Why China won't own the World anytime soon.

‘They’re a one-party communist State and you actually believe their figures. Are you nuts?’

 Now, God knows (if he, she or it exists), I’m not an economist. Anybody looking at my personal accounts would immediately realise that. My true ‘economic genius’ lays in spending money that I haven’t actually got rather than in money-management, a trait I share with China so feel well qualified to comment. Let’s start with a few basics.

 China is a one-party state with centralised control. If you want to get ahead, even today, you still have to toe the party line. What is that party line? Basically the party believes in large, state-run industries. It became apparent some twelve or so years ago that these industries, created in the early nineties (1990s) in an attempt to emulate the West and much of Asia, were being run inefficiently, were going broke or were technically broke already and were a series of gaping ‘money pits’. The State could not allow these industries to fail, precisely because they were state-run and the State could not be seen to fail, nor could they afford to keep pouring money into them, otherwise the State would be seen to go broke as they ran out of money. The solution? In part creative accounting, in part some sham privatization and in part coercion of Chinese banks. The latter were ‘invited’ to loan vast sums of money to bail out failing industries and in return they were given stock in what were essentially failing or failed businesses as security. Some of that stock was then passed to other state-run banks as security on inter-bank loans. Some security! The problem was (and is) that the basic underlaying situation did not change, the industries continued to be run in the same old way, perhaps by new people, perhaps by the same. Of course, state-owned banks couldn’t be seen to fail either (what would the growing number of Chinese depositors make of that) so China today is playing ‘pass the empty parcel’ on a scale that even Wall Street would find impressive, if anybody wanted to be the one who just happened to notice that the emperor’s ‘bit’s were waving in the wind.

 So what about the much-vaunted Foreign Investment? China made much of joining the WTO (World trade organisation), but less of their obligations once they had joined. In the early days foreign investors found that they were severly restricted in the percentage of Chinese companies that they could own and even more restricted (if that were possible) in influencing how the companies were run. That has eased somewhat, and of course Foreign Investors were/are blinded by the fact that that there are potentially 1.2 billion ‘consumers’ in China, who were all desperate to buy ‘doo-hickies and thingies’ to enrich their luxury-starved lives. Hell, Germany sells more luxury cars in China than anywhere else in the world (Rolls Royce being regretably a volkswagen Beetle with a different body shell these days, but that’s another story. Yes I know Volkswagen licenced BMW to form the Rolls Royce Motor Company, but it’s still a damn Beetle at heart and no I’m not a ‘Little Englander’). To get back to the point, whilst there might well have been 1.2 billion people who wanted some luxuries in their lives, for the majority of them luxury consisted, and still does, of a second bowl of rice. Well never mind, we’ll create these huge State-run concerns, invite Foreigners to invest in them, produce ‘whatever’ using cheap labour and export it. To attract and reassure these Investors, we’ll allow and encourage private companies to develop. Of course, we’ll not publicise a few inconvenient truths. Let’s not mention that we are in the habit of taking back privatised concerns under the state wing, don’t mention that most successful Chinese entrepeneurs take their money out of China by the suitcase-load and for ‘Mao’s sake’ don’t mention that we are still a communist country. Talk-up private enterprise, talk up cheap labour, talk-up how modern and ‘freer’ China is becoming, but don’t mention the war!

 To what am I referring to when I say ‘the war’? How about the Chinese peoples’ right to restricted Internet access (definitely don’t mention Tianomen square, the Peoples Party would never send troops against the people, now would they?). How about fairly frequent riots against heavy-handed authority in various parts of the country? How about massive unemployment outside of the industrial sector (and within it now, with exports faltering)? How about China’s growing inability to feed itself due to failed agricultural techniques? No no, don’t mention any of that. Talk about how China is introducing democracy ‘from the bottom up’. Sounds great, doesn’t it? A one-party undemocratic state says that they now hold elections at village/district level where voters have a choice of candidates. And on some well publicised but infrequent occasions, one of the candidates might not actually be a party member. Wow! True democracy in action and you know what, in fifty years the party says that all elections will be this way. They said that in the early 1990s (50 years to go to a transition to democracy) and they’re saying it today, 2012 (50 years to go and still counting?). Reassuring eh? Now ask yourself how many one-party repressive states have ever volutarily transitioned to a form of democratic government. Having difficulty thinking of even one? How about the former Soviet Union then? No wait, didn’t they start to loosen the reigns then there was a revolution, the effects of which are still being felt? The centralised state lost control, the Soviet Union disintegrated and Abramovitch started contacting yacht brokers when he wasn’t buying football clubs.

 Back to China, who of course will pull-off something never before done in human history, or will they? Historically for China to exist as a single political entity there had to be a strong unifying central power. Could that strong central power be democracy? Don’t ask me ask Tibet, but consider this, there are (depending on exactly how you classify it) up to seven different languages in China, at least four of which are mutually incomprehensible. We’re not talking accents or even dialects here, we’re talking separate languages. At least if the mythical Scotsman, Englishman, Irishman, Welshman and Liverpudlian met in a railway carriage they could swop mutually understandable insults before punching each other. A conservative estimate indicates that a half a billion Chinese would simply have to jabber at each other, assume they’d been insulted and then punch each other. A unified country? Please excuse my hollow laughter.

 But China’s wealthy, innit? Wot abart all them hexports then, hey? Ah yes, cheap Chinese exports. Well my dears, travelling around the Pacific region, the place is positively littered with broken-down pieces of Chinese equipment of various sorts. Broken? Well take it back to the dealer and get it fixed under warranty then. Alas no, not according to many (OK, ALL) people I’ve spoken to. There are importers who will import ‘stuff’ and flog it to you, but there are no agents who arrange repairs under warranty. Mainly because there seem to be no manufacturers warranties. Broken ‘thingie’ Squire? Chuck it away and buy another one, they’re really cheap you know. Anecdotally, ‘it’ might be cheap but ‘it’ may not work when you take it out of the box. Certainly in Fiji, a place I’m getting to know quite well, there is a growing tendency, where economically possible, to spend more and buy European or American products which work and carry a warranty that is honoured. Sorry Ocker, Australian products don’t have a particularly good name either, mainly because they’re expensive because of the exchange rate. New Zealand? Who? Oh yeah, good rugby team and dairy products. India? We don’t talk about India in Fiji, but rumour has it they also have a way to go in quality control.

Yeah yeah, well they’ve fooled most of the people most of the time and now they’re a rich country, right? Er, sort of. True they earned lots and lots of ‘luvverly-jubbly’ foreign currency, which they immediately invested in improving Chinese Industry, updating the country’s infastructure and generally improving the lives of Chinese people. Oops, no what I meant to say was they immediately set about buying other countries debts. Some of these debts have acquired the status of junk bonds in recent months and the value of the debt has consequently fallen through the floor, as has the ability of certain countries to service their debts, so that was a good investment strategy then. They brought the Australian mining industry virtually lock, stock and mineshaft, only to find that they had to employ Australians who unacountably wanted to be paid a decent wage, have holidays and other company perks. That worked out well then. You’ve ‘secured’ your raw materials at the cost of buying foreign industries and employing expensive foreign workers. If (or most probably when) China goes bust, head to Australia for lots of cheap property (and a newly-available mining industry). Yes, but all these other countries owe China money, so China must be in a strong position? I ‘owe’ Martin the Meknic’ F$950 for screwing my two engines back together again (or at least I will once he’s actually done it and hopefully that’s screwing back and not up). That’s my problem and Martin is in a strong position if all I can cough up is blood and excuses. If I owed him F$950 million, I’d be sleeping nights but he certainly wouldn’t! Same for China, they actually ‘own the problem’ but they haven’t figured it out yet because for them, under the communist system, the (or a) state cannot fail. In the real world, banks and even states can and do fail.

 The final figure that makes total nonsense of Chinese financial and budgetary reporting is the military expendidure figure. Presumably somebody somewhere knows how much is spent on the military, but they’re keeping very quiet about it. Of course, as a one-party state dependent on the military to remain in power, you’re going to keep them happy. ‘Happy army happy dictator’, just ask Assad of Syria (but hurry, catch him whilst he’s still alive and talking). The only problem with this strategy is the military now has lots of ‘toys’ to play with. If the general populace is for the moment tolerably acquiessent and you can’t justify (even to yourself) shooting them en masse, where do you go to amuse yourself by slaughtering people?

Well, I know I said don’t mention the war, but the PLA (Chinese Army) would rather like to go to Taiwan for their summer holidays, they've actually come out and said this publicy on numerous occasions. Not just junior private Wang but senior general Hang-Lo. After all, the Chinese government ‘retrieved’ Hong Kong and Macao without the help of the PLA and they’re feeling a bit left out. Taiwan is that small island off China that has had the temerity to hold democratic elections and openly say that whilst they’d like good relations with ‘the Mother Country’, all things considered they’d like to continue to be a small independent island off the coast of China. And they have friends you know, America for one. The American Navy get to play with lots and lots of toys, some of them are called carrier battle groups. The pride of the Chinese Navy is an extremely ancient ex-Soviet aircraft carrier that was small in its day, let alone now. The communist party is going to have a tough enough time explaining away the coming financial whirwind and preventing a revolution, never mind having to explain the rumours on the restricted Internet that most of the Chinese Navy is sitting on the sea bed of the South China Sea.

China the dominant economic power of the twenty first century? Late twenty-first perhaps, but then again most probably not, they’ll be too busy clearing up the mess after the revolt against one-party rule and trying to decide if they can remain one country.

Confusion in the Cosmic Ordering Department.

Jung, well known in some quarters for his theories of the ‘Collective Unconscious’ and Archetypes, is perhaps less well known for his thoughts on something he termed Synchronicity. For those unfamiliar with this concept, Jung posited that no event happens in isolation. There is a connection between all events, if only we could see it. Obviously, this is a gross over-simplification and if you’ve ever read, or attempted to read, any of Jung’s work you’ll realise that nothing he wrote could possibly be described as simple.

Synchronicity features in many ‘self-help’ books, normally unacknowledged and in a slightly modified guise. The line these books take is usually something like ‘the Universe is connected and all you have to do to succeed beyond your wildest dreams is to tap into this connection’. Various ways of doing this are proposed; only associating with successful people, surrounding yourself with like-minded individuals or searching for, and persuading, a successful person to mentor you. So far so reasonable, I’m sure we’re all aware of the power, potential or realised, of positive thought. Things happen when we try to make them happen by positive action. Positive thought leads to positive action, but positive thought alone though, well that’s a slightly greyer area. We certainly feel better when we think positively but there is the danger, if one can call it that, of crossing that nebulous line between positive thinking and wishful thinking.

When I was in hypnotherapy practice, I was trained to treat certain presenting symptoms using a form of ‘positive action’. To give a necessarily incomplete example, if treating a patient for depression, one might suggest making a single positive change in their lives, one that they felt they might be able to achieve on a regular basis. My personal favourite was to have people consciously look up whilst they were walking. I suppose you may now have a picture of people staring up at the sky, bumping into things and getting depressed, but that’s not exactly what I meant. When people are depressed, they almost invariably look down when they walk. The simple physical act of looking up, or level perhaps I should say, seems somehow to ‘raise their spirits’. And yes, looking up at the sky can accentuate positive thoughts, if done at a suitable time/location. By looking up you physically hold yourself more erect, which sends a message to the Unconscious Mind that you are in or wish to be in a more positive frame of mind and changes take place. If the patient were male, I might suggest that the positive act of shaving every day, even if they were not leaving the house, might help start a shift in their mental outlook, to facilitate a shift from the negative to the positive. Note that these, and others not mentioned, were all positive actions, not thoughts. Positive thoughts resulted from positive actions, but is there any evidence to suggest that the reverse is true? Certainly, one of the precepts of hypnotherapy is that if you can visualise and feel yourself making positive changes then those positive changes can/will occur. The unconscious mind needs to be convinced that the conscious mind wishes to make changes. The way to do this is by positive suggestions, the unconscious does not handle negatives. The bald suggestion that in times of stress you won’t think of having a cigarette triggers the mental image of having a cigarette before you think of not having one. The unconscious can’t handle the concept of ‘not’, so the image of stress and smoking are intertwined. Only positive suggestions will have the desired effect. So the unconscious mind is capable of making physical changes in the individual, but what of Synchronicity and the Collective Unconscious, does it in fact exist as anything more than a ‘herd instinct’?

Books have been written about how Synchronicity helped individuals achieve great things of which they never thought themselves capable. Seemingly through no real efforts of their own, apparently the ‘necessary people’ suddenly appeared in their lives at the most opportune moment. Most of these books have been written about ‘noble endeavours’, starting a successful charity say or some educational project, even creating a series of ‘self-help seminars’ for the unsuccessful. Rarely is filthy lucre mentioned, except brief references as to how it suddenly appeared when most needed. For the noble endeavour. I suppose operators of Ponzi-schemes might write similar books, although if they were being honest they would speak more of the gullability of the greedy man or woman. The latest guise of Synchronicity is termed ‘Cosmic Ordering’. You think positive thoughts about what you want to achieve and ‘bingo’, you achieve your dreams through the power of positive thinking. You communicate your desires to ‘The Universe’, perhaps the collective unconscious by another name, in simple, positive terms and ‘The Universe’ will provide, as there is enough, whatever form the enough of your desires is, to go round. All well and good.

Back to the more Jungian concept of Collective Unconscious and synchronicity and less of the ‘pop psychology’. I suppose I have some personal experience of Synchronicity. At a time when I had absolutely no idea how I was going to move forward in my life, namely how the hell I was going to rebuild my boat, people appeared. Old friends and new friends, some offering financial help and others equally needed moral support. All I brought to the party was a determination that somehow, and I really had no idea how, I was going to rebuild the boat. So the case for synchronicity and the collective unconscious is made then? Perhaps, but I have one niggling doubt.

You see I have noticed something very strange and alarming, a sort of ‘reverse-power’ of positive thinking. During my ‘walk to work’ every morning (the walk back is uphill and any positive thoughts centre around ‘I will positively keep walking/I’m positively going to indulge myself and have just one cold beer/I’m positive I’ll have a heart attack if I don’t slow down), I don’t just think about what it would actually be like to have a book published, I feel as though I HAVE had a book published. I experience the feelings of satisfaction, of having a realistic, modest, increase of material wealth. To be sure, I am aware of a lot of wishful thinking along the lines of ‘if JK Rowling can do it’ etc etc, but in the main I focus on positive feelings of achievement. I also, on occasions, visualise earning ‘sensible’ amounts of money by coming up with positive shemes for supplimenting my pension, say by producing an online guide to anchorages/countries. I experience putting these plans into action and ‘experience’ the results. Invariably, within a day or two of ‘seeing/feeling’ this, I get presented with a bill. Is my Unconscious Mind actually synchronised with those of the guys working on the boat? Am I actually somehow ‘connected to the flow of the Universe’ and in an effort to keep me positive, as opposed to ‘seeing’ money flowing out (the reality), my unconscious paints a rosier picture of money trickling if not exactly flowing, in?

I have not had the nerve to try to reverse the process and imagine paying out repeated sums, but let us say the jury remains ‘out’ on Cosmic Ordering.

Countdown. The clock is running and the home fires are lit.

If I can’t quite see clearly now because I’m looking through a dark glass, at least the light at the end of the tunnel probably isn’t a train coming. No, this isn’t an attempt to see how many metaphors I can get into an opening paragraph but rather reflects a certain uncertainty of mind, or perhaps the fear of an at times seemingly unlikely dream finally coming true.

As the title of this rambling indicates, the countdown to moving back onboard the boat has started. Originally, well at least a couple of weeks ago, I’d agreed with Rose that I’d move out by the end of this month, as I write that’s five days away. She was thinking of a trip to Australia and had thoughts that it might be an extended one. Rather than commit myself to housesitting for an undetermined length of time, we agreed I’d move out to allow her more flexibility in planning. I’d be quite happy to housesit if it would help out, but with the boat launch looming, I wanted to get Trouters in the water asap rather than pay F$500 per month for being on the hard and leaving her alone at anchor isn’t an option. So with five days of the self-imposed deadline to go I’m readying a cabin and tidying up the saloon as best I can. Tonight, Rose said to stay until the boat is ready for launching, apparently it will seem strange not having me around. With a few of us ‘Peters’ around the place, apparently I’m refered to as ‘our Peter’, I can think of much worse ways of being refered to. We'll see.

The engines ‘should’ be ready Saturday Martin told me today and I’m going to chase the electrician to connect the batteries/test the lights and wire in the cabin fans. So far so good, but boy it feels strange thinking I’ll soon ‘be home’, particularly as home has been somewhat remodelled since I last lived there and is minus many of the ammenities that I used to enjoy.

At the risk of sounding like an Oscar acceptance speech, I guess I’d better thank some people for getting me where I am (where am I and who are all these people staring at me?). First and foremost, to those who made it financially possible, thank you. You know who you are and probably wouldn’t thank me for naming you. Without your help I’d probably be stacking shelves somewhere. Probably; there have been dark times, darker than perhaps I’ve let on. At least with the price of drink here I literally couldn’t afford to disappear into a bottle, that I think would have been fatal, but believe me the temptation was sometimes very strong. To those who provided much needed and appreciated moral support, again thank you. ‘I refer you to my previous comment’. Somebody (Beez Neez I think) likened the last ten months to going up Everest twice with a camel on my back; believe me it certainly felt that way at times, but regular emails, phone calls and visits kept my pecker up (and no Andy, that isn’t a reference to any torrid imagined combination of Gina and Alice!). I have to make a special mention of Rosemary and Vincent, who welcomed me into their home sometime last June and at times must have wondered what the hell they’d let themselves in for. I guess I would have survived camping on the boat, but maybe not. Like I said dark, dark times. I hope my ex-crew has found a safer berth, and can still enjoy being on a boat. Sorry and all that.

So, thank you all. It’s still not all ‘plain sailing’ from here and I suspect the projected launch date of April 7th may be put back, not least because I probably won’t be able to afford a crane until the end of April when the old pension gets paid in. Yep, financial miscalculation rules yet again, but this time it’s an inconvenience rather than an insurmoutable barrier. To quote an old chum, ‘budget? Think of a number, double it and add on a bit!’ Hey ho, at least dried beans are cheap in Fiji! That reminds me, the heads still need to be connected and I must have a rummage around and see if the pressure cooker survived. Ah yes, curried beans, bean stew, beans a la (com)mode, I remember it well!

As to the future, well I think I’ll be in Fiji until the end of June before moving on. Henning (Smiley) has volunteered to crew for me when I leave Suva and take the boat round to the west. I’m both looking forward to the trip and dreading it, many reefs on the way y’know.

It will be strange to be part of the yottie community again.

Not total inactivity

Not a lot of work on the new book I'm afraid, mainly I've been too preoccupied with work on the boat. However I have been keeping my writing hand in. I think I've had an op-ed piece rejected by an online paper.

Now, you might be thinking 'think it's been rejected?', either it has or it hasn't. Normally I'd agree, but I had a quick response to the submission, in the form of a question about what I'd written. In fact, it pretty much indicated to me that the submissions editor didn't 'get it'. Well that's fine, but I'd rather have a 'sorry but I think your central premiss was rubbish' than a question then no response to my answer. That's why I say I think the piece has been rejected.

No news on the article that was accepted by Latitudes and Attitudes magazine. This week I might drop the editor an email and see if they have any idea of a publication date, the money would come in rather handy about now.

I've been toying with the idea of 'sounding off a bit' on this blog. Well why not, I have to admit to holding some opinions and anyway everybody else seems to get on their soapbox on theirs! I would ask your opinions because I know you're out there. It seems I have a small but regular group of readers spread thinly virtually all round the world, even if nobody feels sufficiently moved to comment.

Falling into place?

So having got the manuscript and other 'stuff' off to Emma, I thought I'd take a look at the next book. The first step was to decide on a plot. The outline came fairly quickly and easily, two pages of A4. That covered most of the characters as well, so I then spent some time 'justifying' the story line and the use of the current cast of characters. That took one page of A4 and exposed holes in the plot and where I needed to find new characters. Also indicated where I needed to do more research.

In the middle of this Emma got back to me and said that she was starting the process of going through the second book and was exited by the idea of selling two manuscripts at once (well, everybody has to have some excitement in their lives!). That spurred me into producing a plot outline for book three.....I didn't mention this but we're talking about the third book in the Eliezer trilogy here. That's taken most of my spare time whilst I'm here in Brisbane, but two days ago I had enough to send off a 'what do you think?' email. Emma acknowledged that and seemed to rise to greater levels of ecstasy at the thought of having a trilogy to flog, perhaps I should have a quiet word with 'Mr Emma'? Perhaps I should hope that she hasn't got time to read this blog! She hasn't gone through the proposal yet, but in the meantime I'm trying to write a chapter synopsis, which I must say is at the moment an easier way of doing it than writing 'on the wing'. On the other hand, I'm certain that things will change in individual chapters and most likely the four chapters I've planned out will expand to about eight by the time I actually come to write them.

With ten or so pages of notes, I pretty much have the book 'plotted out'....well Ok, there'll be at least another ten before I've finished the chapter plan. Pretty much all I have to do now is to start writing and see how it pans out. I'm tempted to make a start, but I only have the IPad with me, and although I downloaded Apple's Pages word processing program, I haven't got to grips with it yet. Typing on the IPad I find OK, but formatting etc is a little different from Word and at the moment I don't find it as intuitive as Word, probably something to do with being set in my ways, old and grizzled etc etc. I also prefer to transfer my hand-written notes to a computer, or at least the chapter plans....something to do with not being able to read my own writing. Not too sure if I can transfer notes between the PC and the IPad via Bluetooth, so that would mean emailing myself whatever I put on the IPad, unless of course I get the MacPowerbook back, in which case I'm fairly certain I can sync 'stuff' between the two. I'm pleased with the IPad, but it does have some limitations, or maybe it's my lack of tektkie nous that causes the limitations. now THAT wouldn't surprise me.

On the boat front, I've been sourcing a few things here in Oz. I expect to be pretty busy once I get back to Fiji, so may not be doing much writing until I'm back in the water and 'home'. Luckily, there is good 3G coverage, so any additional research won't (hopefully) be too arduous. I'm toying with the idea of delaying my departure from Fiji until maybe the end of May, then going over to Vanuatu for a few months. The advantage of that is the living will be cheap and I'll have plenty of time at anchor to write. We'll see!

Done and Dusted!

Finito!
Well, maybe. I've done all the 'homework' that 'Miss Emma' insistes on, chapter synopsis, book synopsis, contents table etc etc. I've actually edited about four thousand words out of the book, which I think makes it a lot tighter and keeps the story moving forward. Now I need another pair of eyes to look it over, so having gone through it twice I decided to send it off to Emma. As well as being an agent she does a mean job of editing (no, none of the observations are actually mean, but criticism can be a bit painful, I mean, wot I write is perfec, innit? Peeple spel there names differentely every ovver day and wot's this plot consistency thingy?)


So, off to see 'Bazza of Brizzie' tomorrow. Should be back in Sunny Suva on the 2nd March. If there's any news about anything, of course I'll let you know, but in the meantime although I thought that I was going to be taking a break, Book Three in the Eliezer trilogy has started buzzing around inside my head so.....


So I'm going to write the book synopsis first! Then I think I'll try and write a chapter synopsis, and at some point expand it. Well, that's the plan at the moment. Then of course there's the research. Speaking of which...

Don't asky why, but I need an insight into how a Hareidi femail scientist (could there be such a person?) would interact with work colleagues. If you don't know what I'm talking about then you can't help, but thanks for offering! And I told you, don't ask why!

Editing

I decided to set myself a timetable for the initial editing process, otherwise nothing would get done! So, as I'm off to Brisbane for ten days next week because my Fiji visa runs out and believe it or not it's only about US$70 more expensive to fly to Australia than it is to extend the visa in Fiji, my target is to finish the first 'run through' before I leave.
So far, I've averaged six chapters per day, working three full days, and I do mean FULL days. Just to clarify, by editing I mean firstly reading each chapter, maybe rewriting sections I'm not so happy with, then doing a grammar/spellcheck, then a word count. I aim for five thousand words per chapter, and if I'm more than 8% in excess, I'll either look at deleting anything that doesn't drive the story forward, or move the 'excess' to the next chapter if it's necessary to retain it for continuity purposes. That's only happened once so far, mainly it's been excess that I can delete, and boy can that be hard if you think it's a 'neat turn of phrase'.

I've also been writing chapter summaries as I go, so all in all things are progressing. As tempting as it is to get this finished then blast it off to Emma the Agent, I may just finish this week then sit on it until I get back, then look again with a fresh eye. The only problem with that is things are 'hotting up' on the boat front. My new rudder posts are now in Fiji (haven't got them yet, but they were released by Customs at Nadi airport on the afternoon of the 14th, so the first job today is ring bloody TNT and get them delivered. What was advertised as an eight day delivery will turn out to be ONE MONTH!!! Folks, DON'T USE TNT. I've had no word of an apology, nor explanation as to what took so long! Terrible service, I certainly won't use them again.

Anyway, be that as it may, it looks like I may be busy with the boat interior in order to meet my self-imposed launch deadline of April 7th, so I may be too knackered to do much work on the old editing front, and I know from experience that when you get tired the quality of the editing slips. It also occurs that a writer is not the best person to edit his/her work. Removing the bloopers and obvious inconsistencies are easy enough, but the rest just looks so good!

Finished!!!

Apart from a chapter by chapter review, spell and grammar check that is. Oh and not to mention a book synopsis, chapter synopsis and chapter word count. Apart from that, it's taken just twelve months, one shipwreck and the end of a short but not going anywhere relationship to produce 136,000 words. Now all Emma the Agent has to do is find me that oh-so-elusive two-book deal with an option on the third!


As I type, I have a bottle of Aussie sparkling white in the freezer, two bottles of pre-chilled Asahi beer whilst I'm waiting, and the one remaining house cat who seems to have adopted me would like his fleas scratched! Little does he know, 'there is flea powder'.

A productive weekend

The weather here in Fiji has been pretty damn wet these last few days, in fact I read that the rainfal last week was 'the most intensive anywhere on the planet'. That meant that I spent the entire weekend writing.It didn't as it happens actually rain much, but it looked like it was about to most of the time. After a booze-free week last week, that meant a brisk walk to the nearest supermarket for wine and some cheese. How provincial my dears!
Almost there with "Elieser's Return". My chapter plans indicate 1.5 more to write, although of course this may change as things get put down on the hard drive. I've found making chapter plans really does seem to help things along, although you can get bogged down in detail and spent many minutes/hours tracking down old place names and investigating new locations. Sometimes you have to say 'well, it's fiction, so I'll make it up'. Take it from me there are no floor plans of Solomons palace in Jerusalem, or none that I've been able to track down at any rate.
So, most likely finishing the book this week or by next weekend. I think a final spell/grammar check will be in order, although I only have Word 2000 on this machine. Yes, I'm still bloody Macless, the spare parts STILL have not arrived, so my usual industry-standard Word 2003/4 is missing right now. On the other hand, last week I took the IPad into an Internet cafe and downloaded Pages. I haven't played with it yet, but I've read on another writers blog that it is compatable with Word. Maybe I'll start Eliezer 3 on it and see what happens, small amounts of text I can email easily enough.
Speaking of the next project, Eliezer 3 or something different? I think I'd like to take a break from time travel. I have a couple of chapters of 'Karno' written and it might be instructive to chapter plan that out and see if that makes life easier. Whatever, I do need to put E's Return to one side for a couple of weeks then edit it, despite the temptation to dash it off to Emma the Agent. Mind you, I still have to write the book synopsis and chapter summaries for her, trust me writing the book is relatively straightforward, it's preparing the submission that's the really tedious bit! Having said that, I stumbled across this which at first glance tells me I should write the synopsis first! I guess it depends on your working style, but after I've internalised this, I'll give it a go. Writing is a learning process, isn't it?

Sometimes it works

In an effort to get the writing flowing again, I decide to write out a couple of chapter plans. It was really frustrating, I knew where the story was going, I even knew how it ended and in fact was able to rewrite the last chapter (which turned into a chapter and a half in the process) incorporating a couple of newly thought-of twists in the plot, but nothing else was happening. Oh you know, that's not quite true, I finished Steig Larsons Millenium Trilogy!
Seeking enlightenment, I visited The Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America website. There was an interesting piece by a VERY enthusistic lady recounting how she managed to write up to ten thousand words a day. Now, I frankly reckon that's probably a case of quantity over quality, at least if you achieve it on a regular basis, but she did talk a lot about 'the planning process', something that, to be honest, I'm not great on. Certainly, I have the basic plot in mind when I start writing a new book, I do my research and work up a 'biography' of the main characters, but I've found that somewhere along the line the characters themselves take over and the plot evolves through my interaction with them. Spooky thought that, do I spend a major part of my working day interacting (i.e. talking) with myself or do the characters actually come to life, in which case have I the ability to create them? well, never mind all that, it seemed to me that there might be some merit in my adapting this planning process to suit my working style, so on the rough assumption that I was aiming to finish the story in around another six chapters (not set in stone, but I aim for five thousand words +/- per chapter and between one hundred and thirty and one hundred and fifty thousand words in total) I wrote a summary of each of the six chapters, i.e. what I wanted to include in each chapter, but not any details.
Well I have to tell you that it works! Of course, chapter content evolved once I started writing and there's going to be a fair bit of editing, but things have started moving again. I don't write every day, and when I do I maybe get a half a chapter done, but the end is nigh! Interestingly, the final book of the trilogy suddenly came into focus and a couple of characters dropped by to say 'hello'. Unfortunately, there will be much research required into the background/beliefs of one of the characters, but hey, that's the name of the game!
I'd emailed 'Emma the Agent' to see if she'd had any feedback. The answer was 'no', but she wasn't expecting any unless a publisher wanted the book. She repeated two comments, the first being that it usually takes three to four months to hear anything back, and extracts from the manuscript were submitted in November, so early days yet and the second being
QUOTE All we can do is continue submitting on your behalf, no matter how many it takes, just accept from me that Eliezer's Journey is a great story, and it will be published - we just do not know when. UNQUOTE
So, that's this weeks happy thought.