What a day. Lecturing in the morning at Nottingham, then up the M1 to Leeds for the second part of my working day and then across to Manchester in the evening for the magazine launch of the latest issue of Transmission. The Transmission article is 2,000 words on Nottingham’s finest, Nicola Monaghan, and her debut novel The Killing Jar and it’s relation to the underclass thesis. Transmission are one of those rare commodities, a non-London publication, and supporting them is vital (e.g., not being paid).
May has been a busy month. The short story ‘Norris Nugent’ is coming out in Carmillion at some point (it has been accepted) and have another, ‘DJing for Dogs‘ coming out in the next issue of Stimulus. This story was originally in This is all I Know but I dropped it after the millionth edit which saw the narrative path curve in yet another direction.
Talking of which, I have been occupied for the last two months getting another edit of This is all I know to Route. Having missed the spring publication slot (more details will follow depending upon outcome) I am back in those ugly murky waters of publishing where everything is on, then it’s off, then on. Writing involves compromises of all sorts: Do you change the narrative to guarantee publication or stick with what you feel is right? There’s probably a middle ground, we just don’t seem to be able to find it.