So, my journey has come to an end and I find myself once more upon these distant shores (well… that does depend upon where you measure it from I suppose). The time within England was both enjoyable and well spent. I was able to see Britain again… albeit through different eyes than I have done in the past… and experience life there from a fresh perspective. I was even fortunate to have the blazing sun looking down upon me! A rarity indeed (once) for English weather during April!
My wanderings took me through a number of places when I look back, some of which were London, Norwich, York, Cambridge, and tiny Burnham-on-Crouch. All of these places (and the others that I haven’t mentioned) offered me something that was both refreshing and interesting. Indeed, there is much about Britain that is inspiring (something that I would never have expected to say), the only difficulty is in the finding of it. For me, it was the countryside (and some of the pubs located there – ‘Nelson’s Local’ being just one!). I bring back with me fond memories of the places that I visited and of the sights that I saw. One of the best was perhaps the ‘Dragon Hall’, located in King Street, Norwich. Built about 1430, it remains the only medieval merchant trading hall known to survive in Western Europe. Well worth a look if you happen to be in the area.
And the novel?
Well… there was some done while wandering about England… but not overly much, which is no less than what I expected. However, on my return, I have proceeded to continue with my editing and I am about halfway through at this stage. It will take me many more weeks yet (while interspersed with seeking employment) but it is getting somewhere. Funds, however, are waning… fast! I shall have to return to employment sooner than expected. It may even be that I will have to take up full-time employment once again… at least for the better part of a year. This shall, inevitably, reduce the time I have available for writing once more. Frustrating it may be, but unfortunately a necessity… for now.
The editing that I have been engaged in for the past couple of weeks has seen me change a few of the scenes involving a number of characters. I have removed some of the ‘lighter’ aspects that I feel detract a little too much from the atmosphere I was trying to create. It now feels much more like I intended it to. Gloomy and grim… but with hope not entirely lost. A few extra paragraphs have been added here and there too.
A small issue that I am having is being able to merge the documents that are more or less finished into just one file. This would make life far more easier when it comes to jumping back through the chapters to try and find something that I need to check upon or alter. At present, the only option appears to be the ‘insert file’ function within MSWord. This takes quite a lot of time though. If there was a free program that could do this by just combining selected documents (while inserting page breaks) then that would be fantastic.
Ah well, back to the quill…
