Ned was reading the new Terry Prachett this morning and started laughed out loud when he came to the line saying Vimes believes that writers spend their days lolling about in their pajamas drinking champagne. And the footnote confirming it. I thought this was most unfair as I was actually drinking coffee at the time. And not lolling so much as checking my email and internet to see if their were any interesting oddments on ebay I could buy and claim were essential for research. Then, having been very calm during the building of an Ikea wardrobe I went out for lunch with my editor, Flora. OK. We did have champagne then, but I was dressed. So, you see? Not True At All.
It was our celebrating new book deal and CWA shortlist lunch. And I got a present. It is a very beautiful pen and pencil set in a box with my name on it. It also has the crow silhouette from Island as you see, and, as it is wooden, I can pretend Casper Grace made it. I think I might have applauded when I saw it.
Now I’m back home and have used the pen to write my To-Do list. Here it is in full:
1. Write new novel
2. Make it a very good novel
I fear the time of lolling may be over for a while.
What a lovely gift. I don’t suppose it was a fountain pen? I am a huge fan of fountain pens. I do, however, like your to-do list. Proceed.
Not a fountain pen! I got myself a fancy one of them to sign my first contract and haven’t lost it yet. But this still writes like a dream…
I have resolved to dig out my fountain pen … wonder if it will still ‘work’ and wonder whether I can still buy cartridges for it? It can be used as a traditional pen, filling it from a bottle of Quink or Stepen’s ink, but I have always used ink cartridges. My husband was once given a Mont Blanc, the must-have pen of the 1980s, but it was the most ‘blobby’ writer of any pen either of us had ever used! My favourite was my Parker 51, sadly now with split nib and perished inside.
I like filling my pen from a pot of ink (though I do all my novel writing on a computer these days). For anyone who likes to know my fountain pen is a Caran d’Ache Ecridor Chevron. Just looked it up. It’s lovely, no blobbing there.