Since the end of November last year, I’ve been suffering from a writing malaise.
Not exactly writer’s block, it’s more of an I can’t be bothered sort of thing. I’ve been having just as many ideas as usual but I haven’t been able to summon up the enthusiasm to do much about them.
I’ve written a few words here and there, kept up with my blog posts, added to stories and made notes. But that’s about it. There has been no serious writing.
Several things have happened recently to motivate me.
I had the first reaction to the ARC of Andorra Pett Meets Her Match. Here’s what Steven Smith had to say.
I finished it today. Bloody loved it! It’s very well done!
It was the sort of reaction I was hoping for.
Then, after prevaricating for ages, I finally finished and submitted a short story called All by Myself to a publication on Medium. I got a note back on it, with the usual criticism of my grammar but there was also a request for a continuation of the story.
That gave me a lift, as well as the need to write more, fast.
Finally, my neighbour came around to give my garden a haircut. He’s a landscape gardener and he does this every year for us, pruning trees and shrubs ready for the new season. He reads my books too, making him an even finer fellow. We got talking and he told me how much he enjoyed the last one of mine that he had read.
That made my day.
These things have given me the push I needed. I’m now cranking out words again and have made a list of projects that I actually feel interested in doing.
I hope that I can get back into the swing of writing two or three thousand words a day, every day, like I always used to.
Here’s the first part of All by Myself.

“Abandon Ship, hull breach imminent.”
The voice was that of the ship’s computer, with the message that nobody ever wants to hear. It woke me up and galvanised me into action. I jumped out of my bunk and hurriedly dressed in my overalls and boots. I grabbed my coat, pulled the cabin’s emergency pack from its stowage and headed for the door.
The message was louder in the corridor, continuously repeating. Yet there was no panic, just a steady movement of the crew to the pod bay. Everyone had trained for this, in the simulator orbiting Earth. We’d all been exposed to the conditions of depressurisation and learnt to function until it was almost automatic. I knew exactly where my lifepod was located, I could have got there even if the lights hadn’t been working. In a way, it was a bonus that they were. It meant that things hadn’t got that bad. We might be in danger but we were in with a chance.
Suddenly, the ship shuddered and I felt the breeze on my face from the vents change to a howling gale. Now that was bad.
“Hull breach,” said the computer. “abandon ship. Oxygen at sixty per cent. Emergency airtight doors closing.”
The breach was behind me, I had to keep going, past one more space-tight bulkhead, which I could see was starting to close in front of me.
The gale was making it hard to move any closer to my pod. It was trying to suck me towards the hole in the hull and my last fifteen seconds of life. Unless I could move a few more metres against it and get through the door before it shut. Some of the airtight doors behind me must have failed. Time seemed to slow down as panic gave me the strength to haul myself through the gap. The door shut and the gale ceased. Around me, I saw other crewmembers climbing into their pods. After using most of my strength to get here, I was shaking with the effort as I reached mine and hit the button.
The door hissed open and I tumbled inside. The pod detected my presence, shut the door and started the ejection sequence, The ship lurched again and I fell into the padded seat. The straps automatically gripped me.
“Disconnecting. Stand by,” said the computer. And there was a sudden, gut-wrenching drop, overtaken by a feeling of lightness as I lost the benefit of the ship’s artificial gravity. This was one thing that we hadn’t trained for. Then we fell towards the planet we had been peacefully circling when I’d gone to my bunk, barely an hour ago. At least we knew that the surface would sustain human life until we could be rescued. It just might be some time, we were out on the edge of exploration.
Looking through the clear window as we tumbled, I alternately saw the planet below me and what remained of our ship. It was on fire in the middle. And I could see that there were a lot of escape pods. All heading down towards the surface.
There was chatter on the radio, people asking about each other and speculating on what had happened. I joined in. The thing was, we were all in the same situation, we had been woken by the message, everyone who had been on duty was still on board, trying to fix whatever was happening. And they were the ones who knew what was going on.
“All hands, listen up.” This was a new voice. It was our captain. There was a lot of background noise, shouted orders and small explosions.
For more of this story, head here.

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Darlene Foster
We all have times like this and need a few words of encouragement to keep going. Happy writing for 2025!!
Richard Dee
Thanks, it’s certainly lifted me out of my rut.