A tale of four novels

Something weird happened today in real life, after two positive things that mean my house stuff is moving in the right direction (one of them: I have a front gate). The unsettling thing has unsettled my partner, so I'm currently in a support role. He's not good at dealing with this. At all.

I'm refocusing my energies on four novels; two to edit, one to write, and one to outline and research, so I'm dividing my day up between them. Research & read while on the train/bus/tube. Edit during dead times at work. Write in the evening. Hopefully, I'll be through the pile of work in the next 3-5 months. I'd like to start the crusades novel in about September, so I better hurry. There's also hope that when my camera arrives and the weather clears up (London: cold, grey, wet) I can go on my long exploratory walks in London again. And if the money gods smile, I'll get that patio sooner rather than later, so I can sit on the patio and edit there (again - better weather, kthnxbai).

After all the crazyness of the last eight months, it'll be fun to be in the writing cave and get actual novels done. I like short stories and novellas well enough, but a novel is a totally different animal. It probably sounds weird, but I'm looking forward to slower writing. Where every sentence is an animal that needs to be caught, killed, and dragged to the cave. I'll indulge those literary delusions, but after working so hard for so long, I think I deserve riding that particular horse. I've even, recently, considered writing a fantasy series - a large one, like A Song of Ice and Fire - but none of my very glancing ideas is even remotely interesting enough to sustain me for a few years. Also, my Muse curls up in horror at the idea of being "trapped" in anything for a year or three (or five). The idea to deliver a shelf full of doorstop-sized books is about as attractive as forced labour in a Victorian prison. On the other hand, it would be nice to build something larger again.

I dunno. Might do that in 2013, Muse willing, and if the idea happens. First those four books and the crusades novel.