Anyone noticing my little word widget on the right will have noticed my word count has gone nowhere since ummm I put the word count widget up. The widget is for my Egypt story, which after submitting my dragon story in February, is now my ‘official’ work in progress, although I snicker at the word ‘progress’, my justification is that although I was going quite well during the two free mornings a week I get during term time (and doing work during those two mornings can sometimes encourage me to work in the evenings to) but the last week of term involved me having to be out of the house both those free mornings and then we went to Wales and then the kids have been home, so of course absolutely no writing (there’s been quite a lot of absolutely nothing, I’ve been desperate to make some cushions and do some gardening to, but there’s been no time). Anyway, although the Egypt story is still my official work in progress, I am still thinking about my other two main ideas plus various picture book ideas crop up with increasing regularity. One of my two other main ideas is set in a slightly alternate reality based on the town I live in, it was my idea for NaNoWriMo that didn’t work, I’ve tried sitting down and writing it three times now and each time it doesn’t work but of all the story ideas circling my brain, the really difficult to start slightly alternate reality idea is the idea where I get my most inspiration for, probably because it’s set in a not too dissimilar town to where I live and maybe if I lived in Egypt or 17th century England I’d get more inspiration for my other two ideas as well but inspiration doesn’t come too easily for the Egypt or 17th century story (yet they’re both easier to sit down and write, maybe because there are less things I want to fit into those two stories). Whereas the alternate reality story . . . well yesterday inspiration for it struck in the middle of watching Gardener’s World during a piece about a gnome sanctuary and today I was watching a fashion show in my local department store and admiring the maxi-dresses (ooh I so want one) when the models go behind the scenes, change into another theme of clothes, this time outfits to wear to posh weddings by the looks of it and they came out and suddenly two of the (female) models were characters from my alternate reality story, it literally felt like being socked lightly in the stomach, one was wearing this horrible red puffball dress with matching red hat and shiny red shoes and shiny red bag and the other was wearing what on it’s own would have been a nice yellow dress
Veronique dress from Coast
(it looks a bit more yellow in real life)
but it was teamed with black accessories making the model look like a viscous wasp. So I was standing there thinking “That’s what two of my main characters would wear” and now they definitely seem more ‘real’. And yes, it is a bit of a weird story considering I can get ideas for it from watching a segment on a gnome sanctuary on Gardener’s World and a fashion show, I’ve had bursts of inspiration for this story recently in my corner shop, high street and whilst thinking about garlic bread, I just wish I could write the thing but this is one story I can’t force. I walked back home trying to imagine my two characters in their posh wedding wear and then someone walked past me in the most gorgeous patchwork skirt and I spent the rest of the walk home working out in my head how to make the skirt, so I am the easily distracted.
