Hooray! Or something
Yesterday, just before lunchtime, I typed the last word of the second Detective Inspector McLean novel, The Book of Souls. It was 'gone' if anyone is interested. 409 pages and 118k words, for the number-freaks. I should be dancing a happy dance, but for some reason I'm not.
It's been an odd experience, writing this book. Every book is different, I guess, but this one seems somehow to have been a bit more disjointed in its birthing. I don't really have a sense of finishing the thing either, as today so far has been spent changing all the things that need changing. I'm about a hundred pages in, and reasonably pleased with what I've read so far, but I've just got to the first complete scene rewrite, hence the pause to moan about it here.
I suppose there are a couple of lessons to be drawn from the writing of this book. One is that you really shouldn't take a week off to go to Iceland when you're only halfway through. The other is that it's not a good idea to try and buy a house when you're in the middle of doing something creative. The first meant that I completely lost the thread of what I had been doing up to page 225, and so had to go back and find it. The second is a constant niggling drain on my concentration, even though nothing much has happened for at least a month on the house front. In principle, we've bought it, but we still haven't even got a date for exchanging contracts, let alone completion.
Still, it's another novel written. My tenth, as it turns out.* Over a million words in all (actually, well over a million words, could be more like a million and a half, but right now I can't be arsed opening all the relevant files to count them). So I guess I could say I've achieved something. Even if some people can polish that lot off in an afternoon;}#
All I need now is for some nice publisher to come along.
* well, if you count the travelogue Pedalling Uphill Slowly, most of which is made up, but some of which is true.
It's been an odd experience, writing this book. Every book is different, I guess, but this one seems somehow to have been a bit more disjointed in its birthing. I don't really have a sense of finishing the thing either, as today so far has been spent changing all the things that need changing. I'm about a hundred pages in, and reasonably pleased with what I've read so far, but I've just got to the first complete scene rewrite, hence the pause to moan about it here.
I suppose there are a couple of lessons to be drawn from the writing of this book. One is that you really shouldn't take a week off to go to Iceland when you're only halfway through. The other is that it's not a good idea to try and buy a house when you're in the middle of doing something creative. The first meant that I completely lost the thread of what I had been doing up to page 225, and so had to go back and find it. The second is a constant niggling drain on my concentration, even though nothing much has happened for at least a month on the house front. In principle, we've bought it, but we still haven't even got a date for exchanging contracts, let alone completion.
Still, it's another novel written. My tenth, as it turns out.* Over a million words in all (actually, well over a million words, could be more like a million and a half, but right now I can't be arsed opening all the relevant files to count them). So I guess I could say I've achieved something. Even if some people can polish that lot off in an afternoon;}#
All I need now is for some nice publisher to come along.
* well, if you count the travelogue Pedalling Uphill Slowly, most of which is made up, but some of which is true.
Comments
Now I'm just waiting to hear your book's been picked up. My fingers and toes are starting to feel a little numb...been crossed for a while now, y'know.