Where to start

Hello there,

Welcome to the first edition of Beating, a newsletter in which I document my process as I start, continue, and hopefully one day in the future finish writing my second novel.

For some context, if you don’t already know, I am Iain Broome and my first novel is called A is for Angelica, which was published by Legend Press in 2012. Most people who read it liked it, including the Daily Mail, Time Out and Nathan Filer, a Costa prize-winning author, no less.

I very much recommend you read the Beating sign up page on my website to get the full blurb on what this is and why it exists.

So, where are we at?

Well, we are in the beginning, that much I know. Because everything is a mess and I don’t have a single clue where to start. I’ve written good chunks of at least two novels in the last decade, but the one I want to write now has a word count in the hundreds, not thousands.

The good news is it’s the school holidays (I have four children) and the last two days I have I found myself alone with a couple of hours spare. We are in Somerset for the week with my in-laws, so I have scurried away to my mother-in-law’s writing caravan for some peace and quiet.

How have I used this time? First, a lot of staring at the screen with my head in my hands. But also going back through the things that already do exist for this novel, which include:

• a list of primary characters and primary settings
• two very rough and loose outlines that describe what happens in the book from different perspective or possible plot lines
• a collection of paragraphs and interesting sentences that I have at some point scribbled down over the last couple of years.

This was a useful exercise and a good reminder that not all writing time is spent writing. But because some writing time really does need to be spent writing, I also decided to have a go at an opening chapter.

I can tell you I found this very difficult. Not only am I at the start of a big writing project, it’s been a very long time since I completed any writing project at all. I feel like a complete novice all over again and my confidence is pretty shot.

But at the same time, I know that the only way to get that confidence back and find my voice is to write my way through it.

I can almost guarantee that this (short) opening chapter will not be the opening chapter should I make it to the end, but it was an extremely useful place for me to start. And a start is what I really need. Something on the page. Something to work with.

I am very conscious that I have an extremely busy week at home when we get back, so I am looking at how I might schedule some writing sessions. This is not something I have ever done before. Because I am an idiot, mostly. It really does seem like a very obvious and sensible thing to do.

Anyway. That’s it. Feels good to have written all this down. More soon.

Iain