Green fields. Buzzing insects. Hardly a hint of civillisation. Cornwall may have its disadvantages, but it’s a gorgeous contrast from London, and the time I’m spending here is doing me the world of good. Since the last entry, we voyaged down to my sister’s place in Devon, had a beautiful trip up onto Dartmoor (plenty of sun, for once, which actually has me worried- the whole place was looking kind of dusty and yellow, and this is at the beginning of summer before the major sun has kicked in), had a trip on Sunday to meet up with my Mum that turned dramatic for a wide variety of complex (and not easy to describe) experiences, ate pizza, watched a whole lotta movies (Revenge of the Sith for the second time- it’s the best of the prequels, but deary me there’s still some dodgy dialogue there. Take the eye candy away, and that film would be in serious trouble), ate some gorgeous cheesecake, and then headed down to Cornwall on Monday evening. Since then, life has been slower and quite lovely- Dad’s place is a distance away from anywhere inparticular and has a truly wonderful garden that’s full of exciting nooks and crannies.

Yesterday we spent lolling around and being lazy, but today we went for a walk through Tehidy Woods, and down into Portreath, the village where I grew up. We went along a route that I haven’t been along for a very long time, and there were quite a few eerie moments when my memories were almost being “overlaid” onto what I was seeing. Strange, deja-vu-but-not-deja-vu moments, but it was great getting the chance to do that with George, who was very game for the walk despite not feeling fantastic when she first woke up. We eventually descended all the way into Portreath itself, ended up walking past the house where I grew up (again, a weird experience), and were finally picked up by Dad. All on a nice, warm day, and a walk with plenty of shady spots. There was enough variety and enough moments where there wasn’t anyone else around to make it very, very satisfying. I can see us wanting to get as far away from civillisation as we can as we get older.

Week Eight of Who- and because of my sister’s slightly bizarre decision to (a) buy a highly expensive Hi-Def compatible television and (b) not actually plug the video recorder into it (instead, there’s a slightly confusing collection of audio visual equipment upstairs, wired into an arial-less telly), this was the first Who episode since 1983 that I didn’t get to record. And, of course, it turned out to be one of the best of the season so far- a minimum of cheery one-liners, and a maximum of genuinely atmospheric spookiness. All a huge rip-off of Event Horizon, but none the worse for it.

Hopefully, we should be able to meet up with my friend Tris before we head back- something which doesn’t happen often enough. Other than that, the plan is to relax, stay calm, and take stock of the situation with the novel. It’s possible that I’ve actually cracked one area of the characterisation, although it’s possible that I might think differently once I actually come to write down what’s in my head. Only time will tell…

Setting off for Devon tomorrow. I’m mostly packed, but afflicted with a horrible sense of fatigue that makes me terribly paranoid that I’m not going to remember everything. At the least, I have printed out the entirety of the novel as it stands at the moment. 262 pages of very small, widely formatted single space type. The grand total? 141,000 words. And that’s still with bits missing, and gaps to fill. I’m looking forward to getting out of London, and not having to think about the book for a little while. Everything is too hot and too clammy here. Still, the journey begins.

More details soon…

I don’t like blogging when I’m feeling depressed. It feels wrong, or like it would be rather self-indulgent, so I’ve been slightly avoiding it for the last few days, simply because getting sustained work done on the novel has become very, very tough. There have been plenty of moments that have been the equivalent of getting 3/4 of the way through building a skyscraper only to look down at the foundations and think “Uh-oh…”, but I think I have actually succeeded in getting past them. It’s been affecting my sleep, as well- I’ve been getting up progressively earlier (5.30 am, which has left me feeling somewhat zonked), but thankfully I’ve got one more day, and then George and I are off to my sister’s place in Devon for the weekend, and then I’m down in Cornwall with my dad for the rest of the week.

I’m going to try and leave the book alone for that entire week, so that I can get back, do some furious rewriting, and hopefully be in a good enough headspace to also begin some film journalism work as well. It’d be very easy to continue in this mode for a very long time, and while it’s been fantastic saying “Bollocks to it!” and doing very little other than writing for the past month and a half, I am going to have to balance it out with some genuine work soon in order to survive longer. I am, at least, paid up to survive on my current monthly wage (which isn’t much) until the beginning of September, and that’s with attending the Edinburgh Festival as well. I am terribly tired at the moment, and intermittently convinced that the weird, sexy, action-packed comic-book-style sci-fi romp that I’ve been writing doesn’t actually work, but I know that this has been exceptionally good for me. Whatever happens, I’ll be able to get to the end of this year and say “I have written my first novel!” I might not get any further than that, but hell, it’s better than a lot of people manage. I’m going to get there. And it’s going to be fun.

Week Seven of Who continued the downward spiral- especially disappointing considering it was written by the usually reliable Mark Gatiss. Maureen Lipman as a camp, evil TV intelligence shouting things like “Hungry!!” and “I’m going to eat you up!” is something I could definitely have done without…

My life for the last two weeks has been mainly typing, typing and more typing, followed by some stress, a Doctor’s appointment, a minor foot injury that’s not in a hurry to go away quickly, and a general sense of disbelief that I’m well over 100,000 words into the novel. I’m not quite at the “light at the end of the tunnel”, but I can at least smell the air coming in from the other exit. I’ve still got an awful lot of work to do, and I’m still having to conceptualise certain sections of the story, but it’s going well. I’m being a little too slapdash at certain points in my working methods- the next one of these that I do, I’ve got to be much more organised. No way in hell am I stopping with this one…

Last week’s Who? Well, it had some decent moments, but was otherwise a bit of a runaround disappointment. The cascade of “WTF” moments shows no sign of stopping.

For sheer, unadulterated ludicrousness, however, look no further than X-MEN 3. If it was a stand-alone movie, it’d be a mediocre, overcrowded superhero flick with plenty of spectacle but little else. Coming on the heel of X2, however, this is a real mess- bland, unengaging, and on the verge of turning into a Chekov play with the number of people staring moodily out of windows. It’s a typical example of a studio setting a date for a Blockbuster, hiring a journeyman director who’ll meet deadline, and ending up with product that’ll get a nice opening weekend but will piss off most of the fandom who liked the first two movies. Not only is it horribly overcrowded (winged character Angel- a major player in the trailer- gets a grand total of about four lines), it’s also incredibly daftly thought out with major lapses of logic, continuity (It goes from golden sunset to pitch black instantly) and reason. On top of everything else, they totally screw up the potential of the ‘Dark Phoenix’ saga, instead turning Jean Grey into a witchy zombie-like sex kitten who spends most of her time standing around looking moody. And that’s not even mentioning Vinnie Jones, or the fact that Halle Berry makes a dull superhero- AGAIN! It’s as much of a misguided mess as ALIEN 3, but without any of that film’s ambition or reach. A big, big shame.

I have a habit of having themed dreams- I once went through an entire phase of dreaming up versions of Star Wars: Episode III (pre-release) that were a hell of a lot more interesting than what we got (In one, there was a scarred, half-burned Anakin with a wiry, Akira-style prosthesis on his arm, and in another, all the TIE Fighter pilots were exact clones- but were played by Robbie Coltrane…). Well, I’ve recently been going through variations of the TV series Lost in my sleep- last week there was one where (after a brief interlude involving me having to clear up the drunken mess caused by the drummer from the Red Hot Chilli Peppers), I was actually on the mysterious island, out in the cold, wearing a bathrobe (for unknown reasons) watching new people arrive in the middle of the night by bus (yes, I know it’s an island. Who said it had to be logical). The buses started unloading, and people were getting out looking very confused- and among them were my old school friends Heidi, Dave and Viv, and I was in the process of trying to bring them up to speed with what the hell was going on when I woke up. My dreams tend to be incredibly vivid to the extent that even when they’re mind-blastingly weird (one bit of the dream above- Charlie and Claire from the show encounter this alien technology-style metal tentacle that swoops over both of them and, for some reason, doubles as a shower) I’ll wake up genuinely confused as to whether or not they happenned. Although, in the case of the one which involved me accidentally finding a book all about Eighties TV series Airwolf co-written by the star Jan-Michael Vincent which was half-biography and half a collection of- I kid you not- “Erotic Stories” about the show- I was actually quite glad that it didn’t happen. Although I would have loved to have shown my Airwolf-loving friend Tris if it had…

Anyway, I mention it because I saw the season 2 climax for Lost this week- and a really interesting mix. Part frustrating, part amazing, part annoying, part incredible. They didn’t quite manage as tense and rip-roaring a time as last year’s pirate-ship, dynamite-shifting, hatch-blowing action, but a hell of a lot of answers came our way (along with plenty of new questions), and lots of examples of what Lost does best- tying up new revelations with stuff that’s already happened. It gives the show a very novelish feel, and it is best appreciated in one go, so I’m looking forward to the DVD release.

Another DVD experiece I’m undergoing is Firefly- having missed the boat previously, and being entertained but slightly underwhelmed by Serenity, it’s interesting to try and get an idea of why people have getting quite so orgasmically excited about the show. To be honest, it’s great fun, but I’m not at all suprised that it didn’t last long as it’s an utterly bizarre mash-up of different genres- like someone took Deadwood, Blade Runner and Blake’s 7 and threw them into a bag. For me, it plays best when it’s not overdosing on the Western iconography and having its heroes wielding space-age six-shooters and experiencing traditional bar brawls, and instead just concentrates on being a gritty, earthy space saga. There are moments which feel overdone- the violence sometimes feels very out of place in what’s a good-natured romp for 90% of the time (in one episode today, there were people dying via bleeding from every orofice- not the nicest sight). The characterisation’s great fun, and it would have been nice to see it at least get a full season (the rather dull looking Invasion managed it before it kicked the bucket), but half the problems I had with the movie are still there, and it does feel like it’s missing the iconic central concept that Buffy had driving it. It’s fun, but it really wasn’t the Second Coming.

Lots to do. A week to go, and then I’m on holiday in Cornwall. I don’t know if I’m going to get the book finished by then, but I’m going to have a damn good try.

Week Five of New Who- and while it wasn’t anywhere as good as last weeks, it wasn’t bad. Just a pity they had to cast the less-than-convincing Roger Lloyd Pack as the villain, and also that they’ve essentially nicked the origin of the Daleks and given it to the Cybermen. Whatever the flaws, however, Tennant is seriously growing into the role, and is hugely watchable even when the story is going through shonky patches.

Another week begins- today is going to be a sorting out, processing, charging up day with a little writing involved– and then tomorrow, things really knock back into gear. My friend Claire came over yesterday, and despite the fact that I essentially talked at her for almost 3 1/2 hours about the book, she still claimed she had a good time! It was really useful, and it’s meant that I’ve got some firm ideas about how to deal with the pacing issues in the first six chapters. Writing the thing is still a bit of a struggle at the moment, but I’m going to clamber my way over this mountain even if it kills me. Which it might.

For anyone who watches the series, this will raise a smile!

Not always in the habit of doing this, but browsing through some web stuff yesterday, I unearthed this fantastically interesting discussion about the American right wing, and how the anti-abortion and anti-contraception lobby (the whole “preaching abstinence” thing is something I find both scary and utterly incomprehensible- do none of these people actually remember being teenagers?) is essentially anti-sex, or at least, anti the idea of sex as something that can be fun. The idea of a woman actually enjoying sex and not just treating it as a process for making babies seems to be something they find absolutely terrifying. Anyway, even if you don’t agree it’s well worth a read.

Gosh. Must stop talking about the real world, must stop talking about the real world…

Week four. Blimey. An episode of WHO that didn’t make me feel like my childhood was being stomped on. Not perfect, and a few aspects I could have done without, but very nicely done and the first episode of the new season that I can imagine watching again. Who’d have thought it?

Weekly blog activity isn’t ideal, but I’m spending so much of my life in front of this computer that it’s easy to resist the temptation to type more than I absolutely have to. The novel is making progress- I’ve dumped one character who was giving me serious problems, and rewired the “exposition” bit of the story. It’s not fantastic, but- as I have to keep reminding myself- it’s like writing an utterly gigantic article, and with my usual methods- throwing stuff at the wall to see if it sticks, and then trimming and trimming and trimming- it’s going to take as long as it’s going to take. Annoyingly philosophical, and annoyingly true. I heard back from the first “outside” person (i.e.- not George) to read the first six chapters, and the feedback was very positive and- in true artist tradition- I ended up getting a bit depressed and miserable about the few criticisms they had. Rather silly, especially as they’re right, and I’m going to concentrate for most of May on just getting the actual guts of the story down on the page. I’m at Chapter 11 at the moment, and I’m about to get past the stuff that I’ve already worked on, and into slightly more unfamiliar territory, which is horribly scary. Nevertheless, I’m going to throw myself in and see what happens. What I’ve got at the moment is time- and that is a luxury that I can’t afford to waste. Sooner or later, I’m going to have to get back to ‘proper work’, which is something I’m not entirely looking forward to…

Also- the first new episode of LOST Season 2 for ages, and it actually made me realise exactly how much I enjoy that show when it’s firing on all cylinders. Narrative curveballs galore, and an ending that had me going “WHAAAAAAAT??????” I am doing my best to avoid spoilers for the rest of the season, and am hoping that the season finale is as much fun as last time.

Finished watching Season One of The West Wing this week (thanks to nessreader), which was utterly fabulous and ends on utter bastard of a cliffhanger. I then proceeded to confuse the hell out of myself by watching an episode of Season Seven, which is currently airing on digital station More4. I’d heard that tone-wise, it changes almost completely once Aaron Sorkin left at the end of season 4, and it looks like I may have heard right…

It’s week three, and in an attempt to not repeat myself, all I’m going to say about tonight’s episode of Doctor Who is that it’s nice to see that their rip-offs are getting slightly more surreal, if no more obvious- this week, they decided to treat us to a remake of kids TV show THE DEMON HEADMASTER. And I think the kids TV show actually did it better…

I stormed through the majority of the anime series Neon Genesis Evangelion this week- it’s a genuinely barmy piece of animation art that starts out as a “young boy and a giant robot” adventure that’s very typical of the Japanese genre known as Mecha, and yet ends up transforming into a totally loopy tale of psychology, dysfunction and the Apocalypse that’s brimming over with some fantastically sacreligious iconography that’s from both Christianity and Kabbalah. It’s also got some utterly stunning uses of classical music, although for some bizarre reason, the biggest and most genuinely head-trippy scene in the final movie “The End of Evangelion” is accompanied by a chirpy (and some might say slightly bland) pop song. And, just to make it even harder to ignore, it’s in English while the rest of the dialogue is in Japanese. Still, it’s crazed, it’s violent, and it’s crammed full of all kinds of images that I’m going to find very difficult to get out of my head.

The book is stumbling slightly, but that’s only because I’ve gotten to a tricky, exposition-heavy part of the story. I think I’ve worked out which piece I need to crack, and I’m going to start trying to sort it out tomorrow. If I can get this bit right, I’ll be able to proceed, and start kicking along with the rest of it, because the previous week, despite its problems, has proved to me that this is absolutely what I want to do. And I really want to find out exactly what happens in the end…

The last few days gave been a strange experience. After an intensive burst of writing, I went a bit loopy, and got some bits and bobs done on other stuff, but needed to metaphorically step outside so that I could repressurise. I’ve got the first six chapters of the book together into a vaguely readable state, and I have sent them out to some people just to get an idea of what’s working (or, more likely, what isn’t). It’s currently running at 55,000 words. It’s the biggest thing I’ve ever written, and I’m nowhere near the ending yet. Tomorrow, I kick back into gear, and start full-scale rewriting and construction on chapters 7-12. I don’t know how long it’s going to take, but I’m taking it one step at a time, and I’m not going to stop until this thing is properly done.

Last night was the Arthur C. Clarke Awards- which was my cue to descend on the throng and drink plenty of booze. It happenned in the Apollo Cinema, just off Picadilly Circus, and while the whole thing was a bit of a crush, it was tremendous fun. I ended up having a wonderful (and not at all geeky) conversation about Doctor Who with China Mieville, author of Perdido Street Station, and I also accidentally ended up tasting one of the most ludicrously unpleasent ice creams I’ve ever sampled in my life. They were handing them out free as we entered the auditorium where the ceremony was taking place, and I was briefly cheered and happy- until I tried some. And then, I discovered that the name “Chilli Red” wasn’t some kind of metaphor, or a description of the colour. Actual, honest-to-god, chilli-flavoured ice cream. Thankfully, I survived this ordeal, and ended up going out for Pizza afterwards, and staggering back onto one of the last tubes at Midnight.

I spent most of today recovering, sorting out some paperwork stuff (particularly relating to my tax return), and this evening, I had a screening. It was UNITED 93, and it’s been a long time since I’ve been quite as shaken up by a film as that. I heard about it first via a trailer, and my first thought was, I will admit, “I”m really not sure if that should be made.” The fact that it was Paul Greengrass directing peaked my interest, but it was the kind of thing that I was both fascinated to see and slightly dreading at the same time. You can debate the “too soon” issue until you’re blue in the face, but taking it just as a film, it’s an amazing piece of work, using a documentary-style edge, constructed through improvisation so that the level of reality is nothing short of horrifying. And yet, it’s a film that needs to be seen. It doesn’t cheapen the story. It doesn’t go for the political angle. It just tries to show, as closely as possible what happenned, and what may have happenned, and it does it magnificently. Film isn’t just supposed to entertain. Sometimes, film is designed to do what UNITED 93 does. I’m not going to be in a rush to see it again, but it’s a truly magnificent piece of work.

Time to relax for a little, and then bed.