I can’t believe I haven’t set foot inside a dojo since my last grading 5 weeks ago. Sometimes I really hate working away from home. I have still been training, but it’s not the same as working with your dojo mates and having the guidance of your sensei. On the plus side, I have new weapons in my training arsenal – kettlebells. I love them, and I can’t believe I didn’t get some sooner. It’s not like I haven’t had enough people raving about them to me. Perhaps the fact they are ridiculously expensive had something to do with...

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The good: I’ve finally managed to work around a very sticky plot line in Yantsu. It’s been bugging me for ages and it was going nowhere. Well, this afternoon, I cracked it. I now know exactly where the story is going and I should be able to get a (new) rough draft finished by the end of this month. The bad: The newly tweaked plot means I’ve lost almost half of the book. Actually, that’s not as scary as it sounds. If someone had told me that this was likely to happen before I started writing fiction, I would...

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Yeah, I know, you thought that was something only actors did, right? Not true. I like to get inside my characters’ heads when I’m writing and, to do that, I often try out the things they do. Within reason, or course. I mean, I wouldn’t wield an axe in my local Marks and Spencer or spend the night in a bath of cold water – I don’t think. Nah, my characters wouldn’t so that either. Not the axe bit at least. Anyway, in Yantsu, Danny has a grading coming up (as do I, for that matter) and he’s training ...

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I’m not sure how real authors do it. I’ve been trying for ages to figure out why writing the second novel is so much harder than writing the first. I know my characters better than I know most of my family, and I worked out the major kinks in the plot a long time ago. So it’s not that. There is a lot more going on in my life now than there was when I was writing Sanchin but, if I’m honest, lack of time is just a convenient excuse. So what is it then? Today I had an...

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Gosh if I had a penny for every time I’ve written an, ‘I’m back’ post on this blog I’d be able to retire and finally finish the second novel. Seriously though, if you’re going to jump ship for a while, don’t do it straight after the ‘Happy New Year’ post. It does kind of date things instantly. Anyway, I am back and I am writing again. I’ve poked the screenplay into the depths of my underwear drawer documents folder until I’ve learned to speak proper English – well, okay, British English (yes, there is a difference) – and Yantsu...

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