Daynote - Thu 9 Jan
Bit of a chilly one.
Brrr - it dropped to -2°C overnight. Usually when I'm out for a walk, even on a colder day, I have to take my hat off eventually because I overheat. Not this morning. I had to walk fast enough to stay warm, and when I got to the beach the first metre or two of the water was slush, piling up on the beach as frozen sea foam.
Today is my first appearance on the radio! Sadly you can only actually listen on an actual radio if you're in Connecticut, where WESU FM is based, but you can listen live on the internet here. I'll be appearing on Ed McKeon's drivetime show 'Hoot and Holler' from 4-5pm EST (9-10pm GMT). It should also be available on their catchup service afterwards.
ON DECK: Excellent progress this morning, with 1,315 words down and another couple of scenes nailed. This morning required a bit of research to check locations and distances, which slowed me down a wee bit, but it was solid. Once again I am taking great joy from just making some forward progress.
I'm at a shade over 25,000 words. I tend to over-write then edit down, so I suspect this first draft will come in at somewhere around 110-115k, then I'll cut it back down to 95-100k. Back when I first started writing, losing that many words would have made feel a bit ill. But these days it's just kind of part of the process. I've made my peace with the fact that my first drafts will always contain 10-20% of filler and fluff and it's the purpose of the editing stage to fillet them back out.
TOOLS AND PROCESS: I've been watching my Supernote shipping notifications like a hawk (no movement) but also idly browsing the (very active) Supernote subreddit. This recent thread asking how writers can use the device was very interesting, as was this recent video from Matt Gemmell about how he uses it to plan his novels.
LISTENING: Really enjoying The Rest Is Classified podcast, particularly the last couple of episodes looking at a digital bank heist carried out by North Korean intelligence in 2016. Just absolutely wild stuff. And very entertainingly presented.
WATCHING: A bit of BOB'S BURGERS and WHAT WE DO IN THE SHADOWS last night. Only one episode left of the latter.
READING: Continuing with my beta read, a couple of chapters down. I also got THE WIZARD OF THE KREMLIN by Giuliano da Empoli through the post, which I pre-ordered in paperback months ago and forgot about. It's on the TBR stack, but it'll be a while until I get to it.
LINK: The BSFA Awards nomination process is open at the moment. If you're a BSFA member and looking for work to nominate, please do check out my eligibility post for the SF short fiction that I put out last year. I'd love to have your nomination.
UP NEXT: More PROJECT SCARLET! I sent off PROJECT SHARD to my agent the other day, so there's a chance I might get back notes on that in the next few weeks, but for now I will just be steadily ploughing through this first draft, and having a whale of a time doing it.
On we go!