Floods

July floods

My better half regards the dismal weather beyobd the window and wishes he was back in Australia. Really? When questioned, he answers: Well, perhaps what I want is Australian weather here.

That’s because here in northern England it’s grey and raining and half the country seems to be flooded. He’s forgotten how bright it was on Thursday, when we had blue skies, sunshine with frost and the world looked bright and sparkly.

Looking at pictures of flooded fields and towns on tv, it makes me wonder how folk survived in the sixteenth century. They didn’t have tarmacked roads or cars to keep them safe and dry, nor a centrally heated home or hotel waiting for them at the end of the journey. If they travelled at all in the winter months, it would be on horseback or covered waggon, slogging through miserable, freezing weather and avoiding puddles, swollen rivers and marshlands – and there would be plenty of those before the fields were drained and rivers restrained between stone walls.

Before we went to Australia, a culvert burst under pressure of the rain in Newburn, a suburb of Newcastle, and caused havoc. Now we are back home, and we hear that the Local Environment Department is worried because though there are several known culverts flowing beneath Newcastle into the Tyne – no one knows exactly where they run, and the old maps depicting their course are no longer available. Duh! Bad mark to someone in the records office!

Evidently the owner of land is responsible for the safe conduct of water fron one side of the property to the other, which is a worrying thought for landlords and businesses in the city centre, certainly, but also for the average homeowner who may suspect a water culvert runs beneath his house or garden.

Insignificant water courses on hillsides such as the Tyne valley can become torrents under heavy rain, as many of us have discovered in recent times. Suddenly it seems that no one is safe.

Strange things

The old Roller drove 55 miles from Brora to Thurso to carry the bride to church, and then drove 55 miles back again, so I thought it deserved an honourable mention!

Speaking of battlefields yesterday made me remember a few other memorable things. I've driven through Glencoe many times, in good weather and bad, and not felt a twinge.

Hermitage Castle is dour on the best of days, and holds terrible stories of boilings in oil and dungeons where people were forgotten. There is no spookiness but I don't think I'd like to be left there overnight. Come to think of it, I wouldn't want to be left overnight in Newcastle Keep, either.

But...I went to Bosworth Field on a glorious warm sunny day and walked down to the stone that marks the spot where Richard died. It is a small grassy corner, surrounded by trees, and a stream nearby. Nothing dramatic, only a stone, for all the world like a smaller version of the Callanish stones, yet ... tears welled and I could not stop them. I think I embarrassed the friend who was with me.

And talking of the Callanish stones reminds me...I visited one of the outlying rings with my sister-in-law and nephew. This was many years ago, when he was about twelve. It was a bright breezy day and we fooled about a bit until I found that one of the stones seemed warm. Only one, and only for me. If I stood close to it, the wind died, and the stone warmed me. I ought to go back one day, and see if it is the same.

The Aftermath

I hear there is a new website for romance readers put up by Mills&Boon. I have not peeked at it yet, but the link is here for anyone who is interested.

My weekend went well. No culinary disasters, which is good as I'm not exactly the world's best chef. I can think of lots of things to do that I enjoy far more than cooking, but one has to do it sometimes. I did not lose the thread of my plot while I stood there boiling, roasting and pureeing, which is a huge bonus, and my time since Sunday morning (after all the washing up and putting away) has been spent writing a new chapter to insert as Chapter 21.

It went well once I started, and of course it threw up, as this sort of edit usually does, things to tweak elsewhere in the book. I caught myself writing "dark eyes" for my hero when I know perfectly well that he has grey eyes. Now I worry how many other times I have made that same error.

I'm at the printing-out-of-the-whole-ms stage and then it will be the read through. Here's hoping I don't find many glaring errors, but even more I hope that the pacing will be improved. Someone, I cannot remember who, told me to start a book like Dick Francis - "he has good openings." Well, I checked the half dozen copies on my shelves, and he has. They are excellent openings - for a thriller. However, that sort of opening does not translate very readily to a romance. So I followed someone else's advice - "Start where thing start to go wrong." That works better for a romance.

The last picture of Newcastle - the Millenium Bridge and the Baltic Art Gallery behind it. Next time there will be pictures of lambs and daffodils, I promise.

Newcastle and dinner parties

I should have shots of daffodils and spring lambs dancing about the fields, but I've been struck by a tummy bug this week and spent 36 hours feeling miserable and lethargic for the rest of it. So while I'm on the mend now, which is just as well as I have guests this evening, it means another picture of Newcastle - this time looking underneath the Tyne Bridge. The menu for tonight (thanks to Nigella Lawson) reads: Pea soup, Ham baked in Coca-Cola, Sorbet and Gooey Chocolate Puddings.

Sounds simple enough, but let's see if I can pull it off without any hitches. I'm off to make the soup now, and all the time the scene I want to insert into KT is running through my mind. By the time I get back to the laptop, chances are I'll have forgotten it, or have it complete in my mind.

Let's hope it is the latter rather than the former!

All work and no play

All work and no play at the moment, so I'm a very dull person.

I am working hard on editing KT and doing it carefully so as to increase pace. Some subtle plot twists are going in too, minor things, but important. Motivation, where it is lacking, I am firming up. It takes a lot of concentration. Writing first drafts is so much easier!

A kind friend loaned me a copy of Writing Romance by Vanessa Grant and I wish I'd read this before I tried to write for Mills & Boon! So much became clear as I huffed and puffed my way through. My reading was full of little light bulb moments as things I thought I'd understood became clear at last. It explained pacing, too.

I want to get this draft finished and sent off before Easter, and I should manage that. If I work hard and concentrate.

The picture is of All Saints church on Akenside Hill, taken from the Quayside. The body of the church is circular in shape, which is rather unusual. It was built 1786-96 to replace a medieval church on the site which dated from the 1200s. Deconsecrated in 1961 it was converted to offices and auditorium in 1983-84. I don't know what is happening to it at the moment, but it had scaffording around it not so long ago. I can sense another walk in the offing...

Customs and Excise

HM Customs and Excise in Sandhill is responsible for collecting and administering customs and excise duties and VAT, and Commissioners of Customs were first set up in 1671. So, we have the office and badge on Newcastle's Quayside. The old building is tucked away further down the quayside.

There is mention of custom levies of 6 shillings and eightpence upon 300 wooollen skins, and the same for a sack of wool, in 1281. Henry le Escot and Peter Graper were appointed keepers of the king's customs in the town in 1298. There is a long history attached to the port of Tyne. Some day I might explore it. But not tonight.

We've been celebrating with a bottle of wine as the kitchen refurbishment is just about complete. New worktops in place, looking superb, sink plumbed in, and only the new hob to connect to the gas. Dh expects that will be an hour's work tomorrow.

I see interviews and documentaries on authors who write with a glass of wine to hand, but I can't do it. I can't concentrate. I'm fine for browsing blogs and catching up on gossip, but as for writing - no can do. I can even write blogs - as you see!- but the real stuff - no.

Looking north from the Quayside up to the All Saints church.

My reading lately has been ecletic to say the least. Bone Garden by Tess Gerritsen I got though only by dint of skipping many, many pages of gore. Important to show the cause of transmitting infections, I agree, but not for me. Jo Beverley's Dark Champion I enjoyed on my Sony Reader. Jayne Ann Krentzt's White Lies I enjoyed too, but if you had hidden the book in a plain cover and taken off all the identification, I'd have guessed I was reading Nora Roberts. The styles are very similar. PTQ in abundance, good characterization, interesting story, bitingly modern, and very American. I must try and get the third of Ms Roberts' Pagan Stone trilogy and get to the end of the story, though I fear Ms Roberts has no very clear idea of the demon hidden in the Hollow. There was also a good deal of padding in the second volume. Oh, it was interesting enough, but not absolutely vital. If I thought certain paragraphs and pages were added to reach a word count, I wonder if I'd be called cynical?

I have a good haul of books from my library this time. (I also noted that Northumberland has gone all PC and included a book on Lesbian romances and a book on Gay romances. I smiled to myself as I saw that each was absolutely pristine and untouched by borrowers hand.)

Work and bridges

Work is progressing nicely. I'm still fiddling about with KT as it goes through the critique group, but the real concentration is now on reworking Shadows into something more worthwhile. The original word count was 54,000 and that seems way too low, and I think even lower than that for the original Triskelion publication. No wonder one reviewer called it a novella.

But a writer's life is a constant learning curve. What seemed fine then seems weak now. The surprise is that it is only two years ago, maybe three.

Right now I'm working out the plot on a Snyder-style sheet and it is going well. Lots of scope for using coloured pens, which makes me feel industrious and creative. But seriously, the conflict is definitely beefed up and it is easy keeping track of plot-points via the worksheet. Sometimes it can be hard to remember exactly where in the story an important move is made, but this way makes it easy. No longer am I wondering 'did he say that before she went into town, or after she fell in the pool?' Now I check the sheet and there it is.

I'm debating changing the KT title to something more explanatory. Someone asked me what Keep Trust meant, what kind of story did it hint at?

It is the motto of an old Scottish house and of course it means that if you make a promise you keep it.

Originally I thought that would be quite clear, but now I'm not so sure. Perhaps Shadows deserves a new title, too. I wonder how much has to be re-written before it is classed as a "new work?" I suppose there will be a definition somewhere out there. I'd better go check.

I hinted a few days ago that Newcastle was a city of bridges. Well, here are a few shots to give you a taste. The one to the right is a shot from the east end of Newcastle Quayside, looking west towards the Sage (the silver slug) and the newest Millenium bridge.

Behind that are the older bridges.

The shot through the trees is of the iconic Tyne Bridge (1929).

The third picture show the the Swing bridge (1873) and the High Level bridge (1848) with a train going over the top. The road runs on the lower level. Behind that is the Metro Rail bridge, otherwise known as The Queen Elizabeth Bridge (1981).

There's another bridge beyond that - the Redheugh Road Bridge pronounced [ˈrɛdhju:f]) opened in 1983.

Blustery day at the coast

A picture of Newcastle on Tyne from the Gateshead bank, looking east. The Norman Castle Keep is just visible above the High Level Bridge.

A six span, two level bridge it carries both rail and road traffic over the River Tyne between Gateshead and Newcastle. The bridge opened in 1849, and is a Grade 1 listed structure 412m long.

It is a cast iron heritage structure designed by Robert Stephenson, and is one of Network Rail’s 'Major Structures'. Travel the East Coast Mainline and you will go over the bridge. In May 2008 the High Level Bridge reopened to the public following an extensive, £42M programme of repair and strengthening to extend the life expectancy of the structure and conserve it as an important piece of our national heritage.

We went out today, escaped down to the coast and ate fish and chips from Kristian's on the North Shields river frontage. It was a bright and clear day, but windy enough to blow away every last cobweb. We walked along the river frontage, head down into the blast, and watched several ships come storming into the Tyne on the high tide. The City of Sunderland works between the Nissan car factory and the rest of the world. The factory where 1200 people were laid off a couple of weeks ago because no one is buying new cars in these credit crunch recession days.

It was good to get away from the computer and watch the world go by. I should have had the camera trained on the acrobatic gulls and terns hovering alongside the car as I threw out left over chips. One chip and twelve birds dived for it. The chip never touched the ground! Sadly the camera was in the boot, but next time I'll be prepared.

Bought some jeans and a top in the M&S outlet at Royal Quays, dithered over the sale stock at the Barbour factory in South Shields but left there without making a purchase.

Coming back through Newcastle with the sun sinking in the west I saw lots of pics I could have taken, but the traffic flow was such that I didn't care to stop and hop out with a camera in my fist. One day soon I shall go into town on the bus and walk around and take all the pics I want.

It is a very photogenic town.

This for example, is the view from the same spot as the first picture, but facing west instead of east.

More bridges! And looking so very different because of the light. And that's not all of them. Newcastle is a city of bridges.

I'll catch the rest on that next trip out.

Sting and that painting...

Muker, Swaledale.

Originally a Norse settlement, derived from the Norse word "Mjor-aker" meaning "the narrow acre". People have lived where the Swale meets the Straw Beck since the Bronze Age and the promise of good mixed farming in the valley bottom is probably why the Vikings chose to settle here. It seems a long way from the sea...

Went into town yesterday to view a painting. Not something I do often., but this was on the recommendation of a friend.

Stephen Hannock, an American from Massachusetts, has painted an 8 feet by 12 feet (2.4 metres by 3.6 metres) view of the city of Newcastle on Tyne. The most distinctive feature is the river that divides Newcastle from Gateshead. The Millennium Bridge, The Sage and the Baltic are represented far more clearly than that other icon - the castle built in the eleventh century. I struggled to find that in the murk beneath the Tyne Bridge. The city is rendered as if looking down on a map spotted and blotched with bluish lights of differing sizes which represent coal mines. The painting combines what is there on the ground with what was once there in a way that reminds me of an advent calendar. A hazy outline of a gigantic miner lies along the south side of the Tyne, hewing coal for ever. Personal memories that must mean something to the man who commissioned the thing are scribbled at numerous points across the painting, but your nose needs to be four inches from the painting to read them.

The painting is called 'Northern City Renaissance, Newcastle, England'. The man who commissioned it? Sting. Here's one view

It is an interesting concept. I admire Sting for doing it, and putting it on view before he whips it away into one of his many mansions. I'm glad I saw it. But I won't rush to see it again.