Day 1 of version 4

34. Monday 23 February 2026

I’m now back home in Scotland after a two-week break in London, which mainly consisted of catching up with my mum and 13 friends, which to the Scottish-living version of me amounts to a year’s worth of socialising in a fortnight! I had a really lovely couple of weeks and had considered staying an extra few days, but I felt ready and excited about starting the big edit. Well, I say “big edit” but that’s what I thought version 3 would be. It wasn’t. It ended up being a rewrite. I do now feel that this, version 4, will be the first big edit.

After I’d read through the entirety of Crime Writing for Beginners, I asked Narissa (friend and writing buddy) if she’d read the first three chapters. That felt like a big leap in progress. I felt ready to hear what someone else thought of the story. To my surprise, she was more positive than I expected. In fact, I’d say she was enthusiastic. We had a great walk from where we met in Greenwich, through the foot tunnel and across to Canary Wharf for what turned out to be a destination Japanese pastry and tea shop. Anyway, for most of the walk, we talked about my book and my characters and I loved it. As with every single person who’s read anything of mine in the past, I was surprised by the things they highlighted. Narissa said she’d enjoyed reading about Marie, who to me is more of a narrator than a character. But she was right, Marie is a character and thankfully all the things she said she’d enjoyed reading about Marie, eg her exasperation at the six classmates, are recurring character traits of hers. It was good to see Marie as a more rounded character than “just” the teacher of the course and a key player in maintaining a kind of framework, ie the six classes.

As I’d hope from Narissa, she also gave me constructive criticism, which was mainly in keeping with niggles I’d had from reading it.

Today, after a productive morning and early afternoon doing mainly unrelated chores, I started the big edit. I only managed the first three chapters (taking into account Narissa’s comments), but I did at least make a few changes. I know I will need to go through it again (and again and again) but it was good to make a start now I feel happier with the overall story and format.

In other news,  I have started another sourdough loaf, I’ve made up the cabin to sleep and work in it for the next couple of days and I worked through most of my To Do list. It’s good to be back in the middle of nowhere in Scotland, though, as I sit by the fire now, I am still bewildered by the drastic difference in temperature, most notably inside the flat (a steady 20 degrees according to my thermometer) versus inside the house (without the fire or heating, it’s between about 8 and 13 at the moment!).

My work station in the cabin that I built (with help)