bits and bobs

Just a few bits and bobs:

1) As of tomorrow the OU's level 2 creative writing course, A215, officially starts ~ I've had the course materials for a while so I'm already immersing myself in it, and I'm happy to say that the first couple of chapters seem centred around engendering a good regular writing habit. This is just the caffeine shot in the arm I need, although I'm slightly concerned that course related matters may nibble into my novel writing time. Still, all time spent writing is good, right?

2) I have just finished reading The Accidental by Ali Smith, and if you haven't read it yet then I urge you too. The narrative style is very fresh, and I found the plays on the nature of constructed story-telling fascinating: we only ever know what we know about a person or situation, and that is never the complete story. I'm intrigued that one of the Amazon reviewers regarded it as "a deeply coded and concealed attack on the values of ordinary people". Really? I thought it presented a highly neutral characterisation, in which no-one character was whooly good or wholly bad ~ I found the characters to each be a complex blend of desirable and undesirable aspects, as indeed we all are.

3) Still working through Perry's "Writing in Flow" ~ and I'm probably the fartherst into that I've ever got through any writing manuel!