*Cue jingling bells" My Winter 14 TBR Pile

And here it is, a few days late as seem to be the fashion nowadays, my Winter TBR pile;

Dark Triumph by Robin LaFevers

Mortal Heart by Robin LaFevers

Happy Ever After by Adele Geras

Jessie {hearts} NYC by Keris Stainton

This Charming Man by Marian Keyes

I’ve Got Your Number by Sophie Kinsella

Amelia Grey’s Fireside Dream by Abby Clements

Welcome to Rosie Hopkin’s Sweetshop of Dreams by Jenny Colgan

Lola and the Boy Next Door by Stephanie Perkins

How to be Good by Nick Hornby

I keep thinking that it is smaller than normal, but turns out it’s only by one book and there are still those neglected ones pending on the e-reader since summer.  I’ve finally finished that vomit draft I was working on, so now I figure I can submerge myself in other people’s words for a little while. The next writing sprint is planned for February and March.

The pile is very Women's Fiction heavy, but there is still a male writer in there and few YA represented too. My Lovely CP loves Stephanie Perkins and I have never seen so much as a word she's written, so this pile will change that. 

I’ll let you know at the end of Feb how the reading  went.

What are you reading this season?

Autumn 14 Gut Reactions

Soo, autumn books. This feels a little odd this time. I’ve made my way through the pile but not with the same rate that I normally do. I've also been writing a vomit draft, on which I have just knocked the 90K mark, so I have been slightly laying off other people's plots, trying to keep my head in the game. (I also enforced a Twitter-ban which made all the difference, but that’s another story.)

So thinking back it's a bit of a haze. And I haven't quite finished yet. I'm still on Saskia Sargison's The Twins. And I didn’t get to catch up the ones on kindle. (I like reading in bed, so the e-reader doesn’t really work for me, as I end up lying there with my eyes buzzing if I read from a screen at night. My sleep is duff enough as it is, I don’t need issues falling asleep too.) So the e-books will have to carry over again. I must try to apply myself during the Christmas break.

The pile looked like this; 

 I also snuck in Grave Mercy by Robin LaFevers, because it appeared on order at the library, and Gayle Forman's Just One Night as it finally came out and some things just cannot wait.

Star of the Season, is sinner. Now, I know I always gush about Maggie Steifvater, but this genuinely was my favourite. A companion book to the Wolves of Mercy Falls trilogy, I loved it -except the end, which I would have liked to have been a little more considered. The MC makes a decision and I wasn't convinced by it, at least not the speed of it.  But the dialogue to each character is perfect. And I love dialogue…

That sneaky one by Robin LaFevers, that was a good'n too. A historical YA novel based on Death's female offspring being trained as assasins in 15th century France. I do like me a bit of history, and I've ordered the remaining two of the trilogy in too. Brutal and dark in places, but romantic and intriguing too.

Gayle Forman's Just One... series is an oddity to me. I read the first one and the ending annoyed me so much that it was still bugging me when the sequal came out- so I had to (begrudgingly) read that too, to find out if it got resolved, but that ending annoyed me even more. So finally this novella turned up to finish it, and finally I got the ending I needed. Normally I would have left the series and not bothered, but this was like an itch that had to be scratched...

Morgan Matson's Second Chance Summer was a fab YA Contemporary story, and at risk of stirring up some people I preferred it to Matson's highly acclaimed first book Amy and Roger's Epic Detour. Set in a vacation resort it had everything about summer down pat. One of those books where when I finished I wanted to write something set in the same kind of place. Is that just me…?

Dawn O'Porter's paper aeroplanes promised to show girls’ experience through GCSE years. It pretty much nailed it. Angst, awkwardness, bitchiness, buffoonary and friendship in the 1990's, this book did covered it beautifully.

Part of my aim with this month's pile was to read more Women's fiction, in light of it being what I am currently writing. I've been enjoying Jenny Colgan's books a lot, she has a natural amusing tone, smooth and easy, without going overboard playing for laughs.

If you know any teen girls who like history and horses, then you can't go wrong with Marie-Louise Jensen's Runaway. I'm not a particular fan of horses, but it didn’t hinder my enjoyment. Perhaps I just got consumed by the romance and the Regency history, which were luscious.

Now that I look at it, there is a lot of history in the pile this season, whether recent to my life time, or far far back. Enemies at Home goes as far back as Roman times. I love Lindsey Davis. Love Her. She writes humorous Roman detective stories, which I know is niche, but for me it's a perfect cocktail. (For me, having been brought up on Inspector Clouseau films,  murder and funny is a lovely mix - Janet Evanovitch anyone?) Davis also wrote the book that I read once a year every year, but that too is a story for another time. Enemies at Home is the second in her new series and had the most delicate, fragile, tender love scene in it. No sex at all, but so intimate it was fabulous. And funny too. How skilled it that?!

Abbi Glines is one of the front runners of NA. Rush Too Far is a companion to her Rosemary Beach series, in so far as it is the male POV to the first of the series. I like reverse angle books a lot, so this one was a treat. 

Wonder. Simpl-, Every MG class in the world should read this book. By law. The world could be a nicer place. I made my 10 year old read it the moment I put it down.

and the rest;

  One of these books was a long struggle. Like another book in the pile, it was set in the past that I've been around for. So many people have raved about it, which is why I read it, but in the end it was so very slow. A few of the references were fun to be reminded of, but by and large I wanted more speed. (I suppose it is my issue now of having read lots of YA stories, adult fiction just moves at a much slower pace and it loses me.)

 One of these books, apparently a classic now in its genre or at least a forerunner, the sense of humour was soooo dry that I couldn’t warm to the MC. As in boyproof in last season’s pile, she came across as aloof and IMHO, I’m not sure if that works so well in Women’s Fiction.

One of these books gave me that feeling that there was hope for me yet. Essentially there was nothing wrong with it, it was fine but some of it felt clunky here and there and I came away feeling that given it has been published then maybe I can too. (I don’t know. Is that a mean thing to say?)

Not sure when I’ll post the Winter pile (due..oh, that would be today), because

a)    It currently isn’t much of a pile, more a wee stack

b)   I’m trying to bring this draft to conclusion

So any recommendations, get’em in!

(PS. Sorry about the font sizing. Not sure what is going on...)

Oh! I surprised myself

Please disregard that last post. Not the bit where I said Good Luck to Nanoists as that still holds, but the bit where I said I couldn't write 50k words in November. 

Turns out I just did.

Am smug. Sorry.

Still not finished yet though......

Good Luck, you nutters!

 I usually write a post about the lunacy that is NaNoWriMo. It has become a small annual event for me, even though I do not partake. Writing a Novel in a Month is just not a viable reality for me. And normally I spout about that, at about this point in the year.

This year though, things are a little different. Because this year I can't sit here typing that I wouldn't be able to get 50k words down in a month. And how do I know this? See this smug look here? Here on my smug face? That's there because in June, I did indeed write over 50k words in a single month. I have a badge from 750words.com to verify it, so do not roll your pretty eyes in disbelief at me.

Having an outline made the difference for me, along with a word-count goal. I said 10k a week, with the aim to have that done Monday-Friday which gave me the weekend to make up any shortfall or carry on, if I needed and wanted to. Normally this made it 2k words a day, but it was fluid, which helped. Fluid is good, I have found. Fluid equals less stress. And setting a timer for two batches of 45 minutes was key too. (45 minutes feels less draconian than an hour, to my deluded mind.) No checking t'internet in the timed slot made things way more focused and productive. Who'd have thought?!
 As things took off, I wrote more than the quota, which put me over the 50k mark in the month. 
Ta-dah!

So why am I not doing it again in November with all the NaNoists of the planet? Because November is not the month for me. Aside from it not even being a 31 day month, there are too many things going on. What I am trying to write will be more that 50k, so it'll pull closer and closer to Christmas, and if November is bad, then December is a nightmare for writing. And I'll want to get this sucker finished. In fact I started my current project at the beginning of this month, with the aim of finishing at the end of November.  So I'm having two months to do it, I guess. 

Maybe this just means I cannot play with the other kids. Really I think it just means it isn't my timing.  But what I can definitely say for NaNoWriMo this year is: 

Good Luck and Go to it, I know you can do it. (You Nutters...) 

So late it doesn't deserve a fanfare - My Autumn TBR pile

Yes it is late. I know, I know. But there was school start and an important exam for one of them, which is now done, hurrah. So here's the pile, which seems fairly hefty, particularly as I also have three left over on the e-reader from last season.

The pile looks like this:

 The books are:

Second Chance Summer by Morgan Matson

Rush Too Far by Abbi Glines

Sinner by Maggie Stiefvater

Little Beach Street Bakery by Jenny Colgan

The California Club by Belinda Jones

Runaway by Marie-Louise Jensen

Black Swan Green by David Mitchell

From Notting Hill with Love… Actually by Ali McNamara

Paper aeroplanes by Dawn O’Porter

Wonder by R.J Palacio

The twins by Saskia Sarginson

 Enemies at Home by Lindsey Davies

 The Girl’s Guide to Hunting and Fishing by Melissa Bank

 As usual it is a mix of Teen and Women's fiction, with a dash of Historical Crime. Sinner is the one I am most looking forward to (This, thanks to Lovely CP is a signed copy, with a limited edition artwork in it too. Boasting? Moi? Sorry, not sorry. I'd frame it and put it in my fantasy writing room.)

 There are precious few male-authored books in there. Sorry about that male population. Nothing personal. Just the luck of the draw this time around.

So I'll update you at the end of November, if all goes well. If I haven't bitten off far more than I can chew this season.

What are you reading this autumn?

FREEBIE!!!!

Just to let you know, that for today and tomorrow (September 11th & 12th), Sunlounger 2 is free. Like, no pennies. At all. Nada. Zilch.

Here.

 Did I mention the free bit? 44 stories. On your e-reader for absolutely nuffink.

tis truly a gift!!

The Summer '14 Gut Reactions

The end of summer has crept up on me. I suppose that until the spawn are back in their respective institutions (next week) I don't really recognise that summer has finished. In this case it means that I haven't started compiling the Autumn TBR pile, so that’s gonna be late. 

But I have been writing. I finished a 90k+ vomit-draft on something Women's fiction, which is safely mulling in a drawer right now, in the hope that when I reread it, it might feel like it could be something. And I've started plotting the next one – for once I have a title, so it isn’t referred to by the MC’s name or as “XX-thing” based on the job they do. That feels like an advancement to me. I've also been drafting some short stories too. So I haven't been shirking as such, I just haven't got much to show at this point.

 But I can do the gut reactions, although that comes with a caveat too, as I haven't got to the three e-books, as there is only so long that my eyes can cope with reading on my phone, and I am very low on the pecking order in this house when it comes to use of the ipad. Curling up on the sofa with a laptop doesn’t quite work for me, and I can't sleep if my eyes are buzzing from staring at a screen. (Yeah, yeah, excuses, excuses- but the e-books will just have to roll over to Autumn instead.)

The pile looked like this:

Star of the Season goes to The Probability of Miracles by Wendy Wunder. I loved this book. I was introduced to the awful term "SnuffLit" during the summer, in relation to the popularity of books like The Fault in Our Stars and Before I Die (aka Now is good). I can't tell you how much I dislike associating that term with YA, as it sounds so repulsive. I loved both of those two books, in spite of their teens dying themes as they were handled in a way that felt both true and respectful. And I loved this book too, in the same way that I adored The Sky is Everywhere, which I gushed about here, because though they deal with death, they celebrate life, love and teen feelings and relationships, which are just my cup of tea. Though based on self-pity the tone is gorgeous and is now on my list of "Writing tones I wish were mine." Everyone has that list, right or is it just me?


Notable mentions;

The Travelling Tea Shop - if you like cakes, travel and romance (Seriously, what is not to like in that combo?), this is a lovely  read. Belinda's eye for detail is meticulous and you really feel you are in the setting.

Two boys kissing - If you have followed this blog at all, then you'll know that I adore David Levithan. ADORE. But it took me a while to get into this. And in the end I didn't love it. But that is OK too. It is, however a special book, as a record of how attitudes to homosexuality has changed over a window of time and as an ode to those that went before.

Elizabeth Wein wrote Code Name Verity, which was one of the first book crushes I had on this site and which I still recommend to people with a passion. Rosie Under Fire is the follow up and is as well-researched and well written as the first, although it doesn’t have the same plot device that made its predecessor so special. That said, it is a very powerful, thought-provoking read, desperately hard at times, due to the setting and the experiences of the MC. If anyone knows any teens who are studying history, and specifically World War Two, and particularly girls, these are so worth reading. That's another thing that I love about them: that they tell stories about the war that aren’t the norm. They’re about what the girls were doing for the war effort when the men went off to war, the horrors that they also came to face and the impact that it had on them.

Getting the girl - Again I have huge respect for the Markus Zusak, having read The Book Thief, but this book didn’t do very much for me. Beautiful words though. Sentences that you wish you'd written.

Sunlounger 2 – Nooooo, I am not going to review this one, because, I’m in it. BUT I will give it a mention for best value of the season.


The other things;
 One of these books I had a feeling I might have read before but had forgotten. I didn't like the MC. Perhaps I had cast it from my mind rather than just forgetting it. She was awkward and went out of her way to be unlikable, and so, guess what- I didn’t like her, or warm to her story. Maybe that was the point, and I reacted exactly the way the author wanted me to, but by the time the MC changed and the happy ending came, she'd lost me and I didn’t really care.

One of these books lead me to read the following parts of the trilogy, because of the cliff-hanger end and because I was being a sheep. I was so disappointed with the conclusion. I like a happy ending, I have never hidden that, and like Hunger Games, I didn’t get what I wanted here. Sometimes a "realistic" ending isn't what I paid my money for. I should just lay off these books. When will I ever learn..?

 In one of these books I found the language impressively menacing, but almost too obscure in places, so I wasn't quite sure what was being said, or what was going on or whether I am just too thick to keep up. I guess I don't like books that make me feel stupid.

 And so I am off to build me a new pile of books with likable MC’s who have happy endings, that don’t make me feel dim. With that criteria in mind, feel free to send recommendations.

99p Treat!

If anyone is interested, the Sunlounger 2 has been selected for the Amazon Summer sale and can be bought for the princely sum of just 99p here.

Combine that with Sunlounger 1, and that's 88 stories for less than £3. Yes, really, 88!

 That's Summer pool reading sorted right there!

Amazon Shenanigans

There's stuff going on over at Amazon at the moment. This  post is not about that. 

Last year I got tickled by a raft of reviews written on Amazon about the revolutionary biros for women. I posted about it here, and if you want a laugh, the reviews are worth reading and adding too. Go on, write one, it's liberating to blatantly fib now and again. And it counts as creative writing.

Well, it seems that Amazon are embracing it now, posting some of the other reviews they have had regarding some of the other items they sell, here.

( Yes I know it is a tenuous link to reading and writing, but I've flagged that that might happen, up there to the right in the profile. You were warned.)  

Here it is!

Hurrah!  I am officially published again for the second time, as Sunlounger 2 came out this weekend. Rather aptly for midsummer weekend, my story is called Midsummer Madness, a sneaky peek is available here.

And if you are interested in the whole thing- 44 lovely summery stories and even a murder for less than £3, then it is on sale on Amazon UK and Amazon US.

Off to drink fizz now...

And so it begins...

Last summer, in all the brouhaha of being included in the Sunlounger Anthology, there was much squeeing and whooping on this blog.

There are now less than ten days until Sunlounger 2 hits the ether. So three guesses where things are about to slant. I'm thinking it is only fair to give you warning. 

To kick things off, the Sunlounger website has been given a whole new look and address.
SunloungerStories can be found here. On the site, you'll find info about all the writers and their stories for both books. 

There's also a newsletter you can subscribe to, where the Sunlounger writers have written about holiday locations and travel tips. Come on, It's FREE!

The World Cup, Wimbledon, Sunlounger2, - I'm not sure June can fit anything else in.

*Launch the Confetti* My Summer 14 TBR Pile

It is summer! Hurrah! And with it comes Pimms, strawberries, sandaly-flip-floppy footwear and of course a new reading pile. This is the pile of holidays. There is also a secret pile of some non-fiction as I am in a research phase. Can you spot it? No, of course you can't. Secret, remember? I can say no more. Zip. Sworn to secrecy by... um, me.

 The Un-secret books are;

Stolen by Lucy Christopher

Getting the Girl by Markus Zusak

The Probability of Miracles by Wendy Wunder

Two Boys Kissing by David Levithan

Boyproof by Cecil Castellucci

The Travelling Tea Shop by Belinda Jones

Geek Girl by Holly Smale

Rose under fire by Elizabeth Wein

Divergent by Veronica Roth

Dare Me by Meg Abbott

On the kindle are;

Trinity by Nigel May

The Art of Keeping Faith by Anna Bloom

Red at Night by Katie McGarry

and of course as of June 21^st , there will be this one. More details to follow soon.

I'll let you know how I get on. Anyone read any of these? 

What are you reading this season?

Spring 14 Gut Reactions

Well it is another of those seasons where I feel I have raced through plenty of books and couldn’t remember that many of them. Perhaps I shouldn’t race so much. Perhaps I should read slower. But then when I sat down to write this I realised that I have really enjoyed the majority of them.

The pile looked like this:

 The additional books I read were

Moranthology by Caitlin Moran

Crash into you by Katie McGarry

Geekhood- Close Encounters of the Girl Kind by Andy Robb 

The tied Stars of the List were The Guestbook by Holly Martin, for its form (yeees, we know how I feel about form flexing) and It felt like a Kiss by Sarra Manning, because she just does great voice, and Moranthology because Moran can just say things in the most barkingly mad fashion but that makes perfect sense. If I could write in a combination of Moran and Manning, I would die happy.

Notable mentions go to;

How to get a (love) life by Rosie Blake for a great debut with laugh out loud moments.

Beautiful wedding by Jamie McGuire was good to revisit Travis and Abi’s characters. I think they are done now, but I am looking forward to the new series based on Travis’ brother Trent, starting with Beautiful Oblivion due out in July.

This song will save your life by Leila Sales and Pushing the Limits by Katie McGarry, are both current YA Contemporary. Sale’s book was interesting as it wasn’t strongly bedded in romance. The focus was staunchly on the MC’s personal development, and was refreshing for it. McGarry’s book though following a more traditional plot line, took a look at the grittier side of teen life, here foster kids and mental health. As seems to be the current trend the main and supporting characters appear across other novels too, which is always a boon if you like them.

Hannah Tinti’s The Good Thief is a proper fairytale. There are orphanages, dwarves, mousetrap factories, assassin giants, body snatchers and lost fortunes, all wrapped up in a web of lies and thievery. What more do you need?  

Carrie Fisher's Surrender the Pink - Man can she turn a phrase...

And the other stuff;

  One of these books did not give me the happy ending that I deserved.

  One of these books I never made it past the fourth chapter as I couldn’t get into the voice.

 One of these books was fine, but not as good at the writer’s other books.

Onwards then, to the Summer TBR pile!!

My Writing Process Blog Hop

The lovely Elizabeth Dunn has tagged me to take part in the My Writing Process Blog Hop.

Liz is an MG/YA writer, journalist ,reader, teacher, lovely critiquer, barking mad Kiwi mum of thousands, and lucky enough to live in Venice. You can find her post here.

And so for the Blog Hop questions;

What am I working on? I've just finished the first draft - what I call my Vomit draft- of a full length ChickLit story. To date, the Women's Fiction I've written has been short stories between 650 words and 7000 words, so I wanted to see if I could actually spin out 100k words. And so I am letting that rest for a week or two before I start to strip it into something resembling a first draft and then we'll see if it has any scope to take further. In the meantime, I'm plotting something else, also Women's Fiction. So the cork-board is out and the index cards are charged and ready. I'm also considering trying this project out using Scrivener. Any tips anyone?

How does my work differ from others in the genre?  Ha! I don't know that it does, on the basis that I haven't read every book in the whole genre. What I have is my own voice and the way I see things. I can only really write the story I have, in the way that I have. I've tried projects before where I was deliberately trying to write the opposite to everything else I'd read and it tied me up in knots.

Why do I write what I do?  This one is difficult for me, as in my head I'm new to Women's Fiction. I started out writing for Children, then onto YA. As a side-line I write grown-up short travel stories which for some reason I didn't link with my bigger dream of writing novels.  Then I won a place in Belinda Jones' Sunlounger Anthology on a whim submission (full story here)

and it was only then that I thought that maybe this was where my writing voice is suited to. I'm still working it out, so we'll wait and see.     As to why I write, the answer is simple; I have all these little voices nattering in my head and I have to get them out. I love the dialogues and then I have to find settings for them. Batty but true.

How does my writing process work?  Yeah, still trying to work that one out too. I wrote a 75k word YA story, then promptly forgot how I did it, which had me floundering for a while. Now I write side notes on what I am doing, so I'll remember another time. Daft, yes, but forgetting is awful.

Currently, having recently acknowledged that I am a Planner not a Pantster, it looks roughly like this;

1)    Have the idea. Write it in notebook. Chat to myself about it in my daily entry in 750words.com. This should go on for some days if the idea is really going to get its claws in.

2)     Keep writing about the idea. This is more of a discussion with myself about how it could work, and brainstorming lots of ideas. I am not allowed to write dialogue at this point (some always slides in, but I tell myself I'm just illustrating a point, Ba-ha-ha!) because I am supposed to be working towards The Plot.

3)    Force myself to do an extra couple of days of The Brainstorming, as it still throws up more stuff and whittles out more.

4)    Get the board and the index cards out and stick a load up there. Then I see that there are loads of gaps, and I need more Chat. I go back to points 2/3. I try to add at least 2 cards a day to the board, until I have about 38ish. (This is all in Blake Snyder's Save the Cat, by the way)

5)    Don the writing boots on, and write every day, following The Path of The Plot. This is currently working at 2k a day. I get time off at the weekend to write other stuff, but only if I have reached my quota of 10k a week. I start using the 750words.com site, so I know I have to pitch up and write the first load of words and once I am in it, the remaining words just get bashed out. If I am faffing, I set the timer for 45 minutes, because it doesn’t sound as long as an hour and I am easily deluded.

That's it. That's My Writing Process. At the moment.

 Oh and I write wearing a pink plastic tiara, but everyone does that, right?

I'm tagging my Lovely Critique Partner Fairview for next week's blog hop post.
She writes US-based YA contemporary romance and award winning short stories. We met some three years ago via Maggie Stiefvater's Critiquing Love Connection, clicked and have have never looked back.

Catch her here  or at www.viewfromfairview.blogspot.com on the next stage of the Blog hop next Monday. 

Partytime!

Today I found myself in the realms of Writerdom, hobnobbing with the proper published, at the combined launch party for Belinda Jones' The Travelling Tea Shop and Sunlounger 2.

We took over Trader Vic's at the Hilton for some hours, and filled it with writers and bloggers of Women's Fiction. And cocktails. And amazing cupcakes.



Now, we saw at the last Sunlounger party that I am clearly not David Bailey's lovechild and my photographic skills are second to all, but here are a couple that give a smidge of the action.

Belinda Jones, Anna-Lou Wetherley, Laurey Buckland

Laurey Buckland, Jess Bickerton, Cress McLaughlin, Holly Martin, Lisa Dickinson

My throat is sore from chatting, there was lots of hugging and squeeing with people who I feel I've met before, but only know from t'internet, and I did plenty of Fangirling. But the thing that I brought home mostly, was how lovely this set of writers are. It doesn't feel like there is competition between them, as of course, they can't write the books fast enough to lay claim the market, and so everyone is supportive. Even of aspiring types like me. And to top it all off , there is this vast network of bloggers out there, who love the industry, support it and just want to see more coming their way.

Totally having the feels about the world of Women's Fiction today. And cocktails. And amazing cupcakes.

Incoming bloghop

I've been tagged for the My Writing Process blog hop and will be posting on Monday 26th May. I get to tag others when I am done, to post on the following Monday (2nd of June). Would any of you like to be tagged?

 Let me know, let me know...

P or P?

 So I haven’t been writing much here. Neglect- that is what it is. I admit that. But I have been writing. Like proper writing. 2k words a day, five days a week writing, which is record-breaking for me.

 I've been in the doldrums for an excruciatingly long time; starting things, then going off them; having ideas, squeeing about them for days, then waking up on the fifth day and not even remembering what it was about.  “Writing 100k words demands a bit more investment and belief than that,” I tell myself and move onto another idea. Nothing gets a chance to blossom, I get frustrated, put pressure on myself, contrive a new idea slightly inspired by whatever I happen to be reading at the time, desperately squee about it, then forget it and the cycle continues.

 So last October I’d had enough. Something needed to be done. I forced myself to pick three ideas and work on them for a week each, and then at the beginning of week four I just had to start writing on one of them. And right up to the Sunday night I thought it was going to be the Uni-based NA story, but when my fingers hit the keys on the Monday morning it was the Chicklit story that came out.  I was mooost surprised, I don't mind telling you. But off I went, and working to a basis of 1k words a day, (or rather 5k a week, however I could get that done.) Which I did, and by Christmas I had the first 50k words of a story. It had been a painfree experience, because I had known the direction of the story in my head. Then I hit the middle and floundered. Christmas became an excuse, but into January, I still hadn't picked it up.

 A rejection came in on my YA story "Strong characters, great voice, crystal clear scenes, weak plot." Ah yes. Plot. That old chestnut. I think in my heart of hearts I knew that there needed to be more plot, but was hoping that the other stuff would cloak it. Seems agents are rather more savvy than that.

  I had to get this plotting malarky sorted. Cue purchase of a couple of books, including Blake Snyder's Save the cat, which was clear, simple and helpful. Go buy it if you don’t’ have it. I finally did what I thought I could do in my head; I got the pin board out, bought the index cards and started working on the plot of the story. The biggest revelation for me was that though I thought I had a story with lots of fun/interesting scenes, when I stuck them up on the board that first time, I saw immediately that there weren’t actually that many, and that there were huge gaps in the board. I had been trying to run across a net, when I needed something more tightly woven.

 I appreciate that there are writers who plan and then there are writers that fly by the seat of their pants. If I have learnt anything then it is that I am no Pantser. (Is it Pantster? Whatever. I am not it.) I don't need to know every detail, but I need to have a clear route.

 Now I know where my story is going, I know what scenes still need writing. I can sit at the computer every day, set a 45 min timer and belt the words out. I've doubled the daily word count without any pain, and I am enjoying it all again. Come the Sunlounger meet-up this month, I'll be able to say that I have finished my first rough draft on a full length Chicklit novel and more to the point I know what I am doing going forward. Hurrah.


What about you? Plotter or Pantster?