Last night, after I published my blog post, we got a call from our real estate agent to ask if we were available to check out a brand-new-on-the-market flat in the building next to ours. We were the first people to see it, we loved it, we said we wanted it and this morning we signed the lease. That’s how fast things happen in this city. So, in the course of 24 hours we found and secured office space and a new flat. My brain can hardly process.

Because I knew the rest of the day would be a bit crazy, I got up early this morning and started writing at 8 a.m. I managed 2000 words before we had to leave to meet our real estate agent. I’m nearing the end now, but I will have to rewrite and add some scenes in the beginning. I do like this routine of reaching a decent word count before lunch and then clearing my head by doing other things in the afternoon.

Then, after lunch, for some reason I became obsessed with boxed sets. Check the Amazon top 100 and it’s full of them. So, I decided I wanted my own boxed set. I’m a writer and my brain does not work in 3D, but I then became obsessed with making a 3D book cover boxed set of the 7 novelettes I currently have out. I will reveal the result soon, but I did get great satisfaction out of successfully creating ‘A Super Sexy Lesbian Romance Boxed Set’. 😉

Currently, my eyes are killing me and I will need to step away from the computer shortly. We’re going out to celebrate the double lease signing and I may not check in tomorrow as I have out-of-the-house things to do most of the day. (And on Saturday we’re ‘celebrating’ Hong Kong Pride.)

This is our new office with nothing inside.
I’ll post an ‘after’ shot when we’ve decorated it.

P.S. Are my blog posts less bitter now that my Mrs is back? 😉

The numbers:
Day 1: 1000 words
Day 2: 3600 words
Day 3: 2400 words
Day 4: 0 words
Day 5: 6000 words
Day 6: 5000 words
Day 7: 4500 words
Day 8: 4300 words
Day 9: 1700 words
Day 10: 2500 words
Day 11: 2000 words
Total: 33.000 words

I can’t call it a Ten Day Challenge without Day 10. So here it is. 😉 I started working on Summer’s End again this morning, after taking a delicious four-day break from it. And I was feeling it. I started at 8.30 (not so much a morning person when the wife is home) and wrote 2500 words before lunch. Taking the overall total to 31.000 words. Once I crossed the 20.000 words mark I knew this novella petite novel would never end at 30.000 words and it hasn’t. I have a few more chapters to add and I think the first draft will finish somewhere between 35.000 and 40.000 words.

Also, to my big surprise, I started to miss blogging on a daily basis. It feels so good to vent on here a bit. Seriously. 😉

After lunch we continued our search for both a new flat and a Ladylit office. No luck on the flat front just yet, but… we’ve signed the lease for an office! In fact, we already have the key. (Nothing moves as fast as real estate in Hong Kong!) We can start decorating (aka go on many trips to Ikea, which is conveniently located at walking distance from our home) already. I’m so excited about this. By Hong Kong standards it’s a fairly big, lofty space and it will be ‘such fun’ (sorry, I watched too many episodes of Miranda recently) to move out of my bedroom/office.

Meanwhile, the first draft of Summer’s End isn’t finished yet, but it does already have a cover (which may get tweaked a little along the way.)

I so wish it was me in that picture

I’ve made a deal with myself that every day I’m working on Summer’s End, I will blog about it. So, hopefully until tomorrow (unless I spend the day at Ikea.)

The numbers:
Day 1: 1000 words
Day 2: 3600 words
Day 3: 2400 words
Day 4: 0 words
Day 5: 6000 words
Day 6: 5000 words
Day 7: 4500 words
Day 8: 4300 words
Day 9: 1700 words
Day 10: 2500 words
Total: 31.000 words

Although I didn’t reach my word count today, I will NOT be complaining. In fact, I’m sitting here in a rather perplexed state because of the fact that the little press my wife and I founded a little over a year ago has officially sold more than 25.000 books. On the first of very month I ‘do numbers’ and that’s the number that showed up. And all I want to do right now is distribute 25.000 kisses to every single one of you who bought one of our/my books. Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! (And to think that one of the more common misconceptions in publishing is that F/F erotica doesn’t sell…)

Anyway, on to the business of today. I got up at 6.30 so I could start at 7 a.m. and I managed to write 1700 words before I had to leave the house. Ran some errands, read some submissions at Starbucks (I only drink their tea), had lunch with a friend (all caught up on the latest gossip), and arrived back home around 2 p.m. From the minute I set foot in my bedroom/office, I knew it wasn’t going to happen anymore today and I wasn’t going to reach my 2000 words goal.

Some kind people over at GoodReads have been trying to convince me that I’ve done more than enough, and I chose to believe them. 😉 This novella petite novel will also not be finished once it reaches the 30.000 words mark, so it will require a few additional writing days next week, anyway. On top of that, I really, really, really needed a break from it. I know I can come back to it with renewed energy next week, so I’m going to take the weekend, have a few tonight (celebrating the Ladylit milestone without its co-founder), go for a hike tomorrow and on Sunday I’m going to the Gay Day at Disneyland.

I may or may not check in tomorrow (Hong Kong hikes notoriously end with too much beer), and in case I don’t, I do want to say that I’ve enjoyed blogging every day a whole lot and I want to thank everyone who left a comment (here or on GoodReads) and everyone who sent me messages of encouragement. No matter what happens this weekend, Summer’s End is scheduled for release around Christmas, so I’ll keep you posted on that.

Meanwhile, have you watched Concussion? Last night, I watched it for the third time in one month’s time and I still enjoyed it every bit as much.

Hands up if you want a Laila Robbins/Robin Weigert spin off!

The numbers:
Day 1: 1000 words
Day 2: 3600 words
Day 3: 2400 words
Day 4: 0 words
Day 5: 6000 words
Day 6: 5000 words
Day 7: 4500 words
Day 8: 4300 words
Day 9: 1700 words
Total: 28.500 words

P.S. Good luck to all the brave people starting NaNoWriMo today!

One night maybe a year ago I was at a gay bar and I started chatting to a random guy and the conversation landed on The Voice (as conversations in gay bars do). I confided in him that I l.o.v.e.d. The Voice but couldn’t stand Christina Aguilera. He looked at me in disbelief, got up, walked away and never talked to me again.

“Well, that’s a little bit exaggerated,” I thought, because I really couldn’t see the appeal. Until this season of The Voice when Christina Aguilera started dressing as a lesbian.

Thanks for undoing the tie already, Christina.

I see it now. And I apologise to every gay man I’ve ever offended by saying unkind things about Xtina. Why am I going on about this? Well, I need a picture in this post for on Facebook and I also suspect I may be losing my mind. Almost 20.000 words (19.800 to be exact) in four days will do that to a person.

It’s too much, and if it hadn’t been for this challenge, I would have taken a break this afternoon. (But I have my pride and I’m stubborn enough to want to finish it.) It’s not the numbers of words per se (although today I had to resort to Write Or Die to get them done), but all the living in my head that comes with it.

I wanted to make up for failing to reach 5000 words yesterday, but I failed again. I did my 3000 words before lunch (hunger is a good motivator, I just don’t allow myself to eat until I’m done), but only managed 1300 words in the afternoon. I was in massive procrastination mode and couldn’t snap out of it (corgi videos are so addictive.)

But, between all the whining and procrastinating, I am actually only 3200 words removed from my 30.000 words goal. I’m getting there. The wall I spoke of yesterday was just fatigue and I know where my characters are going (to bed, with toys). Today was the last full day I could work on it, though. I have out-of-the-house stuff to do all morning tomorrow (and morning is obviously my best time to write) and on Saturday I’m going on a desperately needed hike.

But, of course, I’m not going to stop now. I’ll just get up extra early tomorrow and try to get some words in before I have to go and try to amp myself up (aka severely abuse my nespresso machine) in the afternoon to make it to 2000 (the official goal for tomorrow) and then I’ll try to finish it all off on Saturday before the hike (for which I only have to leave at 10 a.m., but it does mean no wine on Friday evening, oh no.)

And now, I’m going to watch Concussion again (I’ll take a picture.)

The numbers:
Day 1: 1000 words
Day 2: 3600 words
Day 3: 2400 words
Day 4: 0 words
Day 5: 6000 words
Day 6: 5000 words
Day 7: 4500 words
Day 8: 4300 words
Total: 26.800 words

As Harper Bliss, I’ve never written a work longer than 21.000 words (Fool for Love is the longest). I’ve written two novels, one out there under a different name (ask nicely and I’ll tell) and another one shelved away on my hard drive because, well, that’s the only place it deserves to be.

Now that I’ve reached the 22.500 words mark in Summer’s End, I seem to have hit a wall. I breezed through 3000 words before lunch (1200 before I even had a coffee, straight out of bed and in front of the computer) (some days it’s so handy to have an office/bedroom) and was smiling all the way through my lunch break (not easy when you live in Hong Kong where hardly anyone ever smiles back), enjoying the sun etc., believing this was going to be an awesome day of writing, and then… the wall.

I’m sure it has to do with nerves of writing something longer than I’m used to (I usually stop long before I have a chance to get stuck) and it doesn’t help that my characters have worked themselves into a bit of an impasse. Before I started this novella petite novel, I always envisioned it as a story in two parts and I’ve now reached the end of part one and part two is not sprouting from my fingers the way I had imagined it. My strategy at this moment is just to try again tomorrow morning, when my brain is fresh and roaring to go. I did manage another 1500 words this afternoon, for a total of 4500 words today, which is not bad at all. So, as always, we’ll see tomorrow. But, in general, today was much better than yesterday, I just need to figure some things out.

Apart from that, I’m sick of living alone. I’m not a person who does well alone. I’m one half of a twin and, quite literally, from the day I was born, someone else was always there.

(Have you seen this video, by the way? I’m sure my mother will say this could have been my sister and me 35 years ago.)

I do have a dinner date tonight (and a bunch of plans for this weekend, some healthy and some not), and, at the end of the day, it does look as though I’ll make my word count by my self-imposed deadline, so I really can’t complain (but I do it anyway, I can’t help it.) 😉

Meanwhile, here’s the view from my other office/bedroom window.

Some buildings

The numbers:
Day 1: 1000 words
Day 2: 3600 words
Day 3: 2400 words
Day 4: 0 words
Day 5: 6000 words
Day 6: 5000 words
Day 7: 4500 words
Total: 22.500 words