Hello, my friends and the occasional relative! Pusillanimous. A long time ago a girl asked me what word she was thinking. I said pusillanimous, thinking it a fancy word she’d be deeply unlikely to be thinking (and which I didn’t understand the meaning of, I just liked the way it sounded, an upmarket purple of …
Continue reading Hyperfactual transmission: A new origin for an old phrase
Hello, my friends and the occasional relative! I have not made much progress this week. My day job has been rather more demanding recently, but that isn’t the excuse. Or if it is, it’s a bit lame. The book is ready. I have progressed with formatting, but not enough. And the fact is I’m not …
Hello, my friends and the occasional relative! I have had two full strength coffees. I should be powered up beyond belief. But I ate two grotesquely sugared cookies (I was sugar free for about 5 months this year and fell off the wagon just before Hallowe’en, not a good time to give in to temptation! …
Continue reading Jazzed to Sluggishly Meet you, My dear Boswell.
Hello, my friends and the occasional relative! Each week can bring surprising changes. A couple of weeks ago I wasn’t thinking I’d be leaving this house any time soon. Now there are floor plans and to do lists. Last week when I wrote my blog I didn’t know I’d be offered the chance to have …
Hello, my friends and the occasional relative! Final proofing progress now 63%. Getting there. This meant sadly that my self-directed learning has slowed considerably, but hey ho, progress on the book comes first. I did find time to flesh out some more ideas for the next book, writing down what has been percolating in my …
Continue reading The Distraction of Ideas and the Need for Careful Construction
Hello, my friends and the occasional relative! I have recently experienced an epiphany. I’ve always written fantasy. Soon # 3 will be out, (my proof of a printed version is complete, and many benefits to the text have been obtained by that tactile appraisal of the text) and again, like the first two I have …
Continue reading Finding Voice in a Language Neglected: the Long Road Towards Mastery of Scots
Hello, my friends and the occasional relative! Very late today, because I worked Monday and Tuesday, which is most unusual. I am a dreamer, I dream vividly. This week, before both of the aforementioned workdays, I played in multiple dreamscapes, some more obviously linked than others. The dreams I awoke from on Monday were so …
Hello, my friends and the occasional relative! Procrastination and doubt. I have written about doubt before, in a series I think. It was quite a long time ago. I thought I had compartmentalized my doubt: not exactly put it away, but perhaps contained it. I felt confident I had developed the tools and the knowledge …
Hello, my friends and the occasional relative! I proceed apace, copy edit now at 69-72% complete (no graphic), depending upon criteria. Given that positive progress, and multiple walks in wind and sun, my mind has been turning to the next story to obsess me. I wrote two excerpts yesterday, plus a brief reminder to myself …
Continue reading Falling in love with my next novel, one conversation at a time…
Hello My friends and the occasional relative! On a wall, in a bathroom, lived a laminate. Beneath that laminate the chipboard swelled, and grew warped with time, but for years I beheld the message that laminate traced for me, and like it or not, some of the phrases never left me, or versions of them …
Roderick T. Macdonald 