize was announced at a launch event on Tuesday and my congratulations go to Tess Burnett for her novel The Hanging of Hettie Gale. Tess wasn’t able to attend the prize giving but alongside the other shortlisted writer, Philip Beale, I hobnobbed with celebrated Dorset writers Tracy Chevalier and Minnette Walters. On hand to announce the winner was Kate Adie. Here’s a photo of me with co-director Paul Atterbury – you might recognise him from the Antiques Roadshow.
I’ve just be told that an interview I did with 10Radio back in March has been uploaded to SoundCloud. If you’d like to tune in and hear me chatting with Suzie Grogan about all things connected withwriting This Much Huxley Knows, here’s the link.
Meanwhile, the publisher of my debut novel, Victorina Press, has been busy producing new graphics to market The String Games. I liked them so much, I thought I’d share them with you here:
That’s all my news for the minute. I look forward to catching up with you again soon.
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.
June has been packed with activities! As we only have a fortnight left until we leave for London, we’re trying to make the most of our remaining time in Edinburgh. My son visited last week and we went on a couple of outings which involved obligatory photos:
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.
Lambs in Dorchester.Several weeks in Edinburgh: mazarins at the bakery in Stockbridge, walking the railway paths, along the Union Canal, Forth Bridge, a proper bacon roll. Cambridge delights: Shakespeare in the college gardens, wild flower garden at Cambridge Botanic, winter garden at Anglesey Abbey. A long weekend in Tenby. The Mani, Greece: starts with the wonderful Mani Lit Fest, and then exploring the area. Lastly, a few days in Athens. View from a writing retreat at Cape Cornwall. A few days staying in Brick Lane.
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.
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…
With the opportunity to meet up to six other people outside from 29 March (when some of the lockdown restrictions are lifted in England) I find my diary filling up. My mum is visiting from 1 April (she’s in our bubble) and my daughter returns to Dorchester until her new-build house is ready. I haven’t seen either since December when we had a pre-Christmas celebration so I’m really looking forward to catching up. Mum and my son share the same birthday in April so there will be more celebrations before she goes home.
In other news, David and I achieved a long held ambition yesterday. The windows of our house look over water meadows to a ridge with a clump of trees. Setting off at ten o’clock, we stomped beside hedgerows and through fields to reach the trees ninety minutes later. They were not as we expected, with the evergreens hiding two huge water tanks but the deciduous tree with its many trunks and extensive roots was fascinating.
We covered 15km in total and saw other interesting things along the way.
Our plans to visit Scotland depend on further lockdown restrictions being lifted but we will definitely be heading off in the coming months. Arrangements are confirmed that will enable us to spend time in Cambridge over the summer. And now the clocks have changed to British Summer Time, things are definitely looking up.
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.
View from my window on consecutive days.
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.
Although currently in lockdown, we are allowed to take daily exercise. David and I are in the habit of running one day and walking the next. We don’t run together as he’s much faster than me. On walking days, we cover a 10km loop that takes us along Poundbury hill fort to the village of Bradford Peverell and then through Charminster on the outskirts of Dorchester to home.
Here are some of the photos I’ve taken on recent walks. From flooded fields, to early buds, lambs in the fields and cottage homes, an azure sky to rain afoot. I hope you enjoy these images of Dorset.
In a determined effort to make the most of our freedom before lockdown, David and I visited the Russell-Cotes Gallery in Bournemouth on Saturday. Formerly the home of Merton and Annie Russell-Cotes, the building was completed in 1901 and is stuffed with paintings, sculptures and mementos from overseas travels enjoyed by the couple.
Photo: Ethan Doyle White
Unlike the photo above, it was pouring with rain when we visited, as evidenced by this photo of the leaking conservatory.
Fortunately, the rest of the house is dry! Until 18 April 2021, there is a special exhibition titled Hidden Highlights Life in Lockdown which comprises eighty of the galleries ‘lesser works’ taken out of storage to replace planned exhibitions which had to be rescheduled due to Coronavirus. The gallery invites visitors to reinterpreted the paintings on display through a lockdown lens. Some of the works include hilarious captions which had me laughing out loud. What do you think of these examples?
Shall we drive to Corfe Castle to test our eyesight?
The hand washing and hand sanitising inspection was very thorough Socially-distanced dating Georgian style
The exhibition has inspired me to run a social media campaign to promote Pandemoniumalong the same lines. Here’s the first example:
the writer is a lonely hunter 