Polka dot pants

I've hardly read anything recently. Life has been hectic and my laptop takes a million years to boot up so all the books i've bought on kindle in the last couple of months (including yours, fellow authors) are largely languishing unappreciated. Somebody i know read Echo on his iPhone. We were a bit sceptical, but it worked for him - he could read a bit of book every time he had 5-10 minutes to spare.

My ipod won't do that since it had 50 minutes in a 40 degree dark wash - the apps work but the wireless appears to be gone forever and the battery life is now less than a mayfly's.


However, i'm fairly hopeful that i'm about to enter the 21st century and get an ipad. Because:

a) it's my birthday shortly
b) i've been muttering about it for ages
c) it's tax deductable
d) everybody else has one
e) my wife is getting a bluetooth hands free car kit
f) i really really want one

:-)

That's an aside really. I came on to write about E2. I'm in the middle of chapter 4 and i'm concious that it's a real frippery and doesn't move the plot on. But then there are chapters of Echo that are about people rather than plot development.

I should just plough on and let the beta readers decide if it stays. E2 is sooooo  much harder than Echo to write. I suspect it's a reaction to the teasing i get at work, particularly about the sex scenes and particularly particularly about the polka dot pants. i threw that in for a laugh and to try and add a bit of colour and humour, but hardly a day goes by when it doesn't get thrown into a conversation.

Beware sex scenes, murders and continuity errors. Also beware loose ends. The AltSpace monsters were intended to be a cameo, but i now have to think about where they can fit into E2/3. Hopefully it won't need a shoe horn

on an unrelated note, i had a conversation with a reader

"i'm reading your book."
"are you enjoying it?"
"i started reading and then realised, oh, it's science fiction" (i would hve thought the spaceship on the cover was a givaway)
"oh, sorry about that."
"and then there's all these murders." (read the blurb!- Echo murdered her way....)

Ashley McCook blogged about how hard the blurb was to write but how important it was when choosing a book. Unless, of course, the reader doesn't take any notice of it.


So, beware polka dot pants, they can bite you (hopefully metaphorically)

How do you comfort the grammar police?

Give them a big hug and say "Their, there, they're."

I've been reading the hard copy of Echo and the typos are just flying off the page. I went through the e version, then printed it out and went through it again, although to save trees it was two pages per side, so it wasn't that big.

Everybody says you should get a professional editor to avoid these things but something like that would have been a massive outlay when i didn't expect it to get read by more than a handful of people.

A few people have expressed an interest in buying the actual book. It's slightly embarrasing when people are shelling out a couple of quid, but the paperback is £7.99 on Feedareed.com. If people want the book i'm going to have to go through it, make all the changes and upload it again. I can also re-upload to Kindle and list it for free for a week so that people who bought it can download a copy without all the mistakes (including one use of the wrong sort of their (there, they're). Not that i mind, but it's not as much fun as writing Echo2.

Having said that, Echo2 isn't much fun at the moment. I've just finished chapter 3 but there's a pressure for it to be as good as the original. Self imposed pressure, but still real. Echo was never meant to be read which allowed me to write whatever i wanted. I'd like to write E2 with the same freedom, but i don't think that's going to happen. I now understand the difficult-second-album syndrome that effects bands.

Does it matter if E2 is rubbish? Not in the grand scheme of things, no, but a remarkable number of people have said very kind things about Echo and i don't want to disappoint them with a disappointing follow up.

Anybody else have this problem?

Cooler than Jean Claude Van Da**e's dangly bits

The postman brought me a package today. It was very exciting, not just because, in the digital age, i don't get much post (even the bills are online now) but because it was the size and weight of a book. A real book.

This one


















Unfortunately, unlike Ashley McCook (hi Ashley) i won't be selling hundreds of these in Waterstones. This is the only one.

Since writing that last sentence, somebody has asked for a signed copy. For his Dad

At some point i must mention to my Dad that i've written a book. I think he's the only person left alive that i haven't told. I haven't quite figured out why i'm so reticent.

I've had a flick through and there are bits i don't remember writing. I think i'm going to actually read it

A good day :-)