Akkad at 115k

Art by Castagnas

 

With all the quaky-shakies going on recently, I haven't done a lot of writing. Poor sleep has led to a state of being too knackered to imagine much. Yesterday, I hit the 115k mark with Akkad and there's still a way to go. Another 5,000 words and it'll be the longest novel I've ever written. Currently immersed on the battlefield, which I must admit, isn't my favourite place to be. I'm not great at military tactics and keeping track of everyone can prove challenging. I can already feel that this novel is going to require more fixing in edit than anything that's gone before, but I'm soldiering on.

I'm still discovering interesting things along the way, including the Babylonian Map of the World, which came much later in history than Akkad, but is still pretty fascinating. I was going to write about this, but I've been spending a lot more time on YouTube recently, so I'll probably just make a video of it soon-ish. It's my new favourite writing distraction after Words With Friends. I must admit, I'm surprised and nervous that I've taken to it. I've always preferred being behind the camera - hence, writer - but I'm getting used to it. Hoping to do an interview with my friend Firmin soon, about his publishing business in Rwanda. More and more lately, I've been thinking I should shift the focus of my consultancy towards something I'm really interested in, and publishing is one of those things.

So, plodding along. 

You'll be glad to know the earthquakes seem to have stopped. We had a little wobble late yesterday evening, but the past couple of days have been really calm.

Here's one of those videos. It's the stuff I was saying previously about the weird similarity between Mesopotamian art and Rwandan imigongo, only in video form.