I’ve just re-read my last post — and how different things feel now! Not only am I recovered from said horrible bug, but I’ve read almost five books in the space of only a few days.
This isn’t just because I wanted to catch up, after missing my normal reading habit while unwell. It was mostly due to travelling, and being stuck on planes in far-off places while some poor people cleaned ice off the wings or refuelled. Or sitting in airports waiting for the gate to open. It was a joy! Not the waiting, obviously, but the long stretches of time when I could immerse myself in brilliant stories and ignore the discomforts of travelling. And thank goodness for Kindle; I downloaded books from all sorts of places with no effect on the weight of my luggage.
I read Violeta by one of my favourite authors, Isabel Allende (a great read as always) and The Island of Missing Trees by another firm favourite, Elif Shafak - it didn’t disappoint. I also finished The Rose Code by Kate Quinn. This was a bit of a departure for me, but the book was chosen by one of my book clubs, so I dutifully bought it and set about reading it on a plane somewhere over the Atlantic Ocean.
The story is set during the second World War in Bletchley Park, where — coincidentally — my mother worked. She died some time ago, and I never really talked to her about her experiences there. You might find this strange, as she lived into the 1990s — but the culture of secrecy instilled in Bletchley Park workers carried through for many decades after the war, and in the case of my parents, who then worked at GCHQ in Cheltenham (where they were also bound by the Official Secrets Act), it never really ended.
Though there were mentions of Bletchley Park, and some of my parents’ friends were from that era, there was never any discussion of what went on there — and as children we never asked, because work was boring and not something we were interested in while growing up. It wasn’t until after my mother died that I realised how important her work there must have been, and I regret to this day not having asked her what it was like. So reading this fictional story about Bletchley Park and its role in the war was fascinating. I got an insight into what her life must have been like during the war years, and I’m proud of her for what she did.
I also read Yellowface by Rebecca F Kuang - a salutary tale about an author who ‘borrowed’ a story from a friend who sadly died in front of her. I say ‘borrowed’; others might say ‘stole’ — and that’s what this story is about (as well as cultural appropriation, racial prejudice and all the complex implications of those). The considerable rewards of publishing a best-seller, the actions and reactions of the publishing industry, the vagaries and influence of social media on individuals — it’s a fascinating insight into the world of publishing. I’m not sure it left me with a particularly good impression of my chosen industry — but it’s fiction, after all!
I’m back, healthy and not too jet-lagged, after more than a month without writing or editing. At last I’m ready to get to grips with my agent’s comments on my latest novel. There’s work to be done! This book has a prologue, which needed reworking, and I’ve been working on that this week. They’re good fun, prologues: they’re generally short and suspenseful, and they set the stage for the story.
Apart from that, there are some simple changes to make to the rest of the book, and there are some more difficult ones. One of the more difficult ones is that my book appears to have a ‘saggy middle’! I’m sure I’ve mentioned this before. The ‘saggy middle’ is when your story doesn’t move on fast enough, or lacks tension and conflict, in the middle part. I thought I understood this and was avoiding it, but no! I got involved in a sub-plot, forgot to move the story on fast enough and the result was saggy. I need to ramp up the tension, which will need some careful thought and some rewriting — but I’m sure I can find a way.
That will be my task for the next few weeks. Hopefully the book will emerge much improved!
Thanks for reading Writing my Novel! This post is public so feel free to share it.
Comments
Nothing yet. Say the first thing.
Sign in to join the conversation.