Well of Silence

Sometimes, a novelist's life is not a particularly glamorous one.

Yes, we spend most of our time at book launches and parties and gala lunches and book award ceremonies and hanging around the Groucho Club drinking martinis. I don't deny it.

But sometimes - just sometimes - we have to do some writing.

Then, worse - much worse than that - at some point we have to Do Our Edits.

I've yet to meet a novelist who enjoys doing edits. This is probably because they usually have to be done very quickly, and because our editors suddenly find things which are wrong, which we hadn't noticed, but which now have to be put right, and smartish, too.

I'm in Dreaded Edit Land right now, and finding all sorts of things which need changing. So I'm doing my best to crack on, stay cheerful, and meet my deadline.

I need a double gin.