Last night I took some photographs of my Piranesi in Montserrat book. This is one that I particularly like.

At the moment I am finding it difficult to find a balance between researching and writing my next book. I´m not sure when to stop doing the research and start doing the writing. There is a sense that if I haven´t completed all the research before I start writing, I will have to go back and edit everything out because it will be wrong. Waiting until I have collected all the necessary facts and details seems like the logical thing to do. However, it doesn´t fit with how I work as a writer, nor with the method I used to write More House, through which I left myself open to all and any influences around me -- what I was reading, who I´d been speaking to that day, what was on the radio, the dream I´d had the night before etc. The plan to use a different method with the second novel doesn´t seem to be working. Instead I just want to write and write about whatever comes up for me on any given writing day, and then afterwards go back and clean everything up.

Perhaps every writer must find their own method and perfect it, rather than trying to write using the methods he or she assumes other writers use. I always picture a writer sitting at a light-flooded desk that overlooks a deserted beach, writing from morning till night. Who are these people? My reality seems so far away from that romantic ideal, but at the same time, unlike what I felt prior to finishing More House, it is not something I lament. Novels get written, with or without giant windows.