Blog on

I've forgotten to write my blog a few times lately because I've been so engrossed in my MA proposal and the assessment work. Particularly the 12 page story for Derrek, which sounds, oh so simple, but in fact has been a killer. I haven't kept count of how many hours I've spent on it, which is probably a good thing. I've now decided that enough is enough and to stop aiming for perfection. If I could produce the perfect story, I'd be in Hollywood, right? So I've done my best and will just have to await the verdict.

I've also been reading the readable bits of the Writers' and Artists' Yearbook - in other words the pieces by successful authors, not the listings. There's a huge amount of information in there, a lot of it new to me, some encouraging and some despair-inducing. 20 years of poverty, anyone? That is the writer's lot according to some. I tell myself that only refers to novelists singlemindedly committed to their art and plod doggedly on. No, I am really not a novelist. Death struggles with story structure and the prospect of 20 years of poverty confirm it.