Daynote - Thu 5 Mar 2026
An early start on World Book Day.
Happy World Book Day! An excellent day to pick up a novel.
A combination of the wicked heartburn I'm getting from the meds I'm on, combined with a large amount of very good Indian food with some writer friends last night had me up early today, so I got an extra long writing session in. Still no walks but I'm recovering fast, so hopefully out on Monday.
ON DECK: The upside of the heartburn morning was a lot of words written, a very solid 1,726 words across about two hours of writing. I also got to a cheeky wee twist reveal, which was a lot of fun to write.
LISTENING: I enjoyed this interview with Tendai (T.L.) Huchu on V.E. Scwab's No Write Way podcast - I've never actually chatted with Tendai, though I've been at plenty of events with him in Edinburgh (it's a pretty small scene with a lot of writers for the size of the city) but based on this interview he sounds like a delight.
READING: More of THE INFINITE STATE by Richard Swan (Bookshop.org, Waterstones, Amazon) on the train to and from Edinburgh and once I got home. Still very much in the narrative setup phase, but the stakes are becoming clear. I'm faintly amused that Richard has written another book that, at its core, is about obscure points of law (maritime insurance fraud in the case of JUSTICE OF KINGS, territorial sovereignty and rule of law in the case of this book) and yet managed to make it absolutely riveting. You can take the boy out of the courts...
LINK: Really enjoyed this piece by my friend Alessandra Ranelli, guesting on the Books and Bits newsletter, talking about the politics (interpersonal and more broadly) of book acknowledgements.
UP NEXT: Today I'll nip back to Haddington to sign some more copies (Kesley's sold out of my book and a few attendees at my talk on Tuesday ordered in more), then tomorrow it's a Writing Day. I'll be getting my draft quota, doing my usual weekly editing and outlining, then prepping for my event with Neil Lancaster next week. Plus a bit of short story drafting in the afternoon.
Onward!