Still Here

I'm on holidays. No work till the 4th of January 2010!

At some point I intend to sit down and get a huge amount of writing and reading done - but not now, and possibly not before the fat guy in the red suit shows up. I'm going all handyman on and around my house. Cleaning, fixing, sorting, throwing, painting, tiling, and dismantling a plenty will be occurring at the Tomlinson household - with brief excursions to the shops to finish my Christmas shopping (yes, I'm really that bad at shopping that it won't be completed before Xmas Eve - it never is.)

And then after Xmas, we have a tradition in Australia called the Boxing Day Test, where we sit, drink, eat and watch our National cricket team run around on the MCG. Of course, that goes on for four or five days and then it's New Year, a night of partying, a day of recovery, and then a new test match starts in Sydney and I'm back to work a few days later.

Therefore it's entirely possible I could lose my grip on anything writing and just drop off the planet for the next two or three weeks into a mundane 'normal' life - 'normal' meaning not writing.

So, in case this does occur, and to give me an out, I shall take this opportunity to wish you all a happy and safe festive season and may all your wants and needs be met, both in and out of the bedroom. If not before, I shall speak to you in 2010.

p.s. If you've tried to email me at work since last Friday - resend it to my home address - I didn't get it.

Christmas Update

Just about to call it a night here so I thought I'd do a quick update on where I'm at.

Firstly, out shopping in the post-Christmas sales today and picked up a CD set of classical music. I love listening to the classics and thought I'd give it a go while writing - very glad I did.

When I eventually got around to doing some writing I knocked off four fifths of chapter 8. Newland has just gone through the 17,000 word mark.

I have four days left to churn out at least 8,000 words to surpass my minimum goal before New Year. If I can get stuck in during the day at some point, this should be a breeze.

I hope everyone is having a wonderful festive season and getting lots of things done - whether that's spending time with the family and friends, writing, reading or whatever else floats your boat. I hope you're having fun and staying safe.

BT

Christmas Update

Merry Christmas!

As I write this, Santa is currently delivering presents to the area around Roswell (Not making this up - according to NORAD Santa Tracker).

He finished up in Australia some 10 or so hours ago. Poor fella. He may get huge amounts of time off but he earns every minute of it in just one night.

My goal by Christmas was to write 2500-5000 words. As we rushed around getting ready for today, this seemed unlikely. But things have fallen into place and I've managed some alone time this afternoon to do some more work. I've fallen over the 2500 word mark at this point and finished chapter 7. Chapter 8 is a race against time with a young child's life at stake, and in the hands of an inexperienced white woman and an aboriginal she doesn't yet trust. Will they make it? If nothing else, it'll be a fast paced chapter to write after the last two had more foreshadowing than anything else within them. Don't get me wrong, there is action in all my chapters- relevant action to boot - but there has to be a story in there to hold it all together and that seemed to take over much of chapter 5 & 6, along with characterisation.

The characters have been revealed more and more since the beginning, but I'm now starting to reveal the intricate relationships between the major role players. Chapter 9 is ear marked for another major relationship reveal so 8 will be a nice change. I'm rambling. 8 has character relationship development but shown more through action than anything else - buy the book when it comes out and you'll see what I mean ;c)

Tomorrow the rest of the family head down to the inlaws and I have a day to write. I'm hoping to make a serious dent in my goal of 10,000+ words between Xmas and New Year.

Stay tuned.

At this point, I think we've been invited to a New Years Party so my last post for 08 will be either during the day on the 31st or during the night of the 30th. On the 1st I'll be setting new goals and publishing them here for anyone interested.

Due to people popping in for visits, pain in my legs, and my normal rambling style, Santa has moved onto Canada now - Fort Nelson to be precise.

I hope you all have a wonderful Xmas wherever you are or I hope you had one if it's already gone. For those of you interested, it was very humid and 32C here in Adelaide today. Definitely shorts and a t-shirt type weather.

Speak soon

BT