Wednesday 21 July 2010

Pros and Cons

Hello everyone! I'm back for another blog...*waves to the empty space*.

In this month's blog, we have a series of pros and cons, which will be marked by +ve and -ve to summarise the current status of the writing dream...


+ve = my current novel is with a beta reader, who will give it lots of useful feedback and will hopefully catch any gaping plot holes in it that need major changes before heading on down to the nitty gritty of minor language usage.

-ve = she's had it for quite a while now and all that time is time that could have been used for getting down to the nitty gritty.

+ve = I've started writing a new novel...well, a very old novel re-written...the second in a trilogy that I've had in conception for about ten years. 7000 words into it now, so I think we can definitely say 'it's alive!'.

-ve = Writing something new is actually an excuse not to get down to the nitty gritty of editing my other novel...and considering that this is the sequel to a novel that is VERY unlikely to be published at any time soon, it's somewhat a waste of energy...

+ ve = I've been doing a lot of travelling. I've been to Edinburgh, land of J.K. Rowling, and I'm just back from my very first festival (Latitude), which was also a fantastic experience and my first taste of camping. Near future events include Paris and Vancouver, and voluntary work with children in August. It's all great life experience, which will be fantastic for developing me and consequently my novel writing. After drinking in a HUGE amount of comedy at Latitude, for instance, I thought: this is it, I'm going to be a comic, and my latest witticism came about on hearing that Cillit Bang is taking over Durex: BANG! And the sperm is caught! Oh dear, oh dear... (people not familiar with Cillit Bang, see their advertising campaign here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=bYYTlcdfr58).

- ve = All this is time consuming stuff and again gives me another excuse to avoid the evil editing of 'Zack'. Alas.


So, yes, it's a mixed bundle. I'm enjoying myself, of course, which is the main thing, but things like these always cost money, and on the down side, my writing's not really getting any closer to a position where it can start earning me money...