WRITING writing

Just when I think I can get on with a new novel, get the whole first draft done before the end of the year, I fall back under poetry’s wheels; in the last week alone I have dragged at least nine out of my head, some as responses from what’s happened in the world or on my journey to and from London. My writing group has decided to split our focus to give better attention to both prose and poetry so I am still working on the novel. Still trying to finish the third chapter. This is something I found in a notebook while going through a stack to hook out lines I wanted to keep/store/use in the future; it was a novel in eleven summarised chapters and some follow-on notes. I liked it, but couldn’t remember writing it; apparently I did this nine years ago preparing for National Novel-writing Month.

I don’t know if I wrote anything with it then, haven’t come across it and don’t want to go searching at this stage; I will when I finish the first draft. Tomorrow is a poetry day at the group but then I have a week to move into the fourth chapter and see how far I get...might even get the fifth done if poetry doesn’t kidnap me. I’m looking forward to reading two books on hypnotism I need to know for a dialogue between two characters..and am thinking that a blast on this front could zoom me well into the sixth chapter. Speaking of dialogue, I am also accidentally writing a play because my friend is sharing an exercise with me from a course she’s doing. So there’s that, and that’s great.

The year is looking productive, interesting and happy. There are three poetry books sitting almost ready to publish, just waiting for poems out in the world to be published in various mags. And, just as I thought I had rid myself of all the old poetry I found another cache in an old Dropbox file. So I have had to look at them, and found more than a few that could be renovated or just tweaked. Time for some serious filing to be done, for the good of all concerned. I can’t trust myself to remember some work never mind where I’ve put the bloody stuff. YWriter6 is the best place to store and find poems, so tonight I set up 2018 Poems and the loose and free young things are being stuffed in it.