OOOH! Lots of NaNoWriMo action today. The Nano website has been reset and all last year’s lovely— or not so lovely as the case may be— words have disappeared into the ether.  Also those delightful people at Literature and Latte are hoping to release a beta version of Scrivener in time for NaNoWriMo. Can’t wait to get my hands on a copy to try it out.

Working my way through the six rounds of 2010 Slinkink Slam (formerly Eurofiction); my round one entry did well coming in second with a score of 92 . I’m pleased about that but more pleased about my word count. I’ve set myself an unofficial target of keeping to less than 1000 words. Believe me that’s a tall order for me. So far so good, round one came in under 800 and I’m on target with the Round 2 (hopefully) final draft—so far. I’m going to try and let it sit for a couple of days.

I’ve feel like my writing has benefitted greatly from taking the Fish Publishing Flash course and I’m only just a third of the way in. It’s really making me work and helping me make every word count.

Time is a precious commodity for me at the moment but I’m delighted to be going to Derby next week for a one day workshop with Sue Moorcroft. Can’t wait. I’m sure I’ll have lots to say about it when I get back.

A week or so after that I’m Arvon bound which is both a little scary and incredibly exciting.

At the end of October I’m signed up for the TWITs Charity Writing Marathon which rolls right into NaNoWriMo.

I had a great start to the weekend with the arrival of the latest issues of Mslexia and Leaf Writers’Magazines and the newly released Getting Published by Harry Bingham this morning.  I’m determined to squeeze in some quality reading time this week but sometimes I despair that there’ll never be enough time to read everything I want to.  I used to feel terribly guilty about not finishing a book once I’d started it but these days I’m sticking to a rule I set myself in January: if the book hasn’t hooked me by the time I’m 100 pages in, then it’s time to say sayonara. I still feel guilty though because I know the author will have toiled and agonised over every single word.

In the meantime if you’re looking for a little NaNoWriMo boost, don’t forget there’s a giveaway here at Travelling hopefully of a new copy of No Plot? No Problem by Chris Batty. (Details here) Just leave a pick me comment on this or the giveaway post.