Kindle-tastic!

I have been working hard this week and as a surprise the Murph bought me a Kindle! I have been curious about these for a while now but never quite got around to getting one. It is very easy to use and the best bit is that there are loads of free books, mostly older books that have gone out of copyright.

I was delighted to find that one of my favourite childhood books was on the free book list, Swiss Family Robinson. I don’t know why I liked this book so much because reading it now it seems quite preachy but I do love the ingenuity the family shows. I seem to always have liked characters who are very self sufficient. Maybe that is why I like Evie so much in The Watchers.

I have also downloaded Dracula which is another free title. I read it when I was a student so I am looking forward to rediscovering it. Handily enough the Murph also bought a cover for the Kindle which has a built in light... so I can even freak myself out reading it in the dark…!

What do people think about the Kindle and other electronic books? Are you using them or sticking to paper? And what are your favourite classics?

Resolutions 2011!

It has been a busy week and I haven’t been near the computer as much as usual... But I am happy to say that the resolution gang met on Friday night and made our new resolutions for 2011. The funniest bit of the evening is always reading through the resolutions from the year before and seeing how successful (or unsuccessful...) we have been!

The resolutions fall under different categories. A random selection of my resolutions for this year are:

- Keep my office tidy.
- Bin all granny pyjamas!
- Do something nice for our first wedding anniversary
- Write the complete sequel to The Watchers.
- Go to Pilates classes.
- Reduce computer time – no more than 2 hours a day.

Because of this last one I am unfortunately going to have to reduce my blogging, at least in the short term. I am trying to finish writing the synopsis of book two. Things are also about to get busy at work. So for now time to knuckle down and get on with things.

Anyone else got any writing resolutions this year?

Revisions, revisions, revisions!

Just a quick post tonight as I've been busy doing some revisions, ready to send the MS to Gillie again. Thankfully they are relatively small things - I had to insert more references to a character and cut a few waffly paragraphs of Evie going places. I am going to come back to the changes tomorrow night with a fresh eye, then send it on.

It's hard in some ways because I feel too close to the writing to be objective. On the other hand it's really exciting reading the book again when I haven't read it for a few weeks. I feel like, "My God! I wrote this!!!" It makes up for the days when I've looked at it and thought, "What am I doing?!"

Ha! The rollercoaster ride of writing a book!

New Year, New Name!

This rather gorgeous picture struck me as a fresh image for a fresh name change. The blog was previously called 'Start to Finish' but I thought the title was kind of ambiguous.

So, for 2011 I'm changing it to *Notebook to Novel* - because of course this is what I'm hoping to achieve this year! Today I signed the agent's agreement and posted it off - so I am officially represented!

The blog hasn't been as writing-related of late, mostly because everything has gone quiet over Christmas at the publishing end - but I think things wake up again this week.

So, I promise that during 2011 I will keep posting honestly about the highs and lows of the winding road to publication - and any tips I pick up along the way will be passed on pronto!

What are weekends for?

Well, short answer to that is hanging out with great people in great places! If you don't recognise the pic it's the Giant's Causeway on the North Coast of Northern Ireland.

Today the Murph and I joined our friends Bill and Fiona for a nice walk along the cliff from Portballintrae to the Giant's Causeway. We stopped off for a bite to eat and had plenty of time to chat. I haven't seen them for a while so they were really excited to hear about the book. Bill especially knew that writing was one of my burning ambitions so they are both keeping their fingers crossed that I get good news in the New Year.

Resolutions 2011 - Part 1 - Take care of my back!

Ha! New Year equals a whole new set of resolutions. Have just ordered this book from Amazon, in the hope that it will help me loosen up my tight shoulders (caused by time hunched over the computer).

So first Resolution of 2011 is to do some of these yoga moves to stretch out my back and shoulders, which will hopefully help me to write nice and comfortably. I'll let you know how I get on with them!

Happy New Year all!

Ho Ho...Nooooo!

Does the pic look familiar? Yep, Northern Ireland is back in the news for all the wrong reasons. This time it's thankfully nothing to do with bombs but the fact we have no water in places! People are having to queue at standpipes.

We just got back this afternoon to find that we DO have water and we DO have heating (sort of) but there's a crack in the oil filter and it's dripping oil into the grass. At least it was - it's now dripping into the mop bucket.

The weather here was just shockingly ferocious by our standards and it makes you realise how much it affects everything. We weren't really very well-prepared for it.

When the boiler broke just before Christmas it made me think a lot about Evie's situation in The Watchers. Her life is pretty tough and there's never much money for things like heating. It's easy to write about it but actually sitting in the house with no heating has given it a whole new dimension. If I was writing those scenes now they would probably be a lot more miserable...!

Merry Christmas!

We are hitting the road shortly, back to my home town of Carrickfergus. Not sure if we'll even have heating there, never mind internet so thought I would pass on my Christmas wishes to you and yours now!

The cats will have to be loaded into the car. The picture was taken 2 years ago of our cat Charlie. She's a great wee character but she didn't like the costume much! She absolutely hates the car so as soon as we put her in she will start yowling. She will then yowl every 30 seconds for the hour and a half it takes us to get back. Yeah. Ho ho ho...

Hope you have a fantastic, peaceful, festive season wherever you are!

Good deeds!

We have a robin in our garden and today I had the great pleasure of feeding him. This lovely pic came from here. For the video I took today, click HERE!

The latest twist...

The rather cool pic comes from a website that seems to offer puzzles. As if I need any more internet distractions...!!!

I got another thousand and something words done today, after skiving a bit the last couple of days. I'm really enjoying writing Book 2 when I actually sit down and get on with it. I feel like I know the characters well and know how they will act as I'm writing them into scenes.

Today I finished chapter 4 and started into chapter 5. I loved finishing chapter 4 as one of my favourite characters came clean with a big revelation. He's absolutely gorgeous and he's one of Evie's best friends. In chapter 5 he's going to have a lot of explaining to do and he's desperately hoping Evie won't walk out the door and never come back! It's a big fork in the book that changes a lot of things - hence the picture.

I feel like I have loads of ideas for books just simmering away in the background. In the past I would stop writing one thing, getting distracted by the new idea. Now I'm being ruthless. I don't mind a bit of subconscious stewing but I've learned now that the book only gets finished if you actually sit down and finish it! So write, Debbie, write!

Lazy winter day

This gorgeous pic isn't totally unlike the view nearby today! We are pretty much snowbound - Northern Ireland is at a standstill after heavy falls last night. Thankfully today it stayed sunny and beautiful.

We went for a walk this morning and came home for hot sausage and egg toasties. Very glad we have our Christmas shopping done. The advice is to stay off the roads so aside from one foray to the garage for milk and biscuits we stayed tucked up at home. It was the perfect excuse to spend an afternoon on the sofa watching Christmas films, while the cats snoozed and the Murph read his way through the newspapers.

We were prepared this time and had plenty of food in so I spent this evening cooking roast chicken and parsnips and making chilli for tomorrow night. Also made a big pot of soup. Don't be fooled - I'm no domestic goddess...

I feel a little guilty not writing today but the Murph has told me I need a break and I didn't need much persuasion... So going to heat some mulled wine and watch Bridget Jones's Diary on TV at 9pm. Incidentally, Aitken Alexander (my new agency) represents Helen Fielding who wrote the Bridget Jones books. Was almost more impressed by that than the fact they represent Germaine Greer!

I love it when a plot twist comes together...

Okay, I'm misquoting the great man here - and showing my age to boot! The original A-Team was on when I was a kid and boy did I love it! For my eight birthday I asked my parents for an A-Team playset instead of Cindy / Barbie etc. You got the four plastic figures, complete with a tent, grenade launcher and assorted other weaponry. They humoured me...

Anyway, I digress. The reason Hannibal sprung to mind was because a plot twist came together today, a big one, which has not only brought the end of Book 2 into sharper focus but Book 3 too! I was able to write the last few lines of Book 3 at lunchtime and have a vague sense of the last chapter.

It's a tricky balance to get right. On the one hand I don't want to know too much at this stage - I've written before that it starts to feel like a 'join-the-dots' exercise when I do that. On the other hand, you have to lay down ground rules for a trilogy, especially when it's fantasy. It's making me look again at Book 1 because there may be a line here and a line there that needs changed for something to happen later.

Anyway for today, I shall just enjoy the moment... "I love it when a plan comes together!"

Just Dance!

Heh heh! Very appropriate picture for this evening. My neck has been acting the maggot recently because of driving and computing so I have been going to the chiropractor. He recommended some fun exercise to strengthen my back and shoulders. He also stuck needles in my neck - but don't worry, he does acupuncture.

So tonight, in my quest for 'fun' exercise, I purchased 'Just Dance 2' for the Wii. Stuck it on when I got home - and it was groovy! I was amazed how quickly I got out of breath messing about on it. Not sure I'm holding the controller right as it sometimes doesn't seem to register my (flailing) arm - obviously it's nothing to do with my dancing...

On a serious note I need to sort out my wretched desk posture. Any tips? Anybody tried yoga / pilates etc?

Writing and the Seasons

This picture is so cute. Just looking at it makes me feel like I'm about five years old and full of wonder at everything!

I've been thinking about weather recently and how it affects writing. I've realised that I have a tendency to start books set in Autumn, putting the characters through the trials and tribulations of Winter, finally resolving the story in Spring / Summer. I'm wondering is this a universal thing or something peculiar to me. Obviously Spring and Summer are much more hopeful and optimistic times so it makes sense to end on a high. Maybe I'm just a sadist to my characters - throwing bad weather at them as well as everything else they have to endure!

For example The Watchers has a very short timeline in its current form - the whole book occurs in a ten day period in October. Book Two begins around 6 weeks later, just a few weeks before Christmas, with the threat of the weather changing and the temperature plunging.

This probably wouldn't seem like a big deal to a reader in Canada or Switzerland or anywhere else the entire country doesn't go to hell whenever there's a bit of snowfall. Here though, it's all people are talking about. The snow and ice are bringing real misery to some areas - the novelty has long since worn off. A reader from the UK / Ireland will see a potential menace here. It's interesting that readers from other places might think, "What's the big deal lady? So it's snowing. And...?"

I'm trying to think about books I've read where the weather almost becomes a character in itself. Any ideas?

Music to write to...

I love this picture. I've been thinking about music over the last couple of days as sometimes it's really good for getting you into the mood of a scene, especially the angsty type scenes.

When I was writing The Watchers I had two basic playlists I used:

'EMO' - music purists look away now! I wasn't specifically listening to Emo bands but generally anything a bit dark, edgy, angsty or reckless. I found this good for writing the love scenes, especially where love seems to be thwarted and Evie is getting angry and frustrated.

'DANCE' - this is self-explanatory really. I can't say it helped create scenes as much as help focus me and get me in the zone. I've always found dance music helps me concentrate, especially trancey, uplifting stuff. It gives me energy and makes me feel alert and relaxed - the perfect writing state!

My EMO playlist is long but includes: Aqualung, Bjork, The Smiths, Evanescence, The Charlatans, Auf Der Maur, Pearl Jam, Portishead, Massive Attack and Moby.

DANCE list is eclectic but very chartsy and accessible, including: Chicane, Orbital, Moby, Paul Van Dyke, Future Sound of London and Jakatta, as well as just upbeat stuff from The Avalanches, Ne-Yo, Beyonce, Primal Scream and Justin Timberlake 'Sexy Back' - which I love - don't ask me why!!!

Anyone else got a writing soundtrack, or a great 'mood' song suggestion?

Happy disbelief.

Ha! This image represents ME!

Today I got an email from my agent, saying how much she is looking forward to working together. I feel like writing 'my agent' again. 'My agent'. Ha! :-D

The point here is that I am still kindof in disbelief. Back in June I started writing a story. I sweated over it during the summer, occasionally doubting my own sanity and shedding tears over my own stubborn stupidity. After all, I could have been lying about chilling, dammit!

Now I am getting emails that use phrases like 'strategy' and 'submissions' and 'visits to publishing houses'. It's like a vindication of my hours as a hermit and the unfailing support of the (angel) Murph and the fabulous Bernie McGill (not to mention her daughter Mary).

The book isn't sold yet - in fact it will be a couple of months before I will even get an inkling in that direction - but the fact is I am Joe Bloggs the writer and for anyone out there who dreams of writing a book I am the living proof that you CAN still get an agent and POSSIBLY even get your story published. Even as a brand new, non-celebrity newbie on the block!

'My Agent'. HA!

I have an agent!

Ha ha! I like this pic!

So I can hardly believe I am writing this but I now have a literary agent! I spoke to Gillie Russell (Aitken Alexander, London / New York - might actually pass out writing that!!!) on the phone tonight and she sent a contract (agreement letter) through by email. So now I just have to sign on the dotted line and send it back - and hey presto!

It hasn't really sunk in yet but I do feel really happy. Of course the book now has to be sold but I feel like I'm another step along the long, long road to getting The Watchers published.

Just looked back at some of my first blog posts in the summer and grinned, remembering the days when I really wondered if my head was cut spending my precious holiday writing a book. But, as they say, no pain no gain. There were lots of times when writing the book was great fun but there were other days when it was like having teeth pulled without anaesthetic. I think that's the bit you don't realise when you read books. You assume it was effortless. I now know better...

Where do characters come from?

I'm always interested in where characters come from. Sometimes you read a book and a character stays with you for a long time afterwards - from Lyra to Lizzie Bennet, Frodo to the father in The Road.

There's a kind of magic when a character arrives in your head with flesh already clinging to the bones. J.K. Rowling famously said that Harry Potter arrived on a train she was travelling on. She had to rush and write things down before she forgot any details.

Certainly I've had this experience of someone appearing in my head fully-formed. It's like a kind of magic or a gift from a strange little corner of your mind. One of them was Evie in The Watchers. She arrived, complete with troubled background, one night in February and I scribbled some notes in a book. She caught my imagination but I didn't get a chance to write about her until June. There was a sort of urgency about her that helped drive me through writing the book. Interestingly the few people who have read The Watchers in draft have all cared about her and found her likeable and believable. Gillie said that she has a kind of integrity that makes her compelling. Maybe this is because she felt so real when I was writing about her.

I can think of two other characters I've written about in half-finished books who 'arrived' fairly randomly. One appeared in a 'picture' in my head - a man sitting in the woods around a fire, with a teenage boy and girl beside him. The other arrived as a name and a sense of who she was and who her opponents were. They're both characters I want to come back to in time.

Of course the problem, as ever, is time. So no more blogging tonight! Time to do some storytelling!

And if anyone is feeling bored... who is the girl in the picture? What's her story?

Candlelight - The Maccabeats - Hanukkah

Cutest video ever - how much do I love this?!

Reading to an audience = scary!

First things first. Fab picture came from here. I only found this site when I googled looking for a cool image but actually wish I had read through it earlier!

Tonight the Murph and I risked life and limb driving along the icy roads to Flowerfield Arts Centre for a special evening. "Say the Word" was a gathering of writers from all over the area, including local writing groups. The standard was intimidatingly high.

It's hard to know what to read in public sometimes - something short is usually good! That's easy to say but when you're picking an extract from a full-length novel it can be tricky finding a scene that is complete in itself, especially when it's 'fantasy'. After all, the audience haven't had a chance to read the book - they don't know the 'rules' of the world you've created.

I kept it as simple as I could and read from the Prologue to Book 2. It's a nice scene with Javan as the central character. He plays a much bigger role in this book than in The Watchers so I wanted to start things off with a bang. It got a fairly good reaction as it has a scary twist and got some "Oooooooh's" at the end - always a great sign! Job done and back home in one piece - all is well!

The Plot Thickens...

I've reached about 8,500 words of the new book, sequel to The Watchers and it's going pretty well. It's amazing how quickly you can get out of the way of writing when you don't do it every single day!

At the minute I'm plotting a bit and figuring things out as I go - the fun bit! I don't want to get to far ahead of myself though. I have a fairly clear idea of the first 6-7 chapters, the big moment in the middle and the ultimate end point of the book. I don't want to nail it down any more than that just yet, as it starts to feel like homework or joining the dots. Basically I wish I could write faster so *I* can find out what's going to happen next!

Pic came from here.

Nothing strange or startling...

Hmmmm, feel like I need to update this but nothing much to report. Great weekend - lazy, snowy and a couple of nice trips out. Did a bit of writing. Tried to rest my neck which was hurting. That's it. So I'm posting this picture of cool shoes in the absence of anything more profound...

An exciting development!

Feeling very happy tonight as I got an email from Gillie Russell, the agent in London I had approached. I sent her the full MS of The Watchers about a month ago and have spent the last 4 weeks trying not to:

a) become an email stalker

b) chew my nails away to nothing

Anyhow, my patience *may* be rewarded in time. Gillie emailed this evening to say that she has been swamped but that she is reading the MS and is "really loving it." I was so pleased to get her message as it feels like I sent the MS to her about a decade ago - every day feels so slow...! :-)

So now I need to keep my fingers crossed that she likes the ending etc and that she decides she wants to sell it to somebody, dammit!

The whole process is a total emotional rollercoaster. I thought writing the book was the hard part - but that now seems like a breeze in comparison to this bit...!

More from Oz...

Oz fever!

Nope, I don't mean Australia Oz. I'm talking about 'The Wizard of Oz' which is on next week in work. Oz fever has gripped us all!!! The picture I found on this rather quirky site.

Currently reading...

... this book. Very quirky and it's definitely keeping me guessing! Plan for evening is to light the fire and get settled in to find out what's going to happen next! Writing for young people is the perfect excuse to read brilliant books for young people!

Christmas Lights!

A great weekend planned... Christmas lights are being switched on in Carrickfergus (my home town, a little seaside town near Belfast) and of course in Belfast itself.

Even better, the Continental Market opens on Saturday too, complete with quirky gifts, lovely food and a couple of bar tents. It is totally magical!

Sadly, the big wheel in the picture is no longer with us but I'll raise my glass of mulled wine in memory of it!

Sláinte!

Mslexia Diary!

Just ordered my Mslexia Writer's Diary 2011 - looking forward to getting it! I haven't had one before but it sounds rather lovely and has places for writing in details of submissions - and of course lots of blank pages for when inspiration strikes!


If you like the look of it, you can get it here.

Guerilla Gardening!

Before I go any further, how gorgeous is this picture?! I found it here, along with some other lovely pics.

So guerilla gardening is new to me but I heard about it on a radio programme today (available for 1 week only I'm afraid). The idea is that people randomly plant things on public land that looks a bit neglected - grass verges, wasteland, the grassy bits in the middle of roundabouts etc. It's about bringing a little bit of colour and nature to the urban sprawl.

I really liked the idea of this. I'm lucky to live somewhere with lots of grass and lovely beaches but I used to live in a place that was all concrete and horribleness. In The Watchers Evie walks through a cemetery and finds it grassy and peaceful - because it was the only big, green space for miles. Well, six years ago that was me walking to work every morning, glad to bottle some of the calm before the storm.

It also made me think about where Evie lives. Imagine a Victorian house, with families crammed into flats from the basement to the attic. The path and stairs up to the front door are covered with chipped black and white tiles and there's a square of garden full of dead earth and weeds. Again, this is a house I knew in London. A bit of guerilla gardening in places like that might put a smile on lots of people's faces... and Evie's an artist so I know she would love the colour!

House hunting...

The Murph and I are house-hunting. Most people go to look at a house and check out things like the bedrooms or the size of the kitchen or the garden...

Instead we both look around and think, "Oooooh, which room will be the writing room???" Two writers* in one house = fight to the death for best study / office... :-)

Needless to say, I didn't get much writing done. As Stephen King says you can write anywhere because art supports life, not the other way round. If I have to write at the kitchen table, that's where I'll do it!

* One journo, one aspiring novelist...

Cute pic came from here.

This is so sweet!

Find it here.

TV Night!

Ok, I'll be honest. I'm not much of a TV watcher. Life seems too short - but never too short for reading, writing or watching the cats chase a tie twitched like a snake.

I digress. If there is one night of the week when I abandon all my scruples and throw caution to the winds, it is Friday night. Friday night is the home of The Mentalist on Ch5, followed by The Event on Ch4+1 (God bless Freeview).

Lots of people seem to hate The Event. In fact, I may even steal an Event-hater's joke and post it here because it's funny. For me however, it's perfect Friday night TV. The characters are straight-forwardly good or bad and I can ALWAYS work out the ending. After a long, exhausting week this always makes me feel clever. Also the Sean / Shaun character is easy on the eye.

Sean is desperate to find his girlfriend and won't stop until he does. We all want to believe that the men in our lives will never give up on us. Maybe that's why it was so easy to write The Watchers. After all, Evie trusts that the 'man' in her life will do whatever it takes to save her - even if it means sacrificing himself.

Diversionary tactics

Haven't done too much writing today but did plot out the whole third chapter. Feeling very tired - too many late nights - so going to hit the sack early.

Also feeling a little despondent on the publishing front but not really sure why. Hope it's not some spooky sixth sense... Patience is a virtue which I'm sorely lacking!!!

Either way, I needed cheering up - and this picture does the job nicely. Enjoy!

Writing again!

Started to get really into the new book today, the sequel to The Watchers. It hasn't even got a working title yet but I have a fairly good idea of where it's going.

I'm starting to think that this is one of the nicest stages of writing. You have characters you like and a (rough) story that you want to tell. You start writing with a few sentences as a guideline. E.g. "Evie goes here and this happens, she's really annoyed and then she meets so-and-so."

What's amazing though is that as I'm writing, Evie starts getting her own ideas and bumping into people she doesn't expect to. In chapter 2 for instance she runs into Annette's younger brother Ben. We haven't met Ben before this point - until now he has just been a name. Now he's a living, breathing character, who's full of grief because his sister is dead. He's quite a forceful little bugger and seems to be shoving himself into a plot twist near the end - none of which I anticipated.

I think this is the bit that Stephen King describes as 'creative play'. Later there will have to be more sophisticated plotting - this will happen in this chapter, followed by that in the next. I found at that stage with The Watchers that it began to feel a little 'join-the-dots' as I wrote it and that it took some of the fun out of the process of writing it, until I reached the last six or seven chapters. On the other hand, it meant that the book was written fairly tightly and needed a lot less work in the revision stage than it might have done otherwise.

Anyway, I just have to enjoy this bit - and hope that The Watchers finds a home... otherwise I will have TWO homeless, urchin books to take care of!

(Cool pic came from here.)