The home straight

A week of snow and some great walking, even if the writing has been a bit of a struggle.

We are nearly into February and in a way this is my first real blog of the year. I have already fallen behind with my novel. The end is tantalisingly close but I’m struggling to finish the draft. There’s a nagging little demon that tells me it’s no good and whilst it remains unfinished I’ve got a good excuse not to show it to anyone. If I have a new year’s resolution it has to be to learn to ignore the little voice of doom in my head and finish the damn thing for good or ill.

I have however been doing a lot of reading. In our house books usually feature heavily amongst the gifts at Christmas and this year was no exception. All of them physical books of course, ebooks don’t quite cut it as a present. You can’t wrap them and leave them under the tree.

I love books, not just the words inside but as objects in their own right. One of my most treasured possessions is a first edition copy of Our Mutual Friend by Charles Dickens, given to me for a landmark birthday. Originally published in 1865 by Chapman and Hall in two volumes and later rebound in one. Though not, alas, signed by the author it does form a tangible link to the past that an ebook can’t.

Traditional book or ebook? Both have their place.

That’s not to say, that I don’t like ebooks. I have the complete works of Charles Dickens on my Kindle along with all the other books accumulating there, including a few that I’ve already forgotten about. They weigh nothing and as long as I remember to keep it charged I can get a quick reading fix at any time just be dipping in my handbag.

It has other uses too. I keep a copy of my novel on it. I can read out extracts from it when I’m at my writing group. I can sit down, as I did recently, and read the whole thing through. The formatting is a bit basic but because it looks like a ‘real’ book, you can get a good feel of what is wrong and what is right with it.

The Kindle has also been useful for research. Since my novel is set in the nineteenth century, I’m much indebted to Project Gutenberg. Volunteers all around the world are digitising out-of-copyright books for free download from the Project Gutenberg website and I’ve been able access many strange and obscure books that would have otherwise been difficult to get hold of.

At home the old yellowing paperbacks are gradually being replaced on the one hand by smart new hardback editions or by the more ephemeral ebook.

For me physical books and ebooks are not an either or. Both have their place.

This week’s excuse…

I finished the 80,000+ word draft of my novel but I knew even as I was writing it that I was unhappy with one of the plot threads. The denouement was overly complicated and involved one character explaining the whole thing to another. Never a good thing except in Agatha Christie novels. Then it came to me what I should do, the clues were there for the most part and even though I was the author I hadn’t seen them. So it needs a bit of a rewrite, but nothing too major. Must buckle down and get it out there. I’m rapidly running out of excuses.

Thinking time consisted of a walk into Leicester City Centre. It takes about an hour and a half from my house but sadly the route passes through the less than idyllic Frog Island area of Leicester. The old factory building (top two pictures and bottom right) looks as though it’s in the process of being demolished but in fact it’s been in that state since vandals broke in and set fire to it in 2011. This, alas, seems to be the fate of too many of the old Victorian factories in Leicester. It’s soul destroying.

However, close by in High Cross Street stands All Saints Church which has a charming clock above one of its doors. The church was left stranded when they built the inner ring road and is no longer used for worship. Perhaps though the surrounding area will be sympathetically developed in the near future and the church will find itself in good company again.

I took these photos at noon just as the little men were hammering on their bells. I wander how often they manage to make themselves heard above the noise of the traffic.

Thinking Time

I'm not planning to blog every day but I’m keen to get started with a proper first post, so here goes.

Thinking time is as important as writing time and the best way for me to let the mind wander is to take the body for a walk. Not always easy with the erratic weather we’re having at the moment. Normally it’s one of the best times of year for walking but this year so much of the land around here is either water logged or flooded.

However, taking advantage of a fine day a week or so ago, I took my camera to Bradgate Park. Normally I’d walk there across the fields and avoid the car parking charges but as the footpaths have been reduced to quagmires, I drove. It was worth the money though.

Bradgate Park consists of about 830 acres of bracken-covered hills interspersed with ancient trees and rocky out crops. It was once a medieval deer park and is still home to herds of red and fallow deer. Bradgate House, now just a ruin was formally the home of the Grey family and birthplace of the ill-fated Lady Jane Grey.

The low sun at this time of year brings out some amazing variations in colours, not just in the oranges and reds that you might expect but also here and there, splashes of purple and magenta. It’s truly magical. I'm not sure my pictures do it justice but they’ll give you a taster.

And to think they once planned to build the M1 motorway right through the middle of the park!