Daynote - Fri 20 Dec

And here we are. My last (dayjob) working day of the year. It should also be my last writing day of the year as well, but I've not quite finished my current edit, so I suspect I will do a tiny bit of editing over the weekend and one or two days next week to get SHARD finished. But I'm nearly there.

ON DECK: A solid session this morning, cutting -508 words and just got the draft total under 125k. So less than 5k to go, with about a third of the book left to edit. However, this last third is where most of the additions need to go, so I suspect rather than just cutting 5k, I'll probably add 3-5k and cut 5k as I go. But it's going well.

TOOLS AND PROCESS: I've been keeping an eye on the early impressions videos of the new Supernote A5X2 Manta, which I am extremely interested in. E-ink tablets have a community of enthusiasts on YouTube who do very, very detailed reviews, which is good because they are quite expensive as tools, while being relatively limited in what they can do (compared to iPads and similar tablets). But it's that limitation that makes me interested - being able to read and mark up ePubs and PDFs would be hugely useful, both for my own novel drafting workflow, reviewing typeset proofs and for reading other people's proofs, but without it also being a Distraction Machine like an iPad. I've also recently begun receiving blurb requests for the first time (which is very exciting) but trying to read a PDF on a regular eReader is a horrible pain, I don't currently have a regular tablet and reading PDFs on my laptop is just barbarism.

LISTENING: I actually watched this, because I wanted to see the Christmas jumper crimes that were being committed, but this year's Page One Christmas Special is absolutely hilarious. Video below:

WATCHING: A bit of BOB'S BURGERS last night, which never fails to amuse and warm the heart. Can't beat it.

READING: Last night I also finished THE PEACOCK AND THE SPARROW by I.S. Berry, which was phenomenal. It has an absolutely riveting finale and the kind of crushing inexorability over the course of the book that really draws me in. When married to gorgeous prose and atmosphere that made me feel like I'd actually visited Bahrain and Cambodia, I can't recommend it enough.

LINK: An excellent post from fellow 2024 debut Jennie Godfrey (THE LIST OF SUSPICIOUS THINGS) on eight ways of tricking yourself into writing.

UP NEXT: More SHARD, probably for the next 2-3 days, early in the morning. Then, hopefully, two proper weeks off, with only my end-of-year roundup and December newsletter to go. The year is nearly done.

Onward!