Out on the water

Have you noticed how hard it is to take a screen break these days? Don't want to watch TV? Why not read - oh wait, my Kindle doesn't count as a screenbreak. Go on the computer, then? No...that's not going to work. Text my friends? No, that won't cut it either. So what am I meant to do? Stare into space? Well, on a beautiful spring day like today, I should probably head out for a run, but I have 30 000 words to write this month and a novel to edit and pitch before July. So back to work it is - except here I am, not working, but blogging.

I have written almost 2000 words today on my Camp Nanowrimo project, so I won't call it a complete failure. If I manage to get to 3000 I might even call it a success.

Meanwhile, in actual blog-worthy news, I went out on the water yesterday with my husband and my brother as one of my field trips. In Chase, my main character is escaping captivity in the drowned fens, and so she and her companion, Will, go part of the way by boat. I have been canoeing before, but not for a long time. As my brother works at an activity centre where they have such things, and because he is acting as my mentor/sponsor, he offered to take me out on the water so I could get a feel for what it's actually like. Well, it was beautiful.

You can't really tell from this picture, but it was actually a really nice day yesterday. Bright, but cold. At one point it started to snow (are you kidding me, 1st April??), which was fine because it's freezing cold in my book, so it was all good research. Actually, the effort of paddling kept me warm enough - well that and the thermal undies.

It really is a beautiful way to travel - the water was still and clear, the reeds were making a nice gentle shushing sound, and it's fairly companionable - as long as your companion can steer ok. (No comment.) At one point we just stopped for about 5 minutes and watched a barn owl swooping and hovering, obviously looking for something to eat. Just beautiful. And if it weren't for the few solitary people walking along the river we would have been completely alone. There's also that feeling - a little bit Thelma and Louisey without the suicide - that we could just keep going. What if we just followed the river all the way to its source, or all the way to the sea?

My brother gave me some useful pointers about the technical elements of canoeing, and I got a feeling for what it's like to paddle for any length of time, and the way the wind makes your eyes stream and how you have to work together to get the boat to move how you want it to move. None of this is especially eloquent, but I'm hoping it will make that part of the book more descriptive when I go back to redraft. *Sigh* I do not enjoy redrafting. Anyway, I will leave you with some pictures of us enjoying the canoe. Happy writing, people!

 

 

 

 

 

Balancing fact and fiction

This blog comes from a place of exhaustion. After a full day in Switzerland on Thursday, I had a late night on Friday making this:

It's a cupcake bouquet.

Then, I was up early yesterday for a weekend in London where I went on a massive walking tour - again - for more research. I wanted to go and see the Thames Barrier Information Centre. I'm no good at buses, so I got a train up to North Greenwich and then walked. It's far. I have blisters on blisters. The information centre was relatively informative. I was basically trying to work out whether or not London would be flooded in the future I've invented where much of the east of England is under water. Having read what I read, I decided that the government probably invested significantly in London's flood defences at the expense of the rest of the country.

This is the Thames Barrier.

I feel like I'm trying to find a balance right now between something that is believable and the story I want to tell. What's frustrating about some of the YA lit - or in fact, any books - is that sometimes they start the story at a convenient point where whatever the situation is, it's been that way for a long while and so the characters no longer dwell on the 'why'. Why, in The Hunger Games, is the rest of the world allowing Panem to get away with treating its people like that? Who, in the world of Divergent, originally thought 'You know what we should do? Let's split people up into Factions and assume that the majority of people slot nicely into one specific Faction'. I love both those books - have read them multiple times - so this isn't a criticism; it's just an observation. I'm sure the authors know the answers - and possibly, in the case of Divergent, all will be revealed in the end - but it was something I puzzled over after I'd read the books. In Chase, I would like to be able to reveal enough of the background to my dystopia that the 'why' can be understood. Probably overly ambitious, given I don't want it to be ridiculously long, but that's the reason for all the field trips. And now, all the blisters. Ouch.

Here's a gratuitous shot of London at night, just because it's pretty.

Picture this with no traffic, no tourists, no lights...That's the London Chase is looking at.

Method writing?

Yesterday I had to go to Switzerland for work. Whilst waiting for my (delayed) flight in the airport, I wrote you a lovely little blog post about making the most of your travels. I was almost all done when my wifi connection ran out, and sadly it didn't save. Don't you hate it when that happens? Makes you realise the importance of backing up your work!

Anyway, I talked about not only going out and seeking inspiration (like on my field trips), but also soaking up the inspiration from all around. I've got a little bit Dawson's Creek about the whole thing, tending to over analyse everything I'm thinking and feeling, physically and emotionally. So now when I go for a run, I imagine what it would be like to run for long periods of time for the sake of a journey - how the air feels in my lungs, the way the ground blurs past, how the day sounds compared to the evening, how long there is between sunset and dusk, that sort of thing. And then I push myself into a sprint and try to feel what it would be like to be running away. How long can I sustain the speed? What does it do to my body? How does it affect my other senses?

It makes running more interesting, anyway.

Yesterday after I'd done what I went to Zurich to do, I walked for hours in heels and a pencil skirt, while carrying my 'luggage' of sorts. It's a world away from the experiences of my main character, Chase (hence the name of the book), and yet by the end of the day I was exhausted and my feet were so, so painful. In fact, they still hurt now. It feels like the soles are bruised. Chase is on the run from her captors throughout much of this novel, so even while I'm moaning about the state of my feet, I'm thinking - I can use this.

Is there such a thing as method writing?

So anyway, here is a picture of what I walked miles to find: a post-work tourist snap of Zurich for your viewing pleasure. Quite the relief to come across this after getting lost in the seedier part of town. Let's hope Chase has a better sense of direction than I do!

 

Field trips

Chase is set in a dystopian version of the UK at a time about 40 years after the Disassociation, when the country decided to cease all contact with the outside world. I can't really research what that would be like, since we seem to have been connected with the outside world since the dawn of ships, but I have been on a couple of field trips to get a sense for some of the places mentioned in the book. First up, the drowned fens:



Beautiful in a desolate sort of way. I wish I knew how to attach the sound recording I made so you could hear the reeds. When I say they were 'rush'ing in the wind, I mean it in the most onomatopaeic way possible. Ruuuussssssssssssssssssshhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

 

 

Next, a visit to the capital to take a look at Canary Wharf:

 

 

I mean, maybe it's the weather, but don't these places just look dystopian to you? Look at these guys -

Miserable bankers.

Anyway, so it turns out field trips can be fun. And useful. I'd already finished the first draft when I visited Canary Wharf, so seeing how huge it is has really made me think about the way I've written it. Definitely need to make some changes. Of course, in my vision of the future, the whole place has been destroyed by riots, but I think that part will have to be left to my imagination...

Next field trip: my brother has agreed to take me out on the water for a two-man canoe lesson. Should be interesting. Quality time out on the water with my bro could lead to some quality fratricide.