Andy Murray Season

Well, it's been a while! I didn't mean to leave it so long, whoops. Anyway, the end of term has been and gone, and it was crazy as ever. Sad to leave, again, and I realised I've been doing this whole packing up for the summer thing for ten years, which is impressive really. Although I can pack very quickly now, it seems that I can't pack concisely however, which can be a little problematic. Also, the amount of books that I gain over one year is frankly impressive. Anyway, I overcame that and managed to say goodbyes (which I hate) and leave everyone, which was very sad. And I am now back home in Sussex, for the summer (which doesn't seem to have emerged yet). After a chaotic return, which included getting overly excited about the Queens final (Murray, whoop!) and the Rally Against Cancer organised by Ross Hutchins, which was fantastic and a brilliant cause, trying to unpack all the books I obtained during the year, swimming outside for the first time this year (yay!) and then getting a horrible summer cold... totally not related, I'm sure. Managed to catch up somewhat briefly with my school friends, which was wonderful.

Oh yeah, and seeing Neil Gaiman! Which was AMAZING. He talks so wonderfully, and he is so inspiring and just brilliant. And his new book is fantastic - The Ocean at the End of the Lane - you should read it if you haven't, because it is brilliant!

Went to the Eastbourne tennis too, and saw one of the women's doubles semi finals and the men's doubles final with Colin Fleming and Johnny Marray, which was fantastic. It's most definitely tennis season. Which brings me onto... Wimbledon, which starts tomorrow. I am SO excited! Totally ready for this, can't wait! Best two weeks of the year. Let's just hope the weather improves. Although a little saddened to think that last year this was the beginning of a fantastic summer of sport. Sigh. Anyway, we're heading to Wimbledon on Tuesday (eeeek!) so excited, it's going to be brilliant. And tomorrow Andy's campaign starts, and James Ward is playing too, and he's awesome. Well, there go the next two weeks!

Writing wise, I have started editing my latest project, and I am so into this story - these characters dominate my thoughts a lot of the time, which is kinda awesome. At the same time, it's weird to be home, because it seems that a lot of the ideas and inspiration from the setting came from here, which is good for adding detail to the setting and everything, but at the same time, just bizarre. Like confronting my story. But so far, the editing is going well. I have added lots of details, and am also deleting things that aren't relevant, doing some rearranging and everything. I even had a moment a few weeks ago (I know, I should blog more, I don't know what happened) when I was talking with a friend and she was talking about something that was irritating in an acquaintance (I honestly can't remember the details) and I was there thinking, yeah I know someone just like that, and tried to think about who it was I was thinking of, only to realise it was one of my characters. Yeah. So there's that. These characters are taking over my life. Which is clearly a good thing and I am kinda in love with this story. It just feels right. So much editing to do, but it is kind of exciting, and I kind of love it. Despite plans to start other projects, think I might just focus on this one for now, and make plans for others for another time. That seems the best thing. Weird how things turn out - especially after swearing to myself I would focus on MG because YA stressed me out too much and didn't work. Of course then comes along a YA story that just clicks! Well, I'm not going to complain about that. Not at all!

June and finished first drafts

How is it June already? The last few weeks have disappeared, and dare I say it, summer is here.

I mentioned a while ago I was working on a new project, and if you follow me on twitter you will have seen me tweet an awful lot about it. But I finally finished typing up the first draft from my very messy handwriting, which was a great relief. The lovely Laura,my wonderful CP, has been reading it as I type it up and has been an amazing encouragment and has been super supportive and just generally awesome! So thanks Laura! And now it's all typed up, I'm going to start reading it through again, make some editing notes, notes of scenes and details and all of that to add, as the first draft is at points rather skeleton. Phew! Lots to do! But I'm still rather in love with this story and its characters, which I reckon is a good sign and I'm looking forward to doing lots more work on it.

And I'm looking forward to the summer, with hopefully lots of swimming, tennis, reading and writing. And Queens starts next week - followed by Eastbourne, then Wimbledon! The best two weeks of the year. So excited!

Anyway, I'm off to go read and make some notes in the sunshine. Got to make the most of it!