Bank Holiday Monday - got back from Southampton (Titanic Ink) a few hours ago and far too buzzed up to sleep. I don't know why driving makes me like this but it's certainly better than the sleepy alternative.
Lying on the carpet when I got back was my first proof of Black Dye, White Noise. If I do say so myself, it's almost everything I wanted it to be. Being as it's still in its first proof, I have plenty of time and resources to dedicate to actually making it all it should be now. This means adding the Rob Zombie, Nikki Sixx and Warrior Soul interviews I wanted to include originally and chose not to in order to keep something back for the future but I've changed my mind. There's also some pre-production work to do as well at this stage - a few minor edits to some of the copy, twice more through the proof-reading mill and some technical glitches that I hadn't banked on such as the text being a little too close to the spine on the left hand pages for my liking. Never happy...
For anybody who thinks independent publishing is an easy way out, to do it properly you need to be harder on yourself than anybody else could ever be. You have to wear a multitude of ill-fitting hats until they are comfortable and mostly, you will need to treat yourself like a third-class citizen until you are happy with your project as an outsider. Then - and only then - can you stand back and have any confidence in it. Anything other than total brutality about your book will result in weaknesses that your potential readers will spot at twenty thousand paces - most of whom will also gladly tell everyone they see.
My personal favourite form of self abuse is taking said copy of Black Dye, White Noise and putting it in the middle of a table and surrounding it with similar books that I have a lot of respect for. Of these, there are many. When I feel it can justifiably sit there and fend for itself, then it can go on sale. That seems fair.
I think that was advice if anybody was looking for any…
Did we like Doctor Who this last Saturday? Yes, we did. Rather a lot. I've had to stop myself from looking at the spoiler pages online now - I think I'll just roll with the punches from here on and take it for what it is that's coming. On Sunday morning, I took a few hours over breakfast to re-outline and re-plot the script that I was writing for the show. As much as I would like it to be otherwise, I do need to point out here that this is an unsolicited script, but maybe if I simply pretend the BBC asked me to do it, the law of wishful thinking will come into operation…
