Friday, September 14, 2007

ANSWERS

I did get some answers on my question about the novella, and have come to the conclusion that it is really more related to the short story than the novel. I thought I should read more so asked if anyone knew any off hand and got two so far which I'll try to get from the library today. My local writing group meet there so it's all quite handy. I've been popping in on this group for the past year, whenever I was in Glasgow, and it never occurred to me to actually join the library. It wasn't till I wanted a Grahame Green book for Susan's writing group that I thought of it! They didn't have one of his books on the premises - it's a deprived area, but I would have thought he'd be there.

Gotta go now but I might be back.

I'm back. Had a fabulous morning with the Ibrox Writers up in the library; a wealth of great writing appeared, and I got help with three little poems I'd dragged out of a dark cupboard - by the end of today I might be able to move them to the Done folder. I'll give them a few weeks there before sending them out to earn their keep.

Picked up the Grahame Greene I'd ordered, End of The Affair, and am very impressed with the first chapter. I did as Susan suggested and read it slowly, going back over the first page a couple of times, asking myself if I knew what he had done there and how he did it. Very clever the way he kept the focus and kept us waiting to find out what we wanted to know from the first sentence.

by the way...I might not have mentioned that I'm participating in Susan Hill's writing course.

I had to put in an order for the two novellas I wanted; this is a pretty small library; but I only waited a couple of days for the Grahame Greene. The up-side is, they have a lot of computers. I had to take a disc with me today so I could print something; I need ink for BOTH my printers, and now I'm not earning at present, I can't afford to spend money on ink. When I went into town yesterday I had to chuck myself on the bus home quickly before I could spend anything. I can't get past Waterstone's, WHSmith or pound shops.

One of the writers in my group reminded me that she'd like to look at the old novel that I've shelved; she's really good at picking out rogue elements in a piece of writing and I had asked her to be my first reader a while ago. She's not best pleased that I'm not working on this, but as I tried to explain my reasons to her, I began to understand myself, what is going on here - she thinks that my art is mirroring my life in that I'm all over the place. It felt good to work this out. I said that at the moment I feel, if I can sort out the structure of the Bluebeard novel and park myself at chapter four, then I can go back and do the same for the other...then perhaps work on them in tandem. I really don't think I'm ever going to be able to stay on one thing at a time. But that's alright, as long as I can concentrate on what I'm working on at the time. I suppose one of them will eventually take the lead. Nothing is ever plain sailing in my life.

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