Notes on a wash

Last week, I finished reading Trumpet by Jackie Kay - an excellent book that I’d been meaning to get around to for Literal Years and was glad to have a chance to pay attention to. At the end of it was printed an interview Kay did with Ali Smith, in which she said that Trumpet took her five years to write, and that she stopped and wrote an entire other book in the middle of it before coming back.

Phew, I thought. That means you’re allowed to do it. Which is comforting, really, because in the last few weeks I have put away the half-a-novel I’ve been working on for the last seven months. It wasn’t working. I’ve tried it backwards, forwards, sideways, switching out endings and middles and beginnings, and finally I’ve had to face it: it’s a wash. Well, not quite. I’ll come back to it in a couple of years and see if, like Jackie Kay, I’ve found the thing that will make it fit together. Meanwhile, I took a bit of time to grieve, and now I’m trying to figure out what to write next.

It’s a strange place to be having ideas in, what with Dark making its way towards other people with increasing speed. I was right, by the way - that’s swiftly got easier to imagine, not least because I’ve already received some extremely thoughtful and kind words from several people. I’m starting to understand that the moment people tell you, “Just relax and enjoy this bit!” is the moment it’s all going to get very complicated. Just like the moment anyone says, “Just try and concentrate on the next thing!” is the moment you have to mothball an entire seven months’ worth of new draft. But here we are! Perhaps the next thing will be good, but even if it isn’t, maybe the one after that will.

Whenever I’m about to start knitting something big - a cardigan, a blanket, a cardigan that’s also a blanket - I’ll knit a few swatches first, to see what the fabric looks like and check I like it. So I’ve started a fresh notebook. Changed the ink in my favourite pen. Bought a stack of new books and promptly got distracted by different ones. Marge Piercy, Jackie Kay, M. John Harrison, Yoko Ogawa, that’s who I’m sitting with at the moment. Sooner or later I’ll know what I’m doing.

If you’re interested in getting your hands on a sneaky early copy of The Dark Between the Trees , by the way, here’s a fun way you might be able to nab one from Wyrd & Wonder! The giveaway is open til the end of May: they’re getting forest-themed for this whole month, to celebrate their fifth birthday, and I for one approve immensely.