My (self imposed) task for February 2013 was to do some editing and rewriting work on my novel, but the underlying reason was to get through February without feeling a bit low as I used to always do at this time of year.

It worked. I've had a lovely February!

Editing is a very different thing from writing, as I'm sure you know. Writing my novel the NaNoWriMo way (see here) was like a fast sprint - exciting, all consuming and very challenging - a lot of adrenalin going around.  Editing on the other hand is a more plodding activity. Not as much fun I have to say, though just as challenging. Part of the challenge is to be objective about this creation you have grown to care deeply about and to try to get into the mind of a potential reader and see if it still makes sense!

So I have plodded gently through February this year, enjoying it, with plenty to occupy me and plenty to do still. I will be working on my novel for some months yet....but as the gardening season approaches, and with commitments to teaching, painting and community projects, I won't be as single minded about it as I have been through February.

I am so lucky to have work that I love, and to have found a way of making this month a month that I love too!

Did you have a good February?  (Or can you think of a way to make next February more fun?)

Yesterday's ending was from Counterparts in James Joyce' s The Dubliners. It chokes me up every time I read it. What can I say, except sorry to end the endings on such a tragic note....

Yesterday's words were of course by Vita Sackville West in her son Nigel Nicolson's biography Portrait of a Marriage. I love her garden writing about Sissinghurst best.
 
Warning! Today's last lines could break your heart.

I've been thinking for days about whether or not to use these - the saddest closing lines I have ever read - from another short story by a great writer whom I have quoted already....but it is such a powerful example of courageous and compassionate writing that I felt I should include it..

Oh Pa! he cried. Don't beat me, pa! And I'll...I'll say a Hail Mary for you...I'll say a Hail Mary for you, pa, if you don't beat me....I'll say a Hail Mary...

Author?
Title?

Did you like the image of 'a lamp quiet-lighted and kind in your heart' ?  It is from Lewis Grassic Gibbon's Scot's Quair again - Sunset Song, first book in the trilogy.

Today's quote is not strictly a first line, as it is published within another book - a biography - but it is famous:

Of course I have no right whatsoever to write down the truth about my life, involving as it naturally does the lives of so many other people..

The author is English, aristocratic and female.

Title, author anyone?

Having the photograph of the tulips (new header) is like having the flowers back again - so lovely in the sunny and cold days we've been enjoying here.

..as will February. Three days to go. Thank you for staying with me!

Yesterday's ending was from Cloud Howe, second in the Scot's Quair trilogy by Lewis Grassic Gibbon.

For today:

But they saw the minister was standing behind her, waiting for her, they'd the last of the light with them up there, and maybe they didn't need it or heed it, you can do without the day if you've a lamp quiet-lighted and kind in your heart.


Also, some of the best writing advice I've come across yet, from author Deborah Lawrenson in an interview today at Cornflower Books-

Never give up. Don't eat that cake.

Yesterday's ending was from Grey Granite the third book of A Scot's Quair by Lewis Grassic Gibbon. Chris Guthrie, with her love of learning and the land, is one of my literary heroines.

Then that had finished; she went slow down the brae, only once looked back at the frown of the hills, and caught her breath at that sight that they held, seeing them bare of their clouds for once, the pillars of mist that aye crowned their heights, all but a faint wisp vanishing south, and the bare still rocks upturned to the sky.


What is it with deadlines? Only four days left of February and I will have to work pretty hard to complete the first rewrite (having been a bit lazy about it till now!) Do you procrastinate until you get close to a deadline?

I am thinking of entering the first 500 words of my novel into a competition in Psychologies magazine....nothing to lose..so why does the very thought make me feel nervous?

Couldn't resist illustrating yesterday's quote with my own jug, sitting on the table shouting 'Spring!'

The line comes from Doris Lessing's The Pit.

Today's closing lines are Scottish, and sad, from the author of a famous trilogy:

But she still sat on as one by one the lights went out and the rain came, beating the stones about her, and falling all that night while she still sat there, presently feeling no longer the touch of the rain or hearing the sound of the lapwings going by.

Author?

Title?

The risk with printing endings is that they can be a bit of a 'spoiler' I realise. Sorry!

The triumphant ending of yesterday's novel Grace Notes by Bernard Maclaverty won't, I hope, spoil this lovely novel for you if you have not read it before. The author makes you experience the world through the mind and the ears of a young composer....I reread this one every now and then.

I've not read this one, and don't remember how I came to find the opening lines:

A final sprig of flowering cherry among the white lilac and yellow jonquils, in a fat white jug...she stuck this in judiciously, filling in a peetern that needed just so much attention. Shouting  'Spring!' the jug sat on a small table in the middle of the room.

This rusty candle ring which I hang above the table on special occasions is a favourite thing.

Birch twigs now, and tiny flower shapes made of card,

glittery bits and gypsophila for Christmas 2012,

twinkling stars Christmas 2009, and at other times I use just ivy or some wild flowers, (though I've not photographed these, yet).

Love it!

Did you like yesterday's closing line? An unusual way to end a novel, isn't it! It is A S Byatt's The Virgin in The Garden.

I've got my camera back, and my husband - they've both been abroad. This was my Valentine's 'card' for him on his return....The paper hearts are made with a clever little punch, glued onto birch branches with PVA. Fun to do..

Quote for today! These are the last lines of a novel which won The Scotsman Scottish book of The Year in 1998 (I think):

Randel came back and pointed to various sections of the orchestra, and they stood. He looked down into the audience and beckoned Catherine with a high wave to the podium. Bravo. She rose.

Yesterday's opening lines were from Elizabeth and Her German Garden by Elizabeth von Arnim who was 'always happy out of doors...for indoors there are servants and furniture'. A delightful read.

These are the closing lines of a book (from which I quoted the opening lines)

That was not an end, but since it went on for a considerable time, is as good a place to stop as any.

Author?

Title?

Yesterday's quote was - Linda Grant's The Thoughtful Dresser.

Can you take many more of these I wonder....not sure if I can!
 

I ordered flower seeds from Sarah Raven today. Though many things in her catalogue are expensive, seeds are mostly  a reasonable £1.95, and if you have the code from Gardens Illustrated there is 20% off.

Visions of a flower-filled garden, jugs of sweet peas, scent, colour, warmth, sunshine, abundance....

Here are the opening words of a book I'm sure many of you will have read:

May 7th. I love my garden. I am writing in it now in the late afternoon loveliness, much interrupted by the mosquitoes and the temptation to look at all the glories of the new green leaves washed half an hour ago in a cold shower. Two owls are perched near me, and are carrying on a long conversation that I enjoy as much as any warbling of nightingales.

Title?

Author?

One day last summer, at the moment of waking, I knew that I had to go out and buy new shoes.

So begins an enjoyable non fiction read  published in 2009 which ends with:

Take pleasure, I thought: take it while you can.

Female, British, short listed for Man Booker novelist....

Any guesses as to author and title?

Quick little post - we need to simply seek out places like this, tiny stall or large supermarket, and support what they are trying to do ....'put our money where our mouth is'.

Don't you think?

It's a long time since I wrote under the category Simply Eat, but with the current meat scandal here in UK and Europe about the horse content in processed foods labelled 'beef' it looks like a good time to revisit the subject.

Sadly we are being lied to and cheated on a huge scale.

What can we do about it?

My blog began in 2010 with a post under Simply Eat as I tried to think my way through the ethical minefiled that is food shopping. If you have time do scroll down and browse my Simply Eat posts (you will find them under Categories in the right hand column).

The 'Great Grandma Rule' (here) might make you smile. You might enjoy the food manifesto I found (click here), or my view of shopping in a supermarket might resonate with you (click here).

What do you think of the latest food scandal?


On another note - yes, James Joyce was the author of the last line in yesterday's post Cath! It is from the short story The Dead in The Dubliners - a book I could never tire of.

Yesterday's line was indeed from Nevil Shute's On The Beach.

Today's is this from a short story by a very famous author:

His soul swooned slowly as he heard the snow falling faintly through the universe and faintly falling, like the descent of their last end, upon all the living and the dead.

If I tell you it's Irish....Author? Title?

Instead of opening lines, here are the last lines of an apocalyptic novel from 1957:

Then she put the tablets in her mouth and swallowed them down with a mouthful of brandy, sitting behind the wheel of her big car.

Can you guess the author? And the title?


I've been finding the editing of my novel pretty tough going but this morning tried for the first time reading it out loud. This really works for me. Hurrah! Progress....

Unfortunately, it is not possible to do this in cafés or libraries - I'm not quite ready for public readings yet!

I wish!
 
Is there any writer more original and poetic? Earthly Paradise, a large anthology of Colette's writings is probably the book I would take with me to that desert island...here are some opening lines of hers which I think are brilliant:

                            I have not had to go out of my way to be let in on masculine secrets.

Always up at dawn and sometimes before the day, my mother attached particular importance to the cardinal points of the compass, as much for the good as for the harm they might bring.

It was the reflected glow of your blazing line along the terrace O geraniums, and yours, O foxgloves, springing up amid the coppice, that gave my childish cheeks their rosy warmth.

Which book would be your desert island choice?


Thank you so much for your encouraging and helpful comments on yesterday's post, and for staying with me and my  February posts!

I am missing my camera, especially as it snowed gorgeously today, and by the way - do you think they have taken the malt out of Maltesers?

I am finding editing much harder than writing. Twelve days into February and I only felt I was really getting to grips with the process yesterday. Then my printer played up!

So any editors reading - help! Advice most welcome.

I will try to pay attention to three bits of advice I have come across: Be Organised, Go Slowly, and Keep A Good Attitude. It seems to me very easy to lose confidence at this stage. Did I really write all this? 50,000 words? Unlike in a painting where I can view the whole at once and keep all the elements in balance and see clearly their relationship to one another, this creation seems unwieldy and huge to me, and I don't really feel I'm altogether in control..


Yesterday's first lines were by Colette and she is describing one of her best known characters Chéri. She is a wonderful writer and the way she starts her stories always makes me want to read on.

More from Colette tomorrow....

Yesterday's line was from Francoise Sagan's Sunlight On Cold Water....lovely title too.

Am still in France with these opening lines from an article by probably my favourite writer:

In the beginning he was just a little, gingery-haired fellow with one shoulder slightly lower than the other, pinkish eyelashes, a weak right eye, and a perpetually running nose. He had the appearance of a deprived child and 1,000,000 francs a year pocket money.

Any guesses who the author might be?

This little project is having the effect of making me want to read all these books again! Very distracting....(I'm not doing it, but I am tempted.)

 
Some of my selected first lines are not well known, I admit. Well done Mary!

It was Jean Paul Sartre's The Reprieve, the middle book of the Roads To Freedom trilogy.

Indulge me if I quote you another first line from a French novel:

                              It had been happening to him practically every morning, recently.

Female author, published in the late 60's....

Author?

Title?

Edna O'Brien has you curious with the first line of Mrs Reinhardt..

And today's line is:

                                  Four thirty in the afternoon in Berlin,  three thirty in London.

Another tale of two cities?

Any guesses?
PS some clues in comments...

You know when you read yesterday's opening sentence that the novel is going to be epic. It is of course from A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens who was born 200 years ago on 7 February.

Today?

                 Everything started to be better for Mrs Reinhardt from the moment she started to sleepwalk.

Author?

Title?

Yesterday's remarkable opening line was from Hilary Mantel's Bring Up The Bodies.

I've just bought Dorothea Brande's Becoming A Writer because Hilary Mantel, in her 10 Rules For Writers (thank you Cornflower) says Read It And Do What It Says! Which is how I got this far with the novel - I read Chris Baty's book and did what it said.

It has to be said I'm not always one to do what I am told - but it does depend who is doing the telling, and if Hilary Mantel, winner of every book award going says this is the thing to do, then maybe....


Today's opening sentence, especially appropriate today, 7th Feb:

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times; it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity; it was the season of Light, it was the season of darkness; it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair.

Author?

Title?

Yesterday's opening line was from Out of Africa by Isak Dinesen/Karen Blixen. I loved the film with Meryl Streep and Robert Redford. Babette's Feast by the same author is another favourite film, though I have yet to read the book.

I've forgotten most of what I was taught in school about metre and iambs, but the rhythm of this line - I have a farm in Africa, at the foot of the Ngong Hills - is just beautiful, so musical!

To today's dramatic opening line then:

                                                     His children are falling from the sky.   

Yesterday's opening line was from A S Byatt's The Virgin In The Garden (which I've just finished).

It's the words malice aforethought that really make you want to know more...

Today?

                                          I had a farm in Africa, at the foot of the Ngong Hills.

Author?

Title?

And who starred in the film....

Yesterday's opening line was from I Capture The Castle by Dodie Smith.

It does get your attention doesn't it! A delightful read.

Cassandra, the speaker, says on page two

I am writing this journal partly to teach myself how to write a novel....It ought to be good for my style to dash along without much thought....but the author Dodie Smith, far from dashing along without much thought, in fact spent hundreds of hours editing (help!) and wrote a 100,000 word notebook on the progress of the novel, says Valerie Grove in her introduction in my Vintage Classics edition.
 
I think I have some work ahead of me..

Today's opening sentence is:

She had invited Alexander, whether on the spur of the moment or with malice aforethought, he did not know, to come and hear Flora Robson do Queen Elizabeth at The National Portrait Gallery.

Author?

Title?