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thanks.

I Hate Books - Official!

I spent the day on the beach yesterday, building sandcastles, eating chips (with sand in) and trying to finish reading Let The Right One In. About fifty pages from the end of this 500 page novel, I mentioned to my wife, 'I think I've just realised, I don't like this book.'

She looked at me as though I was stupid. 'It's taken you that long?'

'It seemed okay at first.'

Then she said, 'You don't like any books you read.'

'Yes I do!'

'No, you don't. Every time you finish a book you say it was rubbish. Name the last book you really, thoroughly enjoyed.'

I had to think. I mean, I really had to think. I came up with Never Let Me Go by Kazou Ishiguro, but I read that about three years ago. Then I mentioned Making History by Stephen Fry. That was twelve years ago.

'So, in twelve years, of all the books you've read, you've only enjoyed two.'

I shrugged. 'I'm picky.'

'That's your problem. You read because you think you should, rather than reading because you want to.'

I was a bit zonked by this. I know that I over analyse books as I'm reading, or I have high expectations and get annoyed when the book doesn't measure up but I never realised how few books I actually enjoy. Even looking at the books I've included in this blog, over on the right there, as books I've read recently. Only three stand out as really good: Walking on Glass, Bog Child and Black Rabbit Summer.

So yesterday I decided to read something totally out of my comfort zone. I actually picked this book up by chance, read the first page and got hooked by the voice of the narrator. It's something I never thought I'd want to read. It's The Reluctant Fundamentalist by Mohsin Hamid. And so far, yes, I'm enjoying it. It's 209 pages long; if my wife is right, I'll get to page 180 and think, 'What a load of...'

Stats Update

Stats are pretty poor for the last few months. I started out this year with some pretty good intentions but things got in the way. I still keep my daily stats and monthly totals. So far, they're not very impressive: (note that these figure are for new fiction only, and don't include editing, which is a pretty lame excuse, but here we go...)

Jan: 17,795
Feb: 11,500
March: 1,800 (oh dear - editing Shingle)
April: 6,000 (a little better, but still low)
May: 0 - nothing - ziltch (I blame my laptop breaking!!!)
June: 4,300 (no excuse)

Actually, I do have a bit of an excuse for June. With two manuscripts out there I wanted to rest for a bit and decide what to do next. I've been toying with ideas for adult fiction for a while, probably because I read a lot of adult fiction and my first novel, The Devil's Prayer, kind of hovers between YA and Adult.

However, to give me a break from the moody subjects of DP and Shingle, I started something earlier in the year based on a sketch. Morbello is about a thief who kidnaps a human kid in order to sell him to clear his debts. He just doesn't count that the kid is just as sly and as clever as he is.

What's nice about this project is that I have absolutely no idea where it is going. With Shingle I spent weeks on plot alone. Writing without a clue is uncharted territory for me and so far, quite surprising and fun.

I'm hoping this will improve my stats for July. Over the past four days I've averaged 1,000 words per day. If I keep it up, even though we're in the middle of the month, I might hit my monthly target for the first time since January.

School's Out

I always thought of that Alice Cooper song as an anthem for freedom, but today I've seen the other side of the coin.

It's been a double-whammy of a sad day. On one hand, I had to go my son's leavers' assembly and say goodbye to his teachers. Then I had to go to back to work - at another school - and say goodbye to the year six pupils that I have worked with for the past year.

It's strange really, because I originally approached the school, offering to help out because I thought it might help me write better fiction for children. I soon got hooked though, and now I think it's fair to say the school is more important than writing.

Not much more to add to this, just that I'm going to miss a lot of those kids, and I know my son is going to really, really miss his old school.