Brrr!

It's gratifyingly cold out there at last - a proper foggy, frosty winter's day that nips at your nose and ears and is instantly nostalgic (oh, my lost childhood - rime on the inside of the windows, yes, that we melted with misty breaths...).

My author copies of the new horror collection "Phobic" arrived unexpectedly this morning, with my story 'The Deadly Space Between' included. This is the fastest I've ever known a book move from offer to print; the same story, of course, is published today in our own "Phantoms at the Phil II". Stereo story...

Meanwhile, I spend the day sitting here hacking away at this year's story, 'The House of Mechanical Pain' - except that it's not really hacking, more like whittling. The story's way too long for a reading, but there aren't any significant swathes I can cut, no subplots or extraneous characters to pick out whole. It's all half a line here, half a line there: trimming out the richness, alas, killing my darlings. Like adapting a book to be read on the radio: there'll be nothing left but the plot. Gotta be done, but I don't like to do it.

One solution, of course, would be to write shorter stories. I know this, you don't need to tell me.

That'll do very nicely...

O come all ye faithful,
Joyful and triumphant;
O come ye, o come ye
To Desperance.

O Come All Ye Faithful
from the Christmas Song Generator.

Get your own song :

Giving up, heading off...

Okay: it's half-past four, I've made two passes through this bloody story and cut two and a half thousand words, and I can't stand it nor this house any longer. It's absurdly early to be setting off for a gig that doesn't start till seven, but I may possibly be a little nervous about this evening. 'Specially with the fog sitting on the city, putting people off. (This drives me wild: we book the gig out early and draw up a waiting list for cancellations, but generally people don't bother to cancel, they just don't turn up on the night. It's no cost to them, as we don't charge upfront for tickets; and of course then it's too late to call in the waiting list, so we always have empty seats in a booked-out gig. It could be worse than usual tonight, with the weather anti-driving. Snarl.)

Nevertheless, I think I'm off. I shall go in at the top end of town and make my way down through the shops, that'll eat some time; and I'll take the proofs of Shelter with me, to give me something quiet and not-story to do until six, when they'll let me start helping to put chairs out and such.

Who'd be an impresario...?