What to blog about when you don't know what to blog about

Over the last few days I have been aware that I haven't updated my blog for a while. 'Hmm, I need to do a blogpost,' I kept telling myself and then promptly not doing any blogging.

Today after dinner, I could not put it off for any longer. The need to blog had come upon me and then I realised I didn't have a giddy clue what to blog about. For some peculiar reason playing back to back games of Scramble didn't unlock the blogging part of my brain either. I mean, what does one blog about. What do I blog about.

1. Posting about what I've been doing

I have been doing nothing remotely exciting. Sadly, the life of an author (or the life of this author) is not an endless stream of launch parties, literary salons and glamorous soirees stuffed to the seams with glamorous media types. Quite frankly, I think I should ask for my money back. Basically, I am writing my next YA book, Adorkable while awaiting a vast amount of editorial notes on my next adult book. There is not much to be said about actual writing. It's a very solitary past-time that involves fingers to the keyboard. Though again, it amounts to back to back games of Scrabble interspersed with suddenly looking at the clock and realising I've been at my desk for hours and have written half a paragraph and it's nearly time for dinner. Then, and only then, do I turn into a book-writing ninja. And in the mornings I go to the gym or go for a run, though I tore a muscle in my calf, which I don't recommend as it hurts like billy-o, so I'm confined to swimming and very long walks.

2. Posting stuff from my huge archive of published works.

I have whiled away a long hour tonight going through old pieces I've written for magazines and became side-tracked by wishing that I still got asked to write pieces about the best rabbits to have as a pet and why Barbie is a feminist icon. Then I had a bit of an existential crisis. (Commissioning editors: call me!)

3. Posting bits that never made it into my books

As you can probably tell, I massively over-write. My adult books usually rock in at about 175,000 words (most lady novels are 120,000 tops) and my first drafts can be anything up to 250,000 words so I cut a lot of stuff. Mostly, I'm cool about that. It's stuff that I need to write to get me in a rhythm or else it's not moving the plot along or developing my characters. Though sometimes, they're just from an awful first draft and should never, ever see the light. But there is an awful lot of unused words lurking on my hard drive. So, where do you stand? Would you like to see some spare bits from Unstickyor You Don't Have to Say You Love Me? Let me know in a comment and (assumes Jarvis voice,) I'll see what I can do.

4. Posting lists of stuff what I like

I am always doing this and I figured that you must be so very bored of it by now. But, if you really want to know, then I exhort you all to read The Last Letter from Your Lover by JoJo Moyes and I've just started to watch The Killing on DVD because I'm always late to the party and I've realised that I may have feelings for the guy who plays Troels Hartmaan.

5. If all else fails, blog about puppies

Who doesn't love puppies, eh? Only stone-cold-hearted people with no souls who prefer cats, that's who. This is my current favourite website All it has on it are pictures of puppies.

There! I did it. I blogged. Leave me a comment with some idea on what I should blog about or post next time. Though you should know, I don't do sequels. I love that you love my books enough that you would like a sequel but I have four unwritten novels all crammed into my head right now and I'd quite like to write a period novel and maybe a screenplay and a magazine piece on why I love puppies, so no sequels. What I would hope is that the story and the characters stay with you and you can have your own little sequel fantasies playing in your heads. I'm totally cool with that.

So, in conclusion, I have blogged and now I will chocolate.

Live on

Sarra x