Colin Harvey – author

No blog yesterday, as it was Monday, although I did post a Film Making Mumblings which I’ll link to here.

A couple of weeks ago I mentioned that I was keeping a spreadsheet of the hours that I was working, and what activities I was allocating the time to; the categories were the four uni subjects that I’m studying, (Writer’s Workshop aka Core, Genre, Feature Journalism and Film Making, plus writing, blogging, reading and other. As it’s the end of the month today, I’ve begun to reflect on the results. I’ll post an analysis -probably tomorrow- but one of the things that’s come out of it is how hard it is to allocate time to a job that’s as complex as being a writer.

For example, your hard drive goes and you have to get a new one. Is that work? I think so. But where do you put it? In the end, I put it under ‘other.’ The problem is that I also put the time I spent at cons and meetings such as the BSFA interview under other as well, and as a result, a third of my time is spent under other. Perhaps if I do it again, I’ll put a column in for ‘networking.’

I have one activity that doesn’t count as work, which is to take the afternoon off, and to attend Kate’s choral performance of various pieces of music such as ‘Hiawatha’s Wedding March’ and ‘Oklahoma.’  The event is at The United Reformed Church in Bath, just over Poulteney Bridge at 3.45pm. Tea and cakes will be served by my fair hand.

Meanwhile, I’m December’s Featured Author in The World’s Biggest Bookstore in Toronto.  There’ll be an interview going up at some point, and I’ll link to it, but in the meantime here’s a rather nice shot of the gondola end with Winter Song and Damage Time  on.

And I continue to paddle frantically below the waterline on stuff that I can’t yet talk about; as soon as I can, I’ll stop with the mystery.

 As I mentioned on yesterday‘s Film Blog, I didn’t plan on posting today due to lack of time (it’s the nine-hour lecture day…except that I just realized that I’ve been planning on catching the bus at nine when I should actually already be in the lecture!!!)

But it’s not every day that one racks up eight years living in the same house. So, happy anniversary, house.

And to justify posting this as a blog entry rather than a tweet, here’s a nice review of Winter Song. Because the novel came out last year, new reviews have been thinner on the ground than when it was first published in the UK. So a nice one now is an unexpected bonus.

This will be the first time that I’ve written a cross-blog post that covers all three –my general blog (this one), my specifically SF blog, and the Film-making blog- but since the exercise that it relates to covers all my activities as a writer, and a creative writing student, it’s particularly appropriate.

I’ve often quoted the hours that I work in broad approximations, but starting on the 1st of November, I started to keep detailed records covering writing (for publication), blogging, reading and ‘other,’ (ie everything that doesn’t fit in those boxes) and of course, my four uni subjects. I’ve been as honest as I can be, since it’s really for my own records.

I’ll post up the results at the end of the month when I’ve correlated them all, but the interim results at the mid-month mark are surprising…perhaps even shocking.

Well, that was good. Bristolcon 10 was over three times the size of last year, with an attendance of over 150 people. Now, that’s a proper con. The panels were well attended — I opened on the Juliet E. McKenna moderated Publishing panel with Mike Shevdon, Andy Bigwood and Dave Bradley of SFX, then sat in on the Joe Abercrombie interview, both of which were excellent. I followed that with an hour on the con dealer’s desk and then the Dark Spires launch.

That went pretty well, although it became a little chaotic (mea culpa) as the event progressed. There were definitely learning points to be taken from it. Like, put the box -and the designated treasurer- at the end of the line. Still, we had  good sales, and people seemed to like the actual finish of the book, which is marvellous, IMHO.

After a late lunch and a visit to the Dealer’s Room to pick up Murky Depths 14, containing Neil Beynon’s ‘Stone,’  onto The Future of Science panel. Impressed as expected by Alastair Reynalds and Gareth L Powell, but it emerges that Paul Cornell’s urbane exterior camouflages an Inner Science Geek…

The Programme culminated with ‘Writing Fight Scenes,’ in which Joe Abercrombie was repeatedly thrown down by Juliet E. McKenna and Meaney-san. I was supposed to moderate this panel, which turned out to be an exercise in futility, but by this time a worsening chest infection (which has seen me confined to barracks while Kate and Sharon hit Bath) forced me into withdrawing from both my panel and the 6.50 reading.  Cheryl Morgan was a more than adequate replacement.

And so, here’s looking forward to next year…

Well, here we are; Sunday night is already falling on the first night of winter time, and I’m just about done.

Four reviews, five guest blogs and a post of my own on Suite101, culminating in a review of the third anniversary Black Static, which is maybe the best issue I’ve read yet.  The lowest I gave any story was one of the three Highly Recommendeds, an Outstanding, and a Year’s Best contender.

Plus a horror film blog over at Film Making Mumblings.

That’s about three hours work this afternoon. More on that later…

Tomorrow I’m going to start posting extracts from Dark Spires, if I get time, I’ll do two a day — if not, I’ll do one. So expect actual blogs to be thin on the ground for another week, at least until after Bristolcon. But next week is not only post-con, but it’s Reading Week as well, which gives me about fiften to seventeen hours extra to…well, read.

Have fun this Hallowe’en night….mwahahaha…

Another day of reading and writing and blogging ; I finished Iain Banks’ excrable A Song of Stone and wondered why I’d bothered with it; then turned my attention to the contents of Black Static, which was much more enjoyable.

On the writing front once I’d finished revising Ultramassive, I turned my attention to Suite101 where I have a procession of guests traipsing through the visitor’s lounge to celebrate Halloween weekend, while I’ve posted the daily update over at Film Making Mumblings. 

I have a horrible feeling that the blog yesterday may have been an academic own goal. It seems that if we use something that’s been published and then use it in an assignment, we’re guilty of self-plagiarism. (Wtf?) So my thoughts on writing to brief are out, or I have to re-work them substantially.

Hmm, interesting…

Sunday afternoon on the eve of the academic week, and I’ve just posted the latest film-making blog, as well as posting a link to today’s Suite101 review of Carrie. Still a few things left to do, so I’d better get on with them…

I did warn you this week’s blogs would be short!

I don’t often post a blog this late in the day, but it’s been an unusual day; almost perfect weather from a working point of view. Sunshine this morning for us to walk Alice around the fields, when we got home it rained for most of the day.  While Kate has lurked in the kitchen making soup and Apple Almond Cake I’ve spent the day on the usual revision.

But unlike most of the week, once the revision is done I’ve left uni work to one side to concentrate on reviews. And then, having written a couple of thousand words, the sun came out again for us to walk Alice through the park. She repaid us by bringing a stick fully fifty per cent longer than she is. As the girl used to say on the Clio ad, “size matters.” It certainly does to a dog.

Blog posts next week are going to be limited. With Damage Time out in the US on Tuesday, I’ll be posting extracts from the novel. And I’ve four reviews to go up on Suite101, all horror, which I’ll be linking to on the day they’re posted;

Stephen King      — Carrie

Joe Hill                 — 20th Century Ghosts

Gary McMahon — The Harm

and

Black Static 19

Right, that’s it for now. Off to eat some pizza.

Have fun!

 As part of my Making A Film elective requirements, I’ve started a new blog which –like all the others in my class– needs to be on Blogger.com (I guess if my lecturer needs to read thirty blogs at a time, it helps if they’re all in one place!). Probably my second biggest time-sink over the next thirty days is going to be the Film Group.

As part of my course, a team of six of us have to shoot an eight to ten minute film the weekend of the 20th and 21st. The preparation for that is going to be huge — and none of us have any idea how long it will take. Part of that preparation is to blog about it, and if you’re interested, the link is here. Feedback is welcome — oh, and there’ll be lots of links to short films which are far superior to mine.   

You’ll notice that I said ‘second biggest time sink.’ The biggest? Well, that comes with good and bad news, from my pov.

First the good news: I have to work at the Eye Hospital for two days next week, two days the week after, with an option of a further two weeks work on the same basis. That brings in some critical cash to ease the shortfall of about a grand’s worth of income that fell through over the summer.

Now the bad news: I have to work at the Eye Hospital for two days next week, two days the week after, with an option of a further two weeks work on the same basis. I’m already fighting to juggle priorities, and I’ve just lost 14 to 16 hours a week.

But on the whole, it’s more good news than bad. I just need to raise my game still another notch.

Back to the new blog…

When I signed on, I suddenly realized that I already had a blog there,  my first attempt at a bespoke blog, about three years ago.

And boy does it show.

But one interesting post, which was supposed to be the first of a series, is some of the outlining process involved in Winter  Song, which is here. I haven’t sat down and analyzed how far away (or how close) this version is to the final one — it might be an interesting exercise — if I had the time. 

Meanwhile, I have a short non-fiction piece to write for my Feature Journalism elective, a horror story to write for Halloween (and my Genre Fiction elective) and a couple of pages for Black Death, which is my Creative Workshop piece this year. But at least today’s bit of Ultramassive is revised.

Onward!

Some time ago, I made a conscious decision to switch off Google alerts — since I have a namesake who also writes about SF, and I also share a name with an England footballer of the 60’s and 70’s, a disproportionately large number of Google alerts had naff all to do with me. (And it’s even worse if you set GA to work on titles…you would not believe how many alerts come up based on ‘Winter’ and ‘Song’!)

However, this does occasionally backfire — as in the case of ‘Filming Winter Song‘ which is over at Andy Remic’s Blog. In fact, it’s been over there for a week now; Andy has had major problems with internet connectivity, and I should have kept an eye out for it. My bad.

So without further ado, here’s the link to Andy’s blog, where you can read all about his war with Sky and E.On, his tenth novel, and if you scroll down the pages a ways, my first thoughts on how the worlds of film and print might overlap in the case of my own fiction. 

Maybe I’ll have a go at writing one for Damage Time, as well.