So, I decided before going on holiday that on my return, it would be head down for the rest of August to finish the first draft of the current WIP.

The trouble is twenty five thousand words in and recently I've had these other characters, from another book idea totally, demanding to be heard. I put them on the back burner months ago because the voices from the WIP were coming through louder. Now it seems they're being bullied into submission. And I hate it.


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Now that 'Calling' has been broadcast, and the flurry of flattering Facebook comments and tweets and emails had died down, I meant to do one last post in this Writing for Radio series: how it feels to have your story read on the radio. But then a friend who writes magazine fiction for a living started a discussion of where stories come from, and I realised that actually I haven't been able to talk properly about where 'Calling' came from, because it would have given away the story. So this post is one big plot spoiler, and if you'd like to listen to the story before you read the rest of it, you can go here, and Listen Again (till Wed 11th Aug). I'll do that other last post in a few days.

The commission gave me the following:

* Brighton setting
* 'Lost in the Lanes' theme
* 13˝ minutes: 2,200 words

When I went down to Brighton to research I knew that it would probably be historical, in some sense, just because, try as I will, it so often is. I was also aware that while I wanted to find a story I could get excited about, to some extent it would be a calling card for me and my writing, so perhaps it wasn't the moment to try my hand at a futuristic techno-thriller. But I didn't know more than that.

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Christopher Little was non non-committal.
I believe A&B mostly go for TV.
The Marsh Agency was harsh as can be
and David Higham, to me, look exclusive: don’t try ‘em.
Heard Aitken Alexander is wary of slander
and Rupert Crew takes on very few.
From Susanna Lea, ‘It’s not right for me’ and
a slip by Diane Banks said, ‘Thanks, but no thanks.’


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I was foolish enough to think that when I'd got my new novel off to my agent for her opinion, life would get a bit simpler. In fact, of course, it's got more complicated, as there's a huge swathe of stuff that I put aside to get the novel done, from doing my tax return to booking a holiday, by way of returning my London Library books and even reading a book or six purely for fun. The tax return, in particular, is not only tedious to do, it also gives me a weird sensation that last year is passing again before my eyes. Never mind New Year's Eve, this is the moment when I really look back and think about where I've been and where I'm going, and what - if anything - it all means. Meanwhile, I'm afraid this is just a quick catch-up post.

Most exciting is the fact that my story 'Calling', read by Philip Voss, will be broadcast on Radio 4 next Wednesday 4th August, at 3.30pm, as part of the Lost in the Lanes series. It'll also be available as a 'Listen Again' on the BBC iPlayer for seven days after that, and as soon as I've got a link for that I'll post it here. I'm really looking forward to hearing it... I think.

On Saturday 2nd October...

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Portraits are claimed as Sargent's forte, but there were few enough of them in the recent RA 'Emperors and Citizens' show, lost as they were among flounces and fancies of the aristos and royals.

So it's good to see another side to his talent. Turner's influence is very evident.


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Musicians are in the house and as usual are putting me to shame. What I envy – these are proper, conservatoire-trained classical musicians – is their work ethic. Every day I hear the piano start off at around 8 am and it continues for the whole morning. Practice, practice, practice. Why am I not so committed to my writing?

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In Lots of Them I was agreeing that loving the sound of your own voice is a bad thing in a writer; it's like the dinner-party talker who is so busy singing their song that they ignore who their audience is and how they're reacting. And of course the fact that with a novel the singer and the audience are at one remove from each other doesn't absolve you of the duty - not to mention the common commercial horse-sense - to consider them. Then, as I said in Fiddling, hangovers and the Paris Review, we all love the sound of our own voice, except when we're hating it. That's fair enough: if something is a real pleasure for you to read, it probably will be for others; if it clunks each time you read it, however subliminally you register the clunk, it will never be right till you act on that subliminal recognition. Having said that, this kind of "hate", in particular, is as much to do with your nature as the quality of the writing: is your Inner Critic on the rampage? And is "love" actually a "that'll do" reaction which is born of resistance, and so needs interrogating?
And then I started wondering if this question has another side. And, of course, it does. Taking "loving the sound of your own voice" in a different sense, I think it's essential for a writer to love the sound of their voice on the page.

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Will you have your five portions of fruit and veg today (or your eight if you live in the USA)? And your protein? Your carbs? Your essential fats? Will you be taking some exercise? Will you be going out into daylight for at least thirty minutes?

It's quite a project, eating a balanced diet, living a balanced life. And it's vital for our well-being. Far too easy to spend the day with the seat of our pants welded to the seat of a chair, grabbing at junk to keep us going and only venturing out at dusk to buy new print cartridges and another bottle of wine. Or wasting another day in procrastination, then getting down to some decent writing at midnight and being unable to tear oneself away from the screen until the early hours, when it's so light you might just as well stay up...

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.... or maybe not spooky, just a rather strange coincidence. Over the weekend I've been having a serious sort out of the real clues and red herrings for The Monochrome Landscape, and I had to find out which single was the UK number one on a particular date that's important to my antagonist (and yes, it's vital to the plot but I'm not giving anything away).

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