charles barrow's writing

I'm re-reading books 1, 2 and 3, and giving them a buff and a polish: a comma here, a carriage return there, a shiny new adjective dropped into a sentence. No major changes, then, just a few tweaks. All of this is in preparation for them being uploaded to Amazon, to make them available on Kindle. I have had qualms about doing this, but I have to concede that Amazon is the largest shop window in the world, and if I want to find a wide audience for my writing, for my stories, then they need to sit on a shelf in their store. I don't think I can afford to have moralistic qualms when I'm an unknown writer looking for readers. I've given myself thirty days to get my reading and editing done, and to get the books uploaded and launched.

Day 23 of the Couch to 5K words writing course and I'm still hanging in there. Though I have fallen two days behind, one deliberately - as in I deliberately chose to save one of the exercises for a later date. And then yesterday I was too ill to write. I had a vice-like clamp of pain around my head and couldn't have strung a sentence together if I'd tried. And the exercise was a difficult one to unpick - introduce a well known fictional character into a different well known plot, and see what ensues. My thumping brain couldn't deal with that at all, at the time, so I set that exercise aside too. Now, today, I can see the fun and challenge in it, though I'm still not up to tackling it. Not all of the exercises have been so taxing. Occasionally we get a day away from creating to recharge on someone else's creativity, by reading a book for 20 minutes. Permission to read, that's my kind of writing course. I was reading Fahrenheit 451, so chose to continue with...

I'm sticking with the Couch to C5K challenge. Today's exercise was interesting. On previous days a topic has been set, but today I had to write to my own tune. I had to get down the scene that has been running around in my head for days, if not weeks. I had to make a start on my own story. Which was a canny idea of Writer's HQ, who are running the course. For 5 days I've been working hard, stretching my brain, sweating to complete the challenges that they've set, on topics they've chosen, and this all made making a start on my own work so much less daunting. No worrying beforehand, no finding excuses, no running errands instead of sitting down in front of a blank page, which I might have been tempted to do in the past. I got straight down to it and wrote a couple of hundred words, in the time allowance. And in so doing, I've set the scene, got it underway, so that I can return to it, pick it up, later.

I signed up to Writer's HQ February writing challenge - Couch to C5K. Everyday they are going to email me inspiration, encouragement, and a task. In response, I write my arse off. Hopefully, by the end of the month, by completing the challenges (or assignments) I will have formed a strong idea of the next story I want to write, and even produced some pages. I felt really smug this morning when I completed the first challenge; a ten minute exercise, not too onerous, I know. I Tweeted about my accomplishment, and then I posted about it on FaceBook. And then I checked my February calendar... I have four free days in the whole month ahead. Four! This is going to be a challenge of Herculean proportions, I now realise. Finding the time, making the time. I could steal ten minutes from my morning routine before I set out to work. I could find ten minutes each evening while the dinner is cooking. This is going to be more of a challenge than I bargained for.

Smoking. Diet. Exercise. Hobby. Career. Charity. Finances. Mental wellbeing. A new language. Stop this. Start that. Do this more, and that less. Try something else entirely. My finger hovered over the 'Buy Now' button for another self improvement book in the Amazon January sale. Another self improvement book to sit on my virtual bookshelf alongside the other titles I've bought over the years; and rarely, if ever, read let alone acted upon. And then I stopped myself. A new me might be intriguing (though probably exhausting to achieve) but wouldn't be me . I'm already me. And I'm not so bad, I decided. I could probably do with a bit of a trim, some buffing up, a kick up the arse, but actually I'm not so bad. I get there, I get things done, more tortoise than hare I'll admit, but that's my way. So I stepped into 2019 in the same suit of clothes that I wore through 2018 - a little wrinkled, in need of a press, a bit faded, but still comfortable, still ...

I'm always happy to bump into strange, weird, wonderful sculptures and statues when I'm out walking in the countryside, or through the woods. I happened upon these startled owls the other day - that's their official name, Startled Owls, like Barn Owls or Long Eared Owls. I'll leave it to you to decide wether they fall into the weird or the wonderful category. Photo is the author's own

I am now the proud owner of a new ISBN number, my third. I won't bore you by listing them here. It's an achievement getting an ISBN. Like getting a medal for crossing a finishing line, or a certificate for completing an arduous academic course. I got this ISBN for finally (finally) publishing John Mann - At Day's End. It's been a long time in the making, but it's made. This book completes the All The Days of John Mann trilogy that I accidentally started writing back in 2013; as I said, a long time in the making. You can download a free copy of the book from Smashwords.com (click on the cover image on the right to link to the book's page on that site). I hope you enjoy it.