I have just completed my National Novel Writing Month project for July. It was touch and go on a number of occasions but I am proud to announce that the first draft of The Gift Shop is now complete. It’s one of the most personal stories I’ve ever written and, as tends to be the case, is about death and sex and drugs and time travel.
I’m gonna go and drink beer until I pass out.
In a weird twist of fate, I was asked a couple of months ago how I felt about a book group selecting one of my books to read. Understandably, I said I would be delighted. As the group was purely women I suggested Yallah! as being my most open and appropriate book for the audience. My other stuff is a bit too male-led and hideous in places. I was invited initially by Gina, a friend and colleague who is also a writer. I will often drop by her desk for a chat about books, mental health and anything else we feel like discussing.The group leader, Suzanne, read the opening chapter and said she would love for them to not only read the book but to also have me as a special guest at their meet up to discuss it.
The best part was I wouldn’t even need to put in for the lunchtime buffet they were ordering.
It was still with some trepidation that I headed off to the meeting with both Gina and Michelle, who had also picked up Yallah and decided to join the group. I felt nervous as we entered the pub and walked straight through to the back room, wondering if I should get a drink first. The room was full of women. They were everywhere. As soon as we walked in, their collective gaze turned and I was terrified and enthralled all at once.
We started with food while Suzanne waxed lyrical about my writing style and the content of Yallah. She had purposely brought hummus to make me feel more comfortable. Every step of the way I was surprised by how much they knew about me. It made sense because they had read a book about me and my thoughts on my experiences. It still felt strange.
After we had dined on fine vegetarian cuisine the questions started coming. They wanted to know more about the trip and the people I had trekked with. They wanted to know more about Alan the camel. They wanted to know if Saaid and Omar were as much fun as they had seemed. If the food had been as good as I had made it out to be in the book. What it had been like to walk so far in such heat. I started to relax and in the end I had a really good time.
I was amazed with the way they connected with my writing. I originally wrote Yallah to serve as a reminder of the first trek I ever took part in. The idea of it being accessible outside of that group amazed me.
We posed for photographs together and they said they would be interested in reading more of my work. I felt like a celebrity. They told me I was an old soul and we had a number of deep conversations about spirituality.
I cannot tell you how incredible it was to sit with them and talk to them about what we went through in the Sahara. It was an incredible and surreal experience and one I will never forget. I would like to thank the Wormettes for taking the time to read my work and for inviting me to join them.
They are total sweethearts.
That’s the number of words I have written this month. It’s probably more. I’ve sent a lot of text messages.
63,630 is my word count for National Novel Writing Month 2016. I’m calling it. It will now be some time before I can look at that book again but I am excited about it and pleased with what I have been able to do in just nineteen days.
I’m now suffering from Repetitive Strain Injury in both wrists and need to just sit and read something completely different to my own work.
Good luck to everyone else still writing.
Five years ago today I tragically lost a very good friend. How strange that time has been.
I often find myself thinking of him, wondering what he would make of the world as it is today.
There is no doubt in my mind that he wouldn’t have been happy with the ending of Peep Show or the way things have changed at work, or in the wider world, but I hope that in some way I am carrying the torch for him. Losing a friend when they are just twenty-seven years old is fucking gutting. Realising that you have passed the age they will always be is a weird thing to comprehend. All of us are changing so much. We are having kids and getting ourselves wrapped up in mortgages. The jobs we had for a laugh so we could spend our Friday and Saturday nights pissing it up the wall are slowly turning into careers and we are losing sight of those teenage daydreams and becoming functioning adults who talk about politics and cavity wall insulation.
There will always be a little part of whatever I get myself wrapped up in that will be intrinsically linked to what he would have made of it and that cannot be helped. I’m glad of it in fact. In many ways I think we are pushed to perform and to achieve because life really is too fucking short. I miss Danny every day. I see him in the faces of strangers. I hear him at the end of corridors that I can’t get far enough down in time. His influence echoes in the best possible way.
As a result of knowing him I have so many friends. I will always be thankful to him for that. I will always be thankful to them for sticking around. He had an ability to throw people together and expect them to stick, and for the most part, it had to work.
At his funeral, Sam read from Perks Of Being A Wallflower, Danny’s favourite contemporary book. I would like to paraphrase from it here:
“I was suddenly very aware of the fact it was me standing up in that tunnel with the wind over my face. Not caring if I saw downtown. Not even thinking about it. Because I was standing in the tunnel. And I was really there. And that was enough to make me feel infinite.”
Please look after yourselves and cultivate relationships with those you truly care about. You never know when that time could be over and it will always be too soon.
They say the first cut is the deepest. By they, I mean animal-print-clad pork swordsman Rod Stewart. I can’t account for that. I suppose it’s possible the first cut could be like a tester and then they could really take the plunge. Initially see how malleable the flesh is, then go up to the hilt.
Where was I? Oh yes, National Novel Writing Month.
This year is my fifth go at NaNoWriMo, a personal challenge of the highest order where participants seek to write a 50,000 word novel in just 30 days.
How could someone possibly do that? you cry.
Well, it breaks down to 1,667 words a day. Piece of piss.
No, literally, how could someone do that?
Also a good question. It turns out that you have to give up an awful lot in order to keep the writing wolf from the door, or invite him in and eat him, I’m lost in metaphors this week. Yesterday I didn’t leave my flat. I stayed in and clocked up over six thousand words, taking breaks to watch Parks & Recs, my latest addiction in between. I probably could have written more but one of my hands went numb, my eyes were streaming and I had a friend over for chilli and cuddles.
Yesterday I managed to hit 20,000 words. I’m immensely proud of having already made it to this point. I would be prouder if I hadn’t learned that someone in the group finished NaNoWriMo in three days. But it’s not a competition and we are all winners just for taking part.
So keep on trucking. You’re doing great. Weekends are good for catching up if you’re fortunate enough to not have to work. If you do have to work then write notes for yourself through the course of the day or dictate the next chapter to yourself. It can help to access that conversational part of your brain that equates so well to storytelling.
So that’s it, I’m 20k in, but I’m not over the hump yet. Even with the halfway point in sight and possible today I’m already assuming I’ll write around 75k.
Peace.
It’s that time of year again when I’m panicking and making spreadsheets and clearing my diary and wondering how close to the brink I will get as I throw myself into another novel-writing month.
For those who are new to the project, here are my tips from earlier this year when I took part in Camp NaNoWriMo:
In February 2016 I spent a week in a gypsy caravan where I recorded twenty songs in the hopes it could become my first album. It was bitterly cold and I had to turn off the storage heater in between takes. I brought home those songs and let them sit for a little while. Then I started tinkering.
This week I finally finished tinkering and am happy to announce that my first fully-functioning album, Workbook, is available now.
You can download it for free. All I want is to share my music and enjoy the fact I’ve managed to get this project together. I’m immensely proud and enjoyed the process so much that I’m already planning a follow up.
I love the idea of now making videos for the tracks. The first of which, for the opening song, Sometime Later, is here.
I’m a chancer. That’s a given. I will take any opportunity. I’m happy to take a leg up. I enter a lot of competitions. I apply for a lot of things and I always live in hope that one day one of them would get me to the place I want to be.
The latest of those is the World Nomads Travel Film Scholarship 2016.
This includes a ten day all-expenses-paid trip to Vietnam and four day workshop with travel filmmaker Brian Rapsey.
You can view my entry above and the video is below. I’ve taken a page from my upcoming book on the Inca Trail in combination with video from my trip there in 2014.
Day 24 of Camp NaNoWriMo 2016. 38,000 words in.
The countdown is saying I’m going to finish on the 1st August which is technically outside of July. Once you’re into August it’s time up. That means I need to write more words than I currently am. I’ve never taken part in Camp NaNoWriMo and not won so I think my pride will get the better of me and I’ll really push this thing along before next Sunday.
There have been some days this week when I didn’t write at all. It’s not so much that the story is stuck, simply that I’ve had other stuff on, which is fine. Then the weekend comes along and I’ve got more time to myself. I can sit and write and get on with things. I’ve written 2,400 already and I’m going to try and smash out a couple more.
I hit a point this morning where suddenly everything that happens from here on in makes a lot of sense. I wrote a plot-point in today and it all feeds in. I get where the characters are going. It’s definitely not going to be finished at 50,000 words. If I hit 50k before the end of the month then I’ll be really pleased with myself. If I can spend evenings this week going beyond that point and getting the story finished as well then that’s fantastic. It’s probably going to be closer to 70k. That’s a lot. When you consider I’ve only written 8,000 this week I know I’m going to be hard pushed. I am a sucker for punishment though.
I hope all of your projects are going well and that you’re looking forward to finishing and indulging yourselves a little bit.
Peace.
Paul Schiernecker 