Weekly Goals 4-12-23

 Another busy week ahead with multiple Christmas parties as well as all the other work I have to get through.  Plus, I'm doing a course on Thursday morning.

So, once again, I'm not setting myself any writing goals for the week - I know I'm probably not going to have time to do any writing.  I guess it's not actually a bad thing to have this time away from my MS because when I go back to it, I'm going to have fresher eyes that I would have if I'd gone back to do the read-through right after finishing the revisions.

I really must get onto thinking about Christmas and what I need to get for everyone.  I haven't done a single thing and haven't even started looking around to see what I could do in terms of gifts.  It's only three weeks away...

What are your goals this week?

Celebrate the Small Things 1-12-23

  

It's the end of the week, so it's time to Celebrate the Small Things...

What am I celebrating this week?

It's the weekend!

it has been another busy week so I am looking forward to a little downtime.  Not that the weekend isn't already booked up with various things.  I'm going up the coast on Sunday to see my friend which should be nice.  Unfortunately the weather looks like it's going to be a bit shit, so I don't think we'll get to walk on the beach this time.

I've managed to ride my bike to work once this week, which is an improvement on last week.  Maybe next week the weather will settle down a bit more and I can get a couple more rides in.  Hoping Wednesday will be fine because I need to be at work at 6:30 in the morning that day, and it will be far quicker and easier to ride than to try and navigate the buses at that hour.

I haven't done any writing work.  There just aren't enough hours in the day.  I think I will leave it until the holidays and just set aside a couple of days to blitz any last revisions then.  It's the only way I think I'll get it done.

What are you celebrating this week?

Books I've read: Carrie Soto is Back

 

Unlike most of the world, I was not a huge fan of Daisy Jones and the Six, but I have read another, earlier book by Taylor Jenkins Reid which I enjoyed, so I thought I'd give this one a shot.

It follows the career of Carrie, a tennis player at the the top of her game, holding the record for the most Grand Slams won.  She retires while she's at the peak of her career, knowing she's the best.

But seven years later a hot young player called Nicki Chan is hot on the heels of beating that record and Carrie just can't stand to be beaten.  So rather than let that happen, she comes out of retirement, gets her old coach (her dad) back on board and decides to compete for one last season to try and hold onto her record.

Carrie has always been fiercely determined.  She has a single-minded focus on winning and won't let anything or anyone get in the way of her getting what she wants.  This earned her the nickname Battle Axe when she was on the tour the first time, and no one is that thrilled to see her return.  Especially the sports journalists who don't believe she has a chance against the new generation of players.

But nothing has changed in Carrie's personality during her retirement.  She will still do anything to win.  Even play with the lover she once spurned, Bowe Huntly, a player hoping to make one last splash of his own before retirement.

I really enjoyed this book. The details of the behind-the-scenes world of elite tennis felt authentic and Carrie is a fascinating character in her single-minded pursuit of her goals.  She's not terribly likeable a lot of the time, but maybe you can't care too much about that if you're trying to be the best.  As she fights her way through her final season, you find yourself rooting for her even when she's behaving obnoxiously.  

And she does change by the end of the season.  Maybe not as much as you might hope, but in reality, how much do people ever really change?  Maybe sometimes a little can be a lot.

So I'd recommend this one.

But don't just listen to me.  Here's the blurb:

Carrie Soto is fierce, and her determination to win at any cost has not made her popular.

By the time Carrie retires from tennis, she is the best player the world has ever seen. She has shattered every record and claimed twenty Slam titles. And if you ask her, she is entitled to every one. She sacrificed nearly everything to become the best, with her father as her coach.

But six years after her retirement, Carrie finds herself sitting in the stands of the 1994 US Open, watching her record be taken from her by a brutal, stunning, British player named Nicki Chan.

At thirty-seven years old, Carrie makes the monumental decision to come out of retirement and be coached by her father for one last year in an attempt to reclaim her record. Even if the sports media says that they never liked the 'Battle-Axe' anyway. Even if her body doesn't move as fast as it did. And even if it means swallowing her pride to train with a man she once almost opened her heart to: Bowe Huntley. Like her, he has something to prove before he gives up the game forever.

In spite of it all: Carrie Soto is back, for one epic final season. In this riveting and unforgettable novel, Taylor Jenkins Reid tells a story about the cost of greatness and a legendary athlete attempting a comeback.

Weekly Goals 27-11-23

 The year is rushing away at alarming speed!  Can you believe it's December this week?  I haven't even started thinking about Christmas yet.  I should probably get onto that...

I didn't get any writing done (or indeed anything) done over the weekend.  We went out of town on Friday night (in terrible weather I might add) and made it to our accomodation.  We had a lovely dinner at a restaurant then went back to the Air B & B and hung out, listening to the rain and speculating if it was going to stop any time soon.

The next morning we got up early and packed ourselves up to drive up the road to the air show.  It was pretty fine when we first got up, but by the time we got to the aerodrome, it was pouring again.  And cold.  We parked the car just in time for the organisers to pull the plug and postpone the event until Sunday.  We'd only booked the accommodation for one night, so going back there wasn't an option.  We debated trying to find somewhere else for a second night and staying over there, but in the end we decided it would be cheaper to drive home and then back the next day.

So we did.  Which meant most of Saturday was gone by the time we got home.  And we left at 7:30 on Sunday morning to get there again.  Luckily the weather was better on Sunday and most of the planes we were supposed to see managed to get there.  Not all of them though.  My son was a bit bitter about one he really wanted to see not making it.  But at least he finally got to use the tickets he got for Christmas in 2020.  There have been a lot of cancellations...

Anyway, that was a very longwinded way of saying I didn't get any writing work done over the weekend.  And I doubt I will get any done next weekend either, since I already have plans which will take up most of both days.  Maybe the following weekend...

God knows when I'm going to get any Xmas shopping done....

Celebrate the Small Things 24-11-23

 

It's the end of the week, so it's time to Celebrate the Small Things...

What am I celebrating this week?

It's the weekend!  And we're going away.  Only for a night, to take my younger son to an airshow he's very excited about. But it's a night away from home!  Although there is supposed to be some pretty dreadful weather this weekend, so I have my fingers crossed it won't be cancelled (again).  It could be a kind of miserable experience anyway, but I'm hoping for the best,  And packing my raincoat!

Another busy week at work, but I don't think that's going to change anytime soon.  It still feels manageable at the moment, so that's a good thing.

I haven't had a chance to look at Guide Us again, but that's probably a good thing.  I should leave it a week or two before I go back in, let the changes settle and my brain let things go a bit before I go back to see if they work. But I'm deftly determined to finish this before the end of the year.  I'd like to get my first queries out in January and early February, before the Festival starts and consumes my life for a month or so.

What are you celebrating this week?

Books I've Read: Girl on the Run

I've read and loved almost all of Abigail Johnson's books so I was excited to discover this one when I was looking for something to read on my Kindle. 

It's about a girl called Kaitlyn who has never really thought to question her mother's intense over-protectiveness, why they move so often and the odd things she's forced Kaitlyn to learn.  Her mother has been the only constant in her life, so Abigail just adores her and goes along with these things.  But when she gets her first boyfriend, she starts thinking that her mother deserves the same kind of happiness and without asking, sets up an online dating profile for Mom.

She expected her mother to be annoyed, sure, but she'd get over it when she realised how happy she could be.

She did not expect her mother's reaction t be so extreme.  Within minutes of finding out about the dating account, Kaitlyn and her mother are on the run, stealing cars and holing up in seedy motel rooms as they escape from something Kaitlyn can't even begin to understand.

To try and keep her safe, Kaitlyn's mother leaves her alone, but it isn't long before trouble knocks on the motel room door and Kaitlyn is forced to run herself.  As she tries to track down her mother and find out the truth about herself and the past her mother had tried desperately to keep from her, she discovers things about herself and her capabilities she could never have dreamed of.

This was a fast paced thriller with a few good twists and turns.  Every chapter ended on a cliff-hanger, daring you to turn the page and keep reading.  It just felt a bit formulaic and I never really warmed to Kaitlyn or the guy she grudgingly begins to trust as they hunt for the truth.  And I won't spoil it for you, but the ending really didn't do it for me.

It feels very much like a first book, so I wasn't that surprised to discover in a an author's note at the end that this was an early book for Johnson and that she always loved it and dug it back out after publishing some of her other books and gussied it up for publication.  I have books like that.  Early attempts that I still feel enormous affection for.  Characters that still haunt me.  I just know they're not good enough to be published and I'll let them linger on my hard drive for my eyes only.

I kind of wish Johnson had done that with this one.  It's not terrible, but it's not great and her other books are great.  So I don't really recommend this one. Read something else by Abigail Johnson and you won't be disappointed.

But don't just listen to me.  Here's the blurb: 

A fast-paced original paperback thriller about a girl who discovers that her mother might not be who she says she is . . . and now someone is hunting them both.

Katelyn wants the best for her widowed mom. Surprising her with an online dating profile seems like a good idea.

It isn't. Katelyn's mom hasn't just been acting overprotective all these years--she's been hiding something. And now that anyone can find them online, Katelyn is in a desperate race against time to uncover the secrets of the past--not only her mom's, but also her own.

As Katelyn's world unravels, she begins to trust the guy who brought this nightmare to her door and to doubt the one person she never thought she would. Because her mom has been hiding for a reason: she's been waiting.

Weekly Goals 20-11-23

 Well, I did it.  I finished Guide Us (again).  All I need to do now is do a full read through to make sure the changes I made and the new timeline are fully bedded in.  I also have a couple of scenes I wrote and cut back out because they didn't work in those places that I'd like to try and find spots for.  But that's more a nice-to-have than an essential.

I think this might be one of the better books I've written.  I could be wrong there, but it feels like something quite special.  If anyone wants to do a beta read for me, I'd love some fresh eyes on it in a week or two.  Given how late in the year it is, I think I'll probably leave querying until 2024, so there's plenty of time.

In terms of goals, I'd like to get that read through done this week, but we're going away over the weekend, so I suspect I may not get to it until the week after.  And I guess I need to start thinking about Christmas.  People keep telling me it's only about 30 days away..

What are your goals this week?