Time for tea, books and writing.

[auroracloud]

Finding it hard to post anything of content. Work started again and it exhausts my brain and leaves too little time. I took a week to have time to even watch The Girl in the Fireplace. Though damn, a good Doctor Who episode does have the power of making everything feel better!

Anyway, I started participating in Write Every Day, held at fan_girlishness's journal this month. The point is to, well, try to write something every day and check in daily about it. I've just started a new original project and I thought this is just the thing that could help me keep going, even with work and all. Turns out I was right. Within about a week I've written 7000 words - the majority of it this weekend, so apparently getting those few hundred words written each night during the week really helped keep the channels open and get me into the story. I hope I don't depress anyone who struggles with getting anything written. For the record, I tend to write fast when I do first draft, at least if I have any idea of what I'm doing. I can spend a very long time in the editing phase afterwards. I'm curious to see how it'll continue with this story, because there'll be parts where I so far have no idea what I'm doing. I hope it'll clear up as I go on. Next week will be quite busy and it will be a lot harder to keep writing, but I'm going to try to get a little bit each day, even if it's just one sentence or so.

I'm starting to really get into reading again, and one of the books I'm reading now is Gail Carriger's latest, Imprudence. If you don't know it, it's alternate history / steampunk / fantasy / historical romance / adventure kind of thing and lots of fun. It's the second part of her Custard Protocol series (the first part being Prudence) and that is a follow-up to her Parasol Protectorate series which is just as much fun. I'm very enamored of those books, fannish even. I'm probably going to post a squeeful post when I'm done reading. I heartily recommend it. It's the sort of book that's deceptively light and fun, easy to read and a bundle of entertainment, but has a brain and a subversive element entangled in there, too. Including strong, awesome, smart and capable female characters of many kinds, and romances also between characters of the same sex, and here and there some discussion of society, norms and breaking the said norms. I adore the characters and the alternate history of Victorian society she's built there. And there's an airship. Called The Spotted Custard and with a somewhat eccentric young lady for a captain.

Anyway, reading such things and thinking about Doctor Who keeps making me want to drink lots of tea and eat things that sound very British. Yesterday was a grey, windy, drizzly sort of day, perfect for staying in, writing like crazy and drinking tea. And then I'd have more tea and toast with jam, and feel like I'm on one of the endless tea times on board the Spotted Custard, only with my characters for company. I wonder if I can get them to call me Lady Captain? That would be neat.

I do think it's time for bed. Proper fandom posts, which I want to write, require more presence of mind than I have left today.

Comments

[navaan]

Glad you joined Write Every Day and it's been working out for you so far. We've been doing it since January last year - since trobadora started it - and it has done wonders for my ability to to write and finish stuff. I've become much more consistent in my writing since we started. I hope you have a lot of fun going forward!

[auroracloud.livejournal.com]

It's a great idea - often a little peer pressure / support group is just the thing you need to keep writing going. And this is perfect because there's no required amount or required way to do it. And seems to be just what my writing needs at the moment. :-)

[tinny]

*waves*

I love the Girl in the Fireplace! One of the saddest eps. Can't he be on time just once? *sigh*

But I love getting my heart broken by tv, so that's okay. :)

The "Custard" books sound interesting. I'm very much a fan of scifi / fantasy / steampunky things, so that sounds like it's right up my alley.

This will go straight onto my to-read pile. I get all my book recs from my flist, and haven't regretted it yet.

[auroracloud.livejournal.com]

It is quite an amazing episode. Though I seem to be in the minority that it's not one of my biggest favourites ever. The plot is great, Reinette is a fascinating character and I love the sad wistfulness of the ending, and I adore the world, what with 18th century France meeting weird spaceship with strangely retro robots. But I still seem to keep a little bit of an emotional distance to it. I think it's the way they're so much building a romantic connection for her and the Doctor. It's fine for her, she's known him all her life, but for him it's a very short time and I have a little trouble believing it. Either way, it's quite heartwrenching the way he just misses her in the end, and she had waited and waited... Very beautiful.

I do recommend those books heartily! Though I'd say it's best to start with the first series, The Parasol Protectorate, which starts with Soulless. The Custard Protocol is basically the next generation, and there are a lot of things that are more enjoyable if you know what happened in the first series. Also, it's every bit as brilliant and really worth reading!

[tinny]

Either way, it's quite heartwrenching the way he just misses her in the end, and she had waited and waited... Very beautiful.

Yes. I love it.

Though I'd say it's best to start with the first series, The Parasol Protectorate, which starts with Soulless.

Ah, thank you for confirming that I picked it right. It took me a while to sort through the different series on Amazon, and I thought Soulless was the first one, so that's the one I put on my list. Looks like I was right!

[auroracloud.livejournal.com]

I hope you'll like it! I think from what I've picked up from your tastes, though, I think it has a good chance of being your kind of thing. :-)

I have a secret desire to write a Doctor Who crossover one day. I think the two worlds would go smashingly together, a lot of that "quirky worlds, fun adventure, awesome characters and banter" spirit is the same.