Gillian Polack's Blog, page 23
August 20, 2015
gillpolack @ 2015-08-20T22:14:00
Another day when I haven't had time to read entries from friends. I still care, but I'm madly trying to reach deadlines. Things will improve next week, I hope. Unless new stuff happens. The book will be almost finished, at any rate.
I'm 1/3 of the way through my re-read of the main part of the book, before it goes back to Van. I want to go to sleep, but I can finish my close read and sort the changes and get it to him tonight, which means I have tomorrow free for tomorrow's other stuff. And it means I get a day and a half with no nook to work on before I have to do the next step. If I carry the close read over to tomorrow, I will only have half a day. And I have Things to Do in that day and a half.
Right now, I'm having a tea break. And an eye break. How is typing an eye break? Well, I have an enormous cup of tea beside me. Also, I've printed out the whole text in a large font size and I'm reading it while standing up and moving around. This s how I stay fit when editing. It also means I look less daft when i mutter to myself. I stop when there are notations to make, of course. This is my method of not getting headaches when things get to the tense final stages - it keeps my muscles working. The tea keeps the rest of me working.
I still don't like the book. I hate it less than last week, though. I'm now prepared to admit that it's good in patches.
And I plan to sleep in tomorrow.
I'm 1/3 of the way through my re-read of the main part of the book, before it goes back to Van. I want to go to sleep, but I can finish my close read and sort the changes and get it to him tonight, which means I have tomorrow free for tomorrow's other stuff. And it means I get a day and a half with no nook to work on before I have to do the next step. If I carry the close read over to tomorrow, I will only have half a day. And I have Things to Do in that day and a half.
Right now, I'm having a tea break. And an eye break. How is typing an eye break? Well, I have an enormous cup of tea beside me. Also, I've printed out the whole text in a large font size and I'm reading it while standing up and moving around. This s how I stay fit when editing. It also means I look less daft when i mutter to myself. I stop when there are notations to make, of course. This is my method of not getting headaches when things get to the tense final stages - it keeps my muscles working. The tea keeps the rest of me working.
I still don't like the book. I hate it less than last week, though. I'm now prepared to admit that it's good in patches.
And I plan to sleep in tomorrow.
August 17, 2015
gillpolack @ 2015-08-18T11:22:00
I think I've sorted the big problems with various part of my manuscript. What's more, I've made all the changes except for one chapter. I will need more words at the end of this, especially in Chapter Eight (for it's uncommonly small right now) but first I'll make the big changes and get a clean text and then I'll look and see where to add. I only need about three (maybe four) thousand words, so we're not talking about an enormity.
My task for this morning is checking through my notes in light of these changes and seeing if there's anything that really has to go in. I suspect I've been to thorough for this to work, alas, but it's still worth checking.
Before I do anything else, though, I need coffee. Weather and associated aches kept me awake until after 5 am. I did a lot of work in that time, when the pain relievers were sufficiently operational for the computer but not sufficiently for sleep and so I've fitted an extra half day in my week (which, given this particular week is a very good thing), but I am so very tired that I think coffee is a fine idea.
Still, there's every chance of finishing the worst of the rewrite of these chapters by late tonight, which gives me tomorrow for a close read, then off to my editor on Thursday. Friday is my Day-for-Everything-Else and then I have the weekend to write the introduction, conclusion and polish off the rest of the bibliography.
I don't know if this timetable will hold, but I hope so. I like to spend more than a couple of days checking for errors, and unless I have a final soon, a couple of days will be all I have. I want so say "Damn my right eye" but my right eye is already damned.
Actually, my right eye has more vision in it, so it's not as damned as it was. I now see with both eyes, but my dual vision is blurred unless I focus a bit on the left. This means the right is functioning fully and in tandem with the left because otherwise I would see things out of one eye but get dizzy (which was last week). Last week I got colours back and this week I'm beginning to get shapes. I have just two weeks before I need my full copy-editing and proofreading skills back (for paid employment as well as my own book), so this is looking promising.
PS LJ logged me out in the middle of answering folks yesterday, so it looks as if I neglected you when, really, LJ neglected me.
My task for this morning is checking through my notes in light of these changes and seeing if there's anything that really has to go in. I suspect I've been to thorough for this to work, alas, but it's still worth checking.
Before I do anything else, though, I need coffee. Weather and associated aches kept me awake until after 5 am. I did a lot of work in that time, when the pain relievers were sufficiently operational for the computer but not sufficiently for sleep and so I've fitted an extra half day in my week (which, given this particular week is a very good thing), but I am so very tired that I think coffee is a fine idea.
Still, there's every chance of finishing the worst of the rewrite of these chapters by late tonight, which gives me tomorrow for a close read, then off to my editor on Thursday. Friday is my Day-for-Everything-Else and then I have the weekend to write the introduction, conclusion and polish off the rest of the bibliography.
I don't know if this timetable will hold, but I hope so. I like to spend more than a couple of days checking for errors, and unless I have a final soon, a couple of days will be all I have. I want so say "Damn my right eye" but my right eye is already damned.
Actually, my right eye has more vision in it, so it's not as damned as it was. I now see with both eyes, but my dual vision is blurred unless I focus a bit on the left. This means the right is functioning fully and in tandem with the left because otherwise I would see things out of one eye but get dizzy (which was last week). Last week I got colours back and this week I'm beginning to get shapes. I have just two weeks before I need my full copy-editing and proofreading skills back (for paid employment as well as my own book), so this is looking promising.
PS LJ logged me out in the middle of answering folks yesterday, so it looks as if I neglected you when, really, LJ neglected me.
August 16, 2015
gillpolack @ 2015-08-17T12:35:00
I'm halfway through the Big Rewrite and Canberra is halfway through its big seasonal change. Between the two things, this means I get a week of supercharged dreams.
The thing I'm far more than halfway through is the Big Paper Sort. I didn't realise I needed to sort paper because I completely forgot one shelf. I looked at that shelf yesterday and thought "I'd better check it before I finish the book." Lo, it had my missing pile of notes and a bunch of bibliographic material that I had intended to find later in the week. Half of the bibliographic material is now entered safely into the bibliography and all but four pages of the missing notes are integrated safely into the book.
The remaining papers are basically notes for the 17th century novel and random academic articles I printed to read at leisure. The latter I will read this week, during breaks, because I have declared war against paper (again). The notes for the novel I shall deal with next week, for I'm not sure they're doing me any good sitting in an indigestible heap.
I also found some recipes from friends, including the most amazing carrot soup recipe from Helen Lowe.
Life is not completely bad when there are recipes from friends and when there is less paper than there was. Also, there will be historical hot chocolate in my late afternoon, for this is decided. It uses water rather than milk, so my milk will last a bit longer (for I won't be shopping until Saturday, if possible) and it's absolutely suitable for today. A late 17th century recipe with more modern spicing, I think.
The thing I'm far more than halfway through is the Big Paper Sort. I didn't realise I needed to sort paper because I completely forgot one shelf. I looked at that shelf yesterday and thought "I'd better check it before I finish the book." Lo, it had my missing pile of notes and a bunch of bibliographic material that I had intended to find later in the week. Half of the bibliographic material is now entered safely into the bibliography and all but four pages of the missing notes are integrated safely into the book.
The remaining papers are basically notes for the 17th century novel and random academic articles I printed to read at leisure. The latter I will read this week, during breaks, because I have declared war against paper (again). The notes for the novel I shall deal with next week, for I'm not sure they're doing me any good sitting in an indigestible heap.
I also found some recipes from friends, including the most amazing carrot soup recipe from Helen Lowe.
Life is not completely bad when there are recipes from friends and when there is less paper than there was. Also, there will be historical hot chocolate in my late afternoon, for this is decided. It uses water rather than milk, so my milk will last a bit longer (for I won't be shopping until Saturday, if possible) and it's absolutely suitable for today. A late 17th century recipe with more modern spicing, I think.
gillpolack @ 2015-08-16T20:39:00
Market this morning gleaned me the new season's citrus - a mandarine hybrid that has many names and is near-perfect, salad vegetables, herbs and duck eggs. I have 20c left to my name, for I didn't know I was getting to the market this week, but it was entirely worth it.
The rest of the day was, is and will be about trouble-shooting, except for the excellent half hour when I was rung by a friend.
The rest of the day was, is and will be about trouble-shooting, except for the excellent half hour when I was rung by a friend.
August 14, 2015
gillpolack @ 2015-08-15T13:07:00
The person who decided the best way to persuade me to donate to charity was by cold-calling early on a Saturday morning was not very bright. They woke me up, and I'd only managed a few hours sleep because yesterday was curious. I'm afraid I grumped at them (teacher voice possibly came into it - I was too tired to know) until they went away. Then I went back to bed and slept off some of the aches.
Chapter Three isn't final, but I've sorted out the biggest of the problems and what it needs now is a close re-read, which I'll do when I do the same to the first two chapters. I wanted to get Chapter Four to the same state by today, but a migraine last night made it not quite possible, so that's today's goal. I'm starting it all very late, because a migraine is a migraine is a migraine and after a while into it I wasn't doing useful work and it was stupid to even try. I'm about 25% in, though. And I've started looking ahead at what needs doing for Chapters Five and Six. That's the good thing about the migraine: thinking time.
I have two problems. The first is that I like to define terms and use them to construct concepts. This doesn't work with my writing style, which is better with commonsense explanations and with examples. Since I don't come up with the terms unless I have examples in mind, a lot of the time my apparent restructure is more explaining "This is what happens" and showing it. This means my theoretical underpinning isn't as much on the surface as it was, but the book will be easier to read, so I'm fine with this change. It's going to cause hiccups for one of the chapters for the weekend, for it means blending things more cleverly, but these are hiccups, not world-ending changes. I can't see how to interweave them yet, but that's not the bit I'm focused on right now, so a way will emerge. It won't emerge until tomorrow, for I'm still fighting the migraine, so finishing Chapter Four is all I shall manage today. (which is not what I thought five minutes ago, but the migraine wasn't as manifest five minutes ago.)
So today is about things emerging and tomorrow is about things merging and I'm on track for the next full draft late next week. Now I think I'll move away from the computer, gently, and deal with the migraine for a bit. It's a much lower level migraine than it was last night, but it's messing with me. There's no big weather, so it's a tension migraine, hence the need to complete things regardless. Migraines might mess with me, but they have their own logic and the trick is to identify it and respect it. Deal with the cause as well as the symptoms. I'm dealing with four major things this week, and that's a lot.
Chapter Three isn't final, but I've sorted out the biggest of the problems and what it needs now is a close re-read, which I'll do when I do the same to the first two chapters. I wanted to get Chapter Four to the same state by today, but a migraine last night made it not quite possible, so that's today's goal. I'm starting it all very late, because a migraine is a migraine is a migraine and after a while into it I wasn't doing useful work and it was stupid to even try. I'm about 25% in, though. And I've started looking ahead at what needs doing for Chapters Five and Six. That's the good thing about the migraine: thinking time.
I have two problems. The first is that I like to define terms and use them to construct concepts. This doesn't work with my writing style, which is better with commonsense explanations and with examples. Since I don't come up with the terms unless I have examples in mind, a lot of the time my apparent restructure is more explaining "This is what happens" and showing it. This means my theoretical underpinning isn't as much on the surface as it was, but the book will be easier to read, so I'm fine with this change. It's going to cause hiccups for one of the chapters for the weekend, for it means blending things more cleverly, but these are hiccups, not world-ending changes. I can't see how to interweave them yet, but that's not the bit I'm focused on right now, so a way will emerge. It won't emerge until tomorrow, for I'm still fighting the migraine, so finishing Chapter Four is all I shall manage today. (which is not what I thought five minutes ago, but the migraine wasn't as manifest five minutes ago.)
So today is about things emerging and tomorrow is about things merging and I'm on track for the next full draft late next week. Now I think I'll move away from the computer, gently, and deal with the migraine for a bit. It's a much lower level migraine than it was last night, but it's messing with me. There's no big weather, so it's a tension migraine, hence the need to complete things regardless. Migraines might mess with me, but they have their own logic and the trick is to identify it and respect it. Deal with the cause as well as the symptoms. I'm dealing with four major things this week, and that's a lot.
gillpolack @ 2015-08-14T20:01:00
So much news, not all of it publishable and not all of it yet known. Still, so much. There's a bunch I can talk about, that is news most definite. Some of it you already know, of course, for I've lost track of where I'm at.
Firstly, the Australian launch for The Middle Ages Unlocked is on Wednesday 26 August at 6.30 pm at harry Hartog (the bookshop) in Canberra. Please feel free to spread the word. The word should include that I'm cooking medieval snacks for the occasion. I don't do this kind of thing much for the public, so this is a rare opportunity to mock my cooking skills.
My next novel (the Jewish fairy one) will be launched at Conflux, at midday on the Sunday. That's the first Sunday in October. More information closer to the date.
My editing of my book has gone pearshaped. Not too pearshaped and it will be resolvable, but it's going to take a lot of attention and my eye is rebelling. I find myself holding intent conversations with my right eye and bidding it behave. It's actually improving, but refuses to stop getting in the way of steady work. Right now, I find it very annoying, Not as annoying as Chapters Three and Five, which are being recalcitrant, but annoying enough.
I've been given my first PR questionnaire for this book and I don't want to fill it in until Chapters Three and Five are all domesticated. This means I have until next Thursday to get Chapters One to Five (and possibly Chapter Six) into order. My eye just laughs at me.
And that's about it, I think, for now.
Firstly, the Australian launch for The Middle Ages Unlocked is on Wednesday 26 August at 6.30 pm at harry Hartog (the bookshop) in Canberra. Please feel free to spread the word. The word should include that I'm cooking medieval snacks for the occasion. I don't do this kind of thing much for the public, so this is a rare opportunity to mock my cooking skills.
My next novel (the Jewish fairy one) will be launched at Conflux, at midday on the Sunday. That's the first Sunday in October. More information closer to the date.
My editing of my book has gone pearshaped. Not too pearshaped and it will be resolvable, but it's going to take a lot of attention and my eye is rebelling. I find myself holding intent conversations with my right eye and bidding it behave. It's actually improving, but refuses to stop getting in the way of steady work. Right now, I find it very annoying, Not as annoying as Chapters Three and Five, which are being recalcitrant, but annoying enough.
I've been given my first PR questionnaire for this book and I don't want to fill it in until Chapters Three and Five are all domesticated. This means I have until next Thursday to get Chapters One to Five (and possibly Chapter Six) into order. My eye just laughs at me.
And that's about it, I think, for now.
August 12, 2015
gillpolack @ 2015-08-13T16:13:00
My very exciting news is that I'm making inroads on my email. And on my eye. I still can't make out specific shapes with my right eye, but having colour back is kinda magic. Mind you, the change is significant enough so that I have to be very careful where i step: my distance sense is all out. One thing about my life, is it's very seldom boring.
The rest of today is my personal struggle with the credibility of historical stuff when incorporated into fiction and how to describe this so that it actually makes sense. I invented a scale to describe things and the scale actually makes everything less lucid (I am normally good at making the complex understandable, so my deficit in this particular chapter amuses me rather than upsets me), so I ave to lose the scale and rewrite some sections and make it make sense. I also have to lose about a thousand words, I think.
I have to do a bit of work on the bibliography, when I finish the editing, but that's easier.
The rest of today is my personal struggle with the credibility of historical stuff when incorporated into fiction and how to describe this so that it actually makes sense. I invented a scale to describe things and the scale actually makes everything less lucid (I am normally good at making the complex understandable, so my deficit in this particular chapter amuses me rather than upsets me), so I ave to lose the scale and rewrite some sections and make it make sense. I also have to lose about a thousand words, I think.
I have to do a bit of work on the bibliography, when I finish the editing, but that's easier.
August 11, 2015
gillpolack @ 2015-08-12T13:32:00
It's trying very hard not to snow here. It's raining quite heavily and there are tiny mentions of snow amidst the rain, but it's still rain. Not even slush. It's just over two degrees, so, in any reasonable city, we'd have snow. But this is Canberra and Canberra unreasonably avoids snow. It's a mystery. A cold mystery.
They tell us we might get thunderstorms and hail. I wouldn't put it past today to storm and hail. It refuses, however, to snow.
Because it wasn't sensible to walk home with one eye and low visibility (due to the rain) and a bit of internal inclemency (a low-grade fever), I had a haircut, ran my most urgent messages, and then caught the bus. The hairdresser was exceptionally impressed at my well-placed white hair. It's all at the front and softens my face with silver-white, as if it were planned. Sometimes inheritance works in my favour. It means, however, that I look much younger from the back than from the front.
And now I go to defeat the low-grade fever by resting with a hot water bottle for a bit. Then I shall defeat today's massive pile of paperwork (for today is a day for everything white, except snow) and then maybe it will still be damp outside and we'll get snow. I doubt it, though, We're more likely to get slush followed by a clear cold night.
ETA: This is a jam every other day thing. Apparently the rest of Canberra gets snow, while the Woden Valley gets slush.
They tell us we might get thunderstorms and hail. I wouldn't put it past today to storm and hail. It refuses, however, to snow.
Because it wasn't sensible to walk home with one eye and low visibility (due to the rain) and a bit of internal inclemency (a low-grade fever), I had a haircut, ran my most urgent messages, and then caught the bus. The hairdresser was exceptionally impressed at my well-placed white hair. It's all at the front and softens my face with silver-white, as if it were planned. Sometimes inheritance works in my favour. It means, however, that I look much younger from the back than from the front.
And now I go to defeat the low-grade fever by resting with a hot water bottle for a bit. Then I shall defeat today's massive pile of paperwork (for today is a day for everything white, except snow) and then maybe it will still be damp outside and we'll get snow. I doubt it, though, We're more likely to get slush followed by a clear cold night.
ETA: This is a jam every other day thing. Apparently the rest of Canberra gets snow, while the Woden Valley gets slush.
gillpolack @ 2015-08-11T23:47:00
Over the last little while, I've started receiving a whole new type of junk mail. I've been put on lists of people who can produce suitable material to appropriate deadlines and I'm getting lots of "Consider us for your next book." This is not unexpected for academic books (although it's new for me), but it's quite unexpected for other books, especially as two of these publishers didn't want to publish me a few years ago. Which just goes to show that life is bizarre. They're all form letters. No-one sending this spam actually knows me or my work. I'm on databases, is all.
I love the approaches by scientific journals and anthropological journals and publishers of the sciences the most, because it really shows the logic behind sending me "please consider us" emails. It kinda makes sense. I will have more academic stuff to publish in the near future, if I only get that job. And I've proven that my work has an audience, which is not always true of scholarly writers. But... that's not the reason I'm getting all these emails. I'm pretty sure that my name is being harvested from a database and that this database is made of people published in major journals, for I started getting these emails about the time the major journal publication hit the library databases. I'd like to think it was my amazing writing and publishing record, but it's just one article in the right place. And because of the imprint that owns it, the bias is towards science journals (for they publish far more scientific journals than journals for the humanities) and so, if I wanted to write a treatise on theoretical chemistry, I'd have a publisher of one kind or another.
No-one courts me for what I actually have to sell, except the publishers I already work with. In case you were wondering.
Anyhow, I shall revise my advice to young writers of all kinds. Publish in something major, early. That way you get all the junk mail. And maybe one of those pieces of junk mail will open a particular door you need opened at a particular time. Look for journals that appear in databases and (for fiction) places that are seen by prizegivers. I will advise this, but I'll still follow my own path for the truth is that even my scholarly stuff is somewhat quirky and I need an editor who sees what I'm doing and appreciates it. Most publishers ask me for my novels and then sit on them forever, for they like them but can't work out if they'll sell or not. One major publisher had a novel of mine for eight years, once (I wasn't going to let that happen more than the once). The non-fiction side was a series of "We can't publish this but oh, we wish we could" until everything found homes in a giant rush.
Maybe my next academic NF though, will be with a major publisher. You never know. After all, I'm getting the spam.
I love the approaches by scientific journals and anthropological journals and publishers of the sciences the most, because it really shows the logic behind sending me "please consider us" emails. It kinda makes sense. I will have more academic stuff to publish in the near future, if I only get that job. And I've proven that my work has an audience, which is not always true of scholarly writers. But... that's not the reason I'm getting all these emails. I'm pretty sure that my name is being harvested from a database and that this database is made of people published in major journals, for I started getting these emails about the time the major journal publication hit the library databases. I'd like to think it was my amazing writing and publishing record, but it's just one article in the right place. And because of the imprint that owns it, the bias is towards science journals (for they publish far more scientific journals than journals for the humanities) and so, if I wanted to write a treatise on theoretical chemistry, I'd have a publisher of one kind or another.
No-one courts me for what I actually have to sell, except the publishers I already work with. In case you were wondering.
Anyhow, I shall revise my advice to young writers of all kinds. Publish in something major, early. That way you get all the junk mail. And maybe one of those pieces of junk mail will open a particular door you need opened at a particular time. Look for journals that appear in databases and (for fiction) places that are seen by prizegivers. I will advise this, but I'll still follow my own path for the truth is that even my scholarly stuff is somewhat quirky and I need an editor who sees what I'm doing and appreciates it. Most publishers ask me for my novels and then sit on them forever, for they like them but can't work out if they'll sell or not. One major publisher had a novel of mine for eight years, once (I wasn't going to let that happen more than the once). The non-fiction side was a series of "We can't publish this but oh, we wish we could" until everything found homes in a giant rush.
Maybe my next academic NF though, will be with a major publisher. You never know. After all, I'm getting the spam.
August 10, 2015
gillpolack @ 2015-08-11T12:38:00
I have an hour and a half to do things, then I hae more medical stuff, which will probably last me til dinnertime. This means Chapter One is my target, for that's about the right amount of work for the time. Not the notes, just the content, The notes are this evening, I think. I need to cross tasks off my chart for the month, for there are a lot of tasks for this month and we're already a third through. I'll be very glad when appointments stop getting in the way!
News is that the Jewish fairy novel will be launched at Conflux. No proper announcement yet, for my editor is busy moving house. What this means is that I have some copies of two of my books, should need arise. Need probably should arise and I'm quite possibly too busy to take advantage of the confluence of books and announcement. Also, I almost forgot other announcement. I'll have the details tomorrow, but the Australian launch of the Beast is in Canberra, at Harry Hartog, in a couple of weeks. We are planning much fun for it. Instead of a reading, for instance, there will be a witty speech by one of the wittiest people in Canberra.
I ought to be full of deep and meaningful thoughts, because of the book, but I think it's all coming together and that means my brain has progressed to a different stage. A cup of tea, then Chapter One. My plan for the early afternoon.
News is that the Jewish fairy novel will be launched at Conflux. No proper announcement yet, for my editor is busy moving house. What this means is that I have some copies of two of my books, should need arise. Need probably should arise and I'm quite possibly too busy to take advantage of the confluence of books and announcement. Also, I almost forgot other announcement. I'll have the details tomorrow, but the Australian launch of the Beast is in Canberra, at Harry Hartog, in a couple of weeks. We are planning much fun for it. Instead of a reading, for instance, there will be a witty speech by one of the wittiest people in Canberra.
I ought to be full of deep and meaningful thoughts, because of the book, but I think it's all coming together and that means my brain has progressed to a different stage. A cup of tea, then Chapter One. My plan for the early afternoon.
