Writing Update: 24-10-25

Change: +7,266

Year to date: 174,817

I spent last weekend at my (now annual?) mini-break, my so-called "writer's retreat" in a cheap AirBnB down on the Sussex coast, in this case quite literally somebody's posh shed in their back garden.

As before, I really enjoyed the get-away. I treated myself to one nice birthday meal, and the rest of the time ate 2-for-£8 Wasabi ready meals. I read quite a bit, starting with the four available chapters of transect's Princess Stuff--sorry, Lady-in-Waiting; and then Murakami's The Wind-Up Bird Chronicles. I'd first and last read Wind-up Bird over twenty years ago, while living in Japan, and revisiting it was like reading it for the first time; I'd forgotten almost everything. It really is stunningly good and traces of Murakami's style, or at least my poor attempt at mimicry, creep into these most recent chapters, just as Sally Rooney did last year.

Last year, I managed just over ten thousand words of writing over my retreat. This year, I only managed just over seven thousand. I think there's a number of reasons the writing didn't feel quite as successful as the previous year's effort:

1. The weather! While the plan was to lock myself in a shed and write as much as I can, a writing wench still needs a break. Last year, the weather was sunny--certainly not warm, but that brisk, seaside wind that flecks blood to the cheeks and invigorates. Between bouts of writing, I went for walks and returned to my laptop refreshed. This year, it rained for two days straight. It really was miserable. There was very little appeal to stepping outside, and I think my brain suffered for it.

2. Outside world distractions. Last year, I did a much better job of isolating myself from the rest of the world. True, the first night I ended up binging Hasbin Hotel, but otherwise I mostly alternated between writing, reading and short walks along the coast. This year - well, there were more distractions. Chief among these, and this was entirely my own stupid fault, was Discord. A week before the get-away, I joined an async game of Twilight Imperium IV on Discord. This was a--frequent distraction. Worse of all, I didn't even win. Next time, no distractions!

3. The end of a book. Endings are hard, and I'm no good at them. In writing, too. Last year, I needed the get-away to finish off Book 4. Those final scenes between Cindy, Tom, Caleb and Julia were bloody hard to write. I needed a clear headspace. But beyond that necessity, I had a crystal clear vision of how the Book was ending - had that ending in mind for years before I wrote it. It's different with Book 5. Wrapping this one up has been a real challenge. I always knew it was going to end with meeting Sin-DI, but getting there was hard. I also wasn't sure how that meeting was going to play out, leaving it to the characters to let me know when it happens. Layed on top of that, I knew that Book 5 had to set up Book 6 in a plausible way, especially as that Book's already mostly written. The end result was that I spent a lot of time writing and then re-writing, and spinning my wheels. As a consequence, the word count doesn't represent that actual effort put in, but still; it feels a bit disappointing in comparison.

For all that, I feel pretty good with how the final chapter(s) are coming out. The interleaving of song lyrics and flashbacks I thought worked out well, as did the opening Hallelujah act. (Hopefully, Leonard Cohen isn't spinning in his grave. I'd like to think he'd like it.) The meeting with Sin-DI is proceeding well (I think), even though it's taking longer than expected. Meanwhile, it cleared up the necessary headspace for me to go back to chapter 13 (Forcefem) and give it a proper rewrite. I wasn't pleased with how that one turned out, and I'm nearly finished with the revision. I think it's a much stronger chapter, now, and should be ready to post soon.

Otherwise, thank you all for your continued patience and patronage.