Writing in progress

Haven't been blogging much this year, too busy writing and editing. Along with all my non-fiction writing work, have been editing the woman's story novel yet again, letting the mental health and family novel marinate while doing further research and thinking and jotting down the odd idea, and drafting and researching the new historians novel. And editing a few short stories in between. Phew! I'm not sure whether working on multiple tasks like this is a good idea or not, but it certainly keeps things interesting. And besides, the major fiction works are all at different stages.

I'm really pleased to report that after umpteenth drafts of the opening pages of the woman's story, I think I may finally have got it right. I have really struggled with this -- nothing I tried seemed to work. And you know how important opening pages are. It turned out that holding on to a particular scene was holding everything else back. I ended up moving two bits to two different parts of the book, making the opening a little less busy, and that seems to have smoothed things out. While it naturally will still need continued editing, I think the foundations are now stronger. It's a reminder that sometimes, to improve your writing, you just have to take stuff out.