Hello,
I'm currently (and very happily) editing book number four. It still has a long way to go to be perfect, but I thought I'd share some thoughts I've been having about it with you.
I just watched a Richard Curtis lecture about screen writing, which gave me the inspiration to write this. If you don't already know, I love Richard Curtis. Not in a sexual way, of course, he's much too old for me, and we're both happily married to the women in our life. I suppose what I should say is that I love his work. I read a lot of things about films like Love Actually and About Time that he's too sentimental. That his films aren't realistic depictions of love and that they're just upper class twaddle. Hearing him talk about love though and why he writes what he writes was truly inspiring because it's how I feel too.
Why do I write about love? Why not write a fast paced thriller, or a science fiction novel? The truth is that love just inspires me and in the words of a famous song from a Richard Curtis film...it's all around us. People fall in love everyday. Parents love their children all of the time. We love our parents, our friends, our siblings, our girlfriends, boyfriends, husbands, wives. It's not often you're involved in a high speed chase and I bet none of you have ever been taken into space by aliens or held captive by armed rebels. But I know that all of you have loved. Love is at the centre of what I write because it's at the centre of everything. Even in the middle of war people still fall in love, still long to hold their children, or sleep next to their husband or wife. No mater what else is happening in the world, we all love and need love. It's what makes life worth living. So the question is, why wouldn't I write about it?
Book four is different from the other books I've written. It's encompasses many different types of love. It's about love between parents and children, husbands and wives, girlfriends, boyfriends, and people we've lost. It's still a comedy and hopefully still very funny, but it has a depth, a pathos that I haven't reached before in my other books. Anyway, I'd better get back to it. I'm in the middle of a really great scene.
Until next time.
Hugs,
Jon X
