Well I finished Time’s Arrow today (referring to 22nd by the way). Wasn’t quite sure how I would end it, but I thought it was sort of nifty, but to my mind an obvious twist, but we’ll see! I think it’s a terrible story, but they say a writer is the worse judge of their own work.

That was 140 words.

Plus I started a new SF story. Just came up with a title and then though of a vague story idea to go around it. The story is called Trial by Dream and I did a paltry 38 words after coming up with the idea.

Other work included doing some research into my Grail story idea. Decided I needed to do a bit of background reading to get me more in the mood and I also fleshed out some ideas about the story – I’m taking more planned approach to this story, whereas for Trial by Dream its seat of the pants.

So not a lot of words, but at least I’m writing a bit every day so far, which I wasn’t doing a few weeks ago.

Reading:

Still feasting on Feast of Crows. I liked the first chapter for Samwell, but wasn’t sure about the next one and the description of Braavos – seems just like a fantasy Venice to me plus the Colossus of Rhodes – I’m not sure if I like fantasy settings that are transplanted so wholesale from our own real world. But I haven’t finished the chapter yet, so maybe there will be something more to it?

I am also dipping into a book called How to Read a Novel by John Sutherland. The idea behind the book is that to really appreciate reading a novel is as difficult as writing well. It’s written by an English professor, so I guess he has a vested interest in telling us that, but I see his point and I’m hoping to get something out of it. Mostly it contains lots of out of date observations about the publishing industry (it was published in 2006), but I’m hoping it will pick up soon!