Little boxes...

Packing continues with minor interruptions along with bad news and good. Pretty much everyday life, in other words. It is an aspect of the paradox that is the writer’s life. Many people consider it a desirable life, yet I suspect that for many they have an unrealistic view of what goes on. Champagne for breakfast, chauffeur driven limos, long lunches with one’s agent and/or editor, literary soirées… Sorry. Not even for the successful ones (although they probably do see a bit of that, who knows there might even really be one out there who gets to hang out with the NYPD and solve cases). For the most part, however, the writing life means dragging your half-awake carcass from bed to keyboard, probably not changing along the way and then sitting in your spare room for hours on end suffering angst whilst fling irate birds at porcine adversaries (so I’ve heard).

All of which is just one side of the story. The other side is that you go places no one has ever been before, or if they have been there, the reports you bring back cast a whole new light (sometimes the eighth one in the spectrum) on things. Writers are explorers, adventurers, people who can, even if they are sitting in the middle of a huge pile of boxes that contain everything they own, create the most wonderful of places, characters, and events. And they conjure this out of the thinnest of air – true magicians.

Books read in May

The Longer Bodies – Gladys Mitchell

The Devil At Saxon Wall – Gladys Mitchell

I, Vampire – Jody Scott

A Crime In Holland – Georges Simenon [new tr]

A Delicate Truth – John le Carré

The Cat – Colette

Inside Mr Enderby – Anthony Burgess

Here Comes A Chopper – Gladys Mitchell

The Treasure Hunt – Andrea Camilleri

Enderby Outside – Anthony Burgess

The Clockwork Testament – Anthony Burgess