Did you see that Adrian Mole is getting rebooted? This is fab news but I've been unable to reread Sue Townsend's original books for some time now. When you spend your days writing the diary of your own fictional character, you try to avoid anything that'll accidentally make you plagiarise a better work.
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| Except I didn't copy anything! |
It last happened with Matilda. I read the book as a child, saw the film as a teen, attended the musical as a thirty-something, and watched the film of the musical a few years back. Despite knowing the story well, I still accidentally duplicated the name of the kind adult who introduces the protagonist to books. It's Mrs Phelps in Matilda. It's Ms Phelps in my own novel. I promise I didn't mean to copy.
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| A teen, a mum, and an overbearing grandmother. The Gilmore Girls! |
Happily I gave my head a wobble. Obviously I've not ripped anything off. I'd never seen the show until a week ago and didn't know what it was about. My characters are not UK versions of Rory's family. But! What made me feel hugely reassured is that these characters are recognisable. The stuffy grandmother has been tried and tested. I can write my own version without worrying it won't work. Likewise the level headed teen has precedent. The small town with strong community values is a classic setting, and the harassed mother is widely recognised. Initial panics aside, The Gilmore Girls has both entertained and encouraged me greatly.
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| Live scenes from my desk |
Writing News
I've started the process of transferring my manuscript onto a pre-formatted template. This will make the whole thing look like book pages. Once it's done, I'll be ecstatic. Until then, I'll be tearing my hair out as I struggle to understand the most basic of instructions. Take this morning. I spent two hours trying to work out why the downloaded fonts that I'd installed on my laptop were not on the dropdown list of fonts in Word. Eventually I gave up, and switched off my laptop. A cup of tea and a mental break later, I turned the laptop back on only to find - yep, you've guessed it - the fonts were now visible. Of COURSE turning it off and on again was the answer. I need to remember that for the multiple technical headaches I'll have during this process.
So, what have I been watching apart from The Gilmore Girls? Well, in the spirit of the season, I've been embracing the Christmas specials of Nigella Lawson. Obviously they're slightly contrived. Filmed sometime like April, the cocktail party that she's effortlessly throwing is unlikely to be replicable. No matter. Her enthusiasm for all things kitsch, twinkly, and fabulous makes me happy. See the next section for specifics.
Nigella starts this episode making a cocktail. I've come to cocktails late in life. For decades I've been a pint of beer or a large glass of wine, kind of woman. In recent times, however, the lure of less volume/stronger impact has become impossible to resist. I eschew fruity flavours and summer juices. For me, it's got to be warming and wintry. Nigella's cocktail involved vodka, Chambord, and creme de cacao blanc. I had just one of those ingredients (voddy, obvs) so needed to improvise. Using two parts vodka, to one part stollen liquer and one part chocolate rum (Christmas presents from previous years) I had the booziest and loveliest winter cocktail ever. Bastardised martinis FTW!
On Saturday, I spent a few hours in London visiting my auntie. Even though most of the time was spent sitting on a train, I was physically knackered yesterday. London, eh. It's a trek. Then, last night I had a night in Liverpool arena watching James B Partridge. Yep, that's the guy that does the school assembly bangers. He was performing a Christmas show so me and my own friend from school had an excellent time. There's nothing like a bunch of pissed up adults singing Little Donkey to get the seasonal cheer flowing.
Decs are going up this week. They MUST. The house is ready, I'm ready, it's time.
Have a lovely week, folks.
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