Sunday, September 13, 2015

Boot has a night out

So tonight, I took the poorly leg to meet friends at Bill's in Norwich. The burgers there are amazing. I also had a rather unusual cocktail called a Raspberry and Rosehip Collins which was rather yummy - and a Bill's cider.



Boot was not happy as had to spend most of the evening under the table, Here is a picture of boot sulking.

Saturday, September 12, 2015

Have boot will travel

Today I took the poorly leg to Oxburgh Hall, a lovely 15th century house in Norfolk owned by the National Trust. There were a few Tudor stalls there and there was an oppotunity to try on costumes (boot refused point blank).

The house is a lot like Hampton Court albeit on a much smaller scale and it has a huge moat with crocodiles, sharks and piranha fish so no swimming is allowed.


Here's us posing with the house in the background. You can probably just make out the moat.


 
We had a lovely lunch then stopped to play chess, but boot got in the way and kept 'accidentally' knocking the pawns over. This is how it looked before we started playing.







 And afterwards...






 

 

 Finally, on the way out we had a look at the plants and flowers which were 'bootiful' (*sighs*). They have a great variety of apple trees there plus a climbing pear tree which you weren't aloowed to climb !?!
Still, a lovely afternoon.

Friday, September 11, 2015

Meeting author Meg Rosoff again.

Yesterday, the poorly leg and I took the train to Cambridge to attend the annual Philippa Pearce Lecture at Homerton College with my SCBWI group. This great event is actually free and followed by a wine reception afterwards (also free!) The committee rely entirely on donations to provide such events and on the goodwill of Homerton College. Amazing and so well attended.

This year the speaker was the lovely Meg Rosoff, author of How I Live Now among others. It was a wonderful lecture, truly inspiring and in many ways reassuring to the way I write. I was also a big girly fan and asked her to sign a book for me. I was delighted that she remembered me from our previous meeting at a SCBWI conference in Winchester where I had my photo taken with her.  No photo this time, but here's the earlier one. We really are best friends you know. :)

We all got together for a lovely meal afterwards (not Meg!) which was lovely and gave us a chance to catch up on our authory exploits. A great evening. 

Special thanks to Alice Turner for chauffeuring me from the train station to the venues and back on account of my poorly leg. :)

#YA #YAlit #Kidlitchat

Wednesday, September 09, 2015

Editing first draft with a poorly leg.

I have finally finished the first draft of the Iron City which is brilliant - finishing the book, that is. I am not claiming that the book is brilliant as that would be a little big headed. In its present state it is an okay book, but it needs a lot of work on it. Argh!

   Working on the first draft edits is where I act as the reader and just read it through making sure it flows and that I haven't left chunks out. Because of the way I write, this is so necessary as I jump around all the time when I'm writing (not literally, especially with a poorly leg) so I could work on an end piece then dart back to a more middling part. It all depends how excited I am at the time.

   There are also lots of questions I need to make sure I know the answers to. Here's a few examples of questions I had to research:
  • How far can a healthy person walk in one day?
  • Where would you hit someone in the face to knock them out?
  • How much weight could a typical teenager carry?
  • What's the inside of your elbow called?

See, and you thought being a writer was all about the glamorous things in life! I'll let you know when other questions pop up in further edits. :)

Here's a photo of my poorly foot until then.

 Ooops! Wrong photo.



#AmWriting, #AmEditing, #YALit, #YA