Diary of a Determined Author….
The way to go apparently. Keep ‘em short. And snappy.
Am back in the UK, shivering, for about 4 weeks. My objectives include rewriting my novel, meeting Julie to discuss our planned take-over the publishing world idea, hanging out with my bezza who is 8 months pregnant and playing with this blog. Sigh. Trying to upload images (for those of you waiting for cat shots!) and failing so far. Also trying to work out how to generate traffic.
Any ideas welcome.
Short & snappied out.
Monday today. Sigh. And I’ve got today pencilled as a writing day. So far, I’ve woken up late, swanned down to town to read The Daily Mail (free in one of the cafés), queued up in supermarket to buy some jamon, made illicit call to man I shouldn’t be in contact with, arranged to see three houses tomorrow as part of my property quest, surfed net for more publishing information, written today’s blog and made myself a list. Lists being a very useful tool for Hannah when Hannah doesn’t know exactly what she should be doing or indeed how to do it, so making a list at least feels like work.
The list involved what to do next re my book.
The list started with start rewrite.
But I confess to a minor bout of nerves! The book’s been out of focus now for a few weeks (I’ve been focussing instead on bread and butter income, getting website revamped and illicit liaison with man – see above). The slip in focus bothers me, even though I’m sure it’s all part of the ‘journey’, I’d far rather I was doing, i.e., writing, rather than list-making. So, why don’t I start this ‘hard edit’ of mine? What is stopping me?
In part, the practicalities of earning a living when I’m not earning a living from my writing. And in another part, I know it’s fear. I know how my next draft should look and feel but I’m afraid of approaching it. What if I rewrite it and it still won’t sell? What if I mess it up? What if I keep on rewriting it and never reach the end? What if I don’t really know what I’m doing?
These are all fears I know. The ego stepping in the way of actual progress. Doubts and insecurities hindering my path. They’re normal and natural and very much the writer’s curse. My job is to overcome them.
And the way to overcome them is to start writing. Action equals motivation and all that.
Though I think I might just compose another list first…..
I like this one lots. http://eoinpurcellsblog.com/ It discusses things like the future of publishing, the future of books, e-books and lots of other grand topics that discusses how the publishing industry can keep up with the online industry. And how the latter is overtaking the former. Interesting stuff. I’ve heard it say before that the traditional publishing houses are both stuffy and backward thinking which is why new publishing houses, like Snowbooks and Legend Press, are attractive in a different sense. They use all the interactive tools of the web to their advantage.
Off Eion’s blog I managed to find out about a whole new site I knew nothing about! Check out LibraryThing, http://www.librarything.com/ which is like a social network site but primarily a way of cataloguing your books. There’s a recent google version, http://books.google.com/googlebooks/mylibrary/
Anyway, amazing what one learns by visiting a blog!
In their own words:
“The Harbour Agency takes a novel approach to its writers. We read between the lines and look for quality, verve, energy, originality and talent. We focus on intelligent, well-crafted, professional literary fiction and exciting, accessible and unique non-fiction. Think of Harbour as a haven for great ideas.”
Got an email from Liam today. Remember him? The travelling minstrel guitar player that swanned in and out of my life in July. I dreamt about him last night and because I dreamt of him, I emailed him to tell him the dream.
In the dream I am standing in a shopping mall outside a shop. There is music coming from the shop and I realise it is Liam’s song, By the Lake, a tender, beautiful, soulful song. The first track on his album. At the same time as realising it’s Liam’s song, I also realise that if the shop is playing his music, that means Liam must have made it.
And so I email Liam to tell him this.
And remind him, none too subtly, that it was my 33rd birthday the other day.
3, I say, is the magic number. May I have a magical year ahead of me.
33, he replies. You’re a 3rd of the way there.
Where? I wanted to say? A 3rd of the way along my journey of publishing my bestselling book? Or a 3rd of the way along my life, assuming I live to the grand old age of 99 (which would be a shame because I’ve always fancied getting a telegram on my 100th.) And whilst Liam told me that he was negotiating some publishing deals for his fabbo album, I took a little step of my own today. I registered the domain name for my book. www.thevoicesofangelsonline.com
Don’t bother clicking it just yet….
But the aim is to soon upload chapter one of my novel, The Voices of Angels, so all you lucky folk can read it. Eventually, once the book is published (whichever route I take) you’ll be able to buy the book online too.
This seems an exciting thing to do.
And I’m so tired right now after my birthday celebrations, a weekend of hard partying, a fear that my cat had got poisoned today (she hadn’t – it was just foam at the mouth) and some atmospheric cloud pressure that I’m just gonna have to curtail my excitement right here and now and go to sleep.
I’m 33 and getting old.