Some of the inspirations for my WIP, plus my inability to draw. Also, Yorkshire is entirely built of uphill - discuss.

You may, if you are assiduous followers of my blog (and no, assiduous doesn't mean that your bottom falls off in winter.  Although, if your bottom does fall off in winter you may want to see a doctor. And buy thicker trousers.  I can help you no further on this.) remember my trials and tribulations when I started out on writing the New Book, back in ..err...well, it was probably about last summer. Ish.  The one about the tea shop and the big house and all that.  Before I got distracted by The Cough..yes, I am now living my life in the state of dating things by whether or not they happened in the days before I coughed myself stupid or after. 

A sort of Post Cough ergo Propter Cough, if you will...

Anyway.  That book, titled 'Crush' for the moment, is the one I am finally limping to the end of.  Of which I am finally limping to the end, for all the grammatic pedants out there.  So I thought you might like a small glimpsette into a few of the things that have gone into the making of this one.

Firstly, the site plan.  Now, rarely has the total and complete inability to sketch been a real drawback in my daily life.  Of course, it stopped dead my nascent career as an archaeologist, because there's quite a lot of sketching in that, even if it's only layers of earth, and, believe me, it takes quite a lack of any skill whatsoever to be unable to draw layers of earth in a recognisable form, but I can manage it.  Imagine archaeologists all over the country (all right, imagine Tony if you must but be careful, you will go blind) holding up matrix sketches, turning them sideways and saying 'no, I give in, is it a sort of dog?' and you will be close.  So, when it comes to sketching out the plan of the buildings and the layout of my story...well.  You get something like this...



And then I went to visit the house where I sort-of based my story...

Yep, that's me on the bench, all hunched and wearing all the clothes I possess.  I wasn't feeling well, all right?  I think you can see how my sketch and the reality bear absolutely no resemblance to one another at all?  I like to think of it as a kind of reverse-talent, and as soon as I find a use for it, you will be among the first to know.

I can't even draw a straight line WITH A RULER.

I have just noticed that the above sketch contains two uphills.  And now I can't remember if that is one continuous uphill, or whether it goes uphill in one direction and downhill in the other - well, obviously it does because that is how hills work, if they were uphill in both directions they'd be impossible.  Although I have been on walks (particularly post Cough) that do seem to be entirely uphill even when ending up back at the original starting position.  I am convinced that Yorkshire is not built on normal principles, and is entirely built of Uphill, except on those occasions when, eg, you drop the dog's ball and it rolls considerably further than either your, or the dog's, enthusiasm can take you.

There is also some of this...

In the book, I mean, not in Yorkshire.  Well, yes, in Yorkshire too, but you know what I mean.  And this...

And ghosts. But I can't find a picture of those. 

Anyway.  That's a little bit of what's gone into the latest book.  Now, I must stop procrastinating and actually finish it, otherwise this entire exercise has been a bit of a waste of time.

Except the cakes. Cakes are never a waste of time.