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March

In MARCH I will be writing a Western.

I’d like the main protagonist to be an older gent, based on a lovely chap who used to come into the library and take out 12 westerns at a time, even though he’d read them all hundreds of times already.

Maybe he sees his day to day life in a slightly schemey bit of a Scottish town as a Western? Maybe he goes back in time to the Wild West, either in reality or in a dream?  Could it be a sort of western style set up in the future, like Firefly/Serenity?

I don’t want to spend too much time researching the actual history of the wild west, I just want it to be a fun, colourful, ripping read!

It has been suggested that I call my old gent Victor McGlynn, and that ‘The Shootist‘ and ‘Once Upon a Time in the West‘ would be good films to watch.  And I’ve been told to listen to Ennio Morricone during the writing process to get me in the mood.  I’ve also got a copy of Salty’s Gold to read – let’s hope it lives up to the blurb.

(Old Salty Parker rose into town every week with his little poke of gold dust and left it at the bank. He was the last of the miners at Willard’s Creek and the source of his gold was a mystery that many folk wanted to solve…)

But I need a bit more to go on.  What other western movies should I watch for inspiration? Where should my story be set – the actual wild west or somewhere totally different? Who are the other characters?  Is it a revenge saga?  Who needs avenging?  How?  When?  Are there horses?  Or bandits?  Or ponchos?

As ever, you can leave a comment below, through twitter, or on facebook.  Or you can send me a good old fashioned email – ali.george85@yahoo.com

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Still Here!

Hello.

I haven’t updated in ages, for two reasons.  First of all I wasn’t writing anything for days at a time and I was too embarrassed to tell you.  Well, I was writing loads actually – there was an article about libraries, one about trying to make it as a freelance journo, and one about what it’s like trying to get into theatre directing; as well as assorted posts on my other blogs – but it none of these were my murder mystery novel.

Then last weekend, I wrote so much my hands nearly exploded.  That meant I didn’t really have time to blog, although there was some very mundane tweeting about how many words I had got down.  Between Saturday and Monday I did 23,722 words in order to catch up with my word count target.  Re-reading and editing that lot is going to be interesting…

Anyway, now that chicken sitting duties are over I have gone back to work four days a week, which I hope will help to get me into some semblance of a writing routine.  Assuming I get some suggestions for March’s Western – thus far it has been suggested that the protagonist be called Victor McGlynn, which I rather like, but other characters / plot devices / etc are still wide open.  Feel free to leave a comment below or on the facebook page if you’ve got any further ideas!

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How Twitter Helps

The @12books12months twitterfeed is a terrifying and time consuming place.  I follow authors, agents, publishers and book bloggers from all over the world and am constantly bombarded with links to articles about writing, publishing and blogging.  Interesting, but overwhelming.

This evening I’ve read a few that stood out, so I thought I would link them.

10 Ways to Tell You Have Author Potential is fairly self explanatory title.  I seem to tick some, but not all of the boxes.

How to Become A Better Writer is one of many posts that appear almost daily on this theme, and covers the bases as well as any.

The Influence of Anxiety is the most interesting of the three, because rather than give hints and tips on what we ought to be doing it focuses on what a lot of authors actually do, including taking ages over one tiny bit of writing, procrastinating, and comparing oneself to everyone else and coming up short (easier than ever before thanks to twitter, facebook and blogging).

Meanwhile, another #WIP

April 28th

Festival of Floralia begins today.  We’re having more games in the Circus Maximus to celebrate, at which the people will be showered with beans.  My idea.  It’ll be really funny to watch, but also they won’t mind, because they’re being given free food.  Brilliant.

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Oops

Slightly too long for a #WIP (a thing on Twitter where you post 140 characters worth of a work in progress to get feedback) so thought I would post it here.

Just heard that my order to let Sextus Papinius go was somehow misconstrued as “execute him.”  Honestly, communications in this place are a nightmare. I’m not being racist, but I think it’s because there are slaves from all over the empire and frankly a lot of their Latin is absolutely appalling.  Anyway, long story short, Papinius is no more.

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A Day In The Life of Book One

I have recently decamped from Edinburgh to Perthshire, to house-sit for my parents and write Caligula’s Blog in idyllic rural surroundings at temperatures of -6.

The main reason my folks need someone around is because they keep chickens.  Poultry cannot be left to their own devices, as they are deeply stupid.  So here I am, working my way through the freezer, and popping outside every ten minutes to see whether they’ve gone round the front of the house so I can steal their eggs like an ornithological Fagin.  When I do this, I’m supposed to leave replacement eggs so they don’t get suspicious of the vanishing act and go find somewhere else to lay.  But sometimes, they come round and catch me red handed!  Awkward.  More often though, they haven’t gone round the front at all, so I step out of the door and they cluster round me, cooing ineffectually, whilst I  perform a circuit of the front garden, hands in pockets, nonchalance personified.

A writing day in Blairgowrie, then (based on my experience of one day):

9.30ish – Wake up and free the chickens from the coop.

10.30ish – Settle down to write maybe 1000 words of Caligula’s Blog.

11.30ish – Go outside on egg watch.

11.40ish – Come back inside, eggless.  Check email, facebook, twitter.

11.45 – Polly Toynbee has joined Twitter!  And she got like 900 followers in her first ten minutes!  That’s how popular I want to be…

12.30 – Realise I’ve been faffing about on the net for ages.  Go and make a coffee.

12.35 – Looking outside I can see two of the three chickens out back.  One is digging a hole.  Surely this is enough of a distraction for me to carry out operation egg theft?!

12.36 – Other chicken still on guard duty.  Dammit.

12.40 – Digger chicken is sitting in the hole it has just made, not doing much.  Looks happy enough though.

12.45 – Decide I must do the dishes.  NOW!

13.00 – I should shower.

13.30 – Go to co-op for milk.

14.00 – Make lunch.

14.20 – Hear knocking at patio door and am faintly freaked out as I would have seen a visitor go by one of the windows…  Turns out to be fowl play.

14.30 – Settle to write another 1000 words.

15.30ish – Egg watch success!  Ali: 1, Chicken: 0!

15.40ish – Tea/coffee/Twitter/email

16.40ish – Chickens go to bed.  Shut them away so nothing can eat them.

17.00 – Drive to Perth to collect boyfriend from grandparents.

21.30 – Return and watch many episodes of South Park.

23.30 – Discover Dragon Wars on SyFy.  It’s pretty bad, so we fall asleep on the couch.

So there you go, that’s the writing process in action.  Stealing eggs and social networking.  Caligula would be proud.  Perhaps tomorrow will be more productive…

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Verification

I want to link you to this post on Janette Currie‘s BookRambler blog because it explains the thinking behind NaNoWriMo, which is exactly the same as the thinking behind 12 Books in 12 Months.  Essentially, I read it and felt validated, and wanted to bookmark it in a forum other than Twitter.

In summary, if Frederick Forsyth and Ian Rankin reckon a first draft in a month is plausible, who are we to question them?  Nobody, that’s who.  Bring on the twelve.

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