I’m working on my next Radwinter novel, provisionally but not necessarily, to be called ‘Earthquake’. The first part of it went splendidly, everything progressing nicely; I’d started to write it while editing my recently published novel ‘Lucky Portbraddon’, because editing is really, really dull, and not particularly creative. In the last couple of months when the pressure increased to get ‘Lucky’ finished, I stopped working on ‘Earthquake’; now I’m back, back to my Radwinters.
Coming back to it has taken a little while to pick up all the threads, and I realised that possibly the way I began to write it wasn’t very sensible – trying to write two things at once… so I have spent the last few weeks, untangling the threads and trying to get the continuity correct.
This afternoon, while wandering around the nearby seaside town of Burnham with my daughter, nattering away to each other as we do, I suddenly had a realisation – not exactly a blinding flash, but certainly a flash. If I continue with the novel as it is, with the story lines I need to finish, it is going to be enormously long. One of the plots is quite separate from the others, and written in distinct parts – if I excised those parts, maybe saved them for another story, it would make the rest of it much more manageable! What is more, I think, it wouldn’t just be manageable for me, but also for the reader!
After a lovely weekend with the family, it’s just me and my husband, him painting, drawing and drumming, me back to writing… so I can settle down and do a careful incision and then crack on!!
If you haven’t read my Radwinter stories, or my other novels, here is a link:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_noss_1?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=lois+elsden
Lois Elsden 