The action moves to France

I’m almost half way through the current draft of The Sphinx Scrolls novel. So far the majority of the book has taken place in Central America, in particular Guatemala and Belize (although I still have to write a few scenes in England for that part of the book where Ratty follows a trail of historical clues). But now the action has moved to France. The reason for this is that the French government is helping Guatemala in its research into the ancient artefacts that they have found, with the plan being for them to share the benefits of any knowledge gained. So Ruby has just arrived in France, forced to work on the research project, only she’s now afraid for her safety after a dissenting co-worker disappeared.

This presents Matt with a challenge: he’s a wanted man, currently hiding in remotest Belize, and he has no passport or cash, and yet he needs to get to France to save Ruby (again). Only this time she’ll let him, if he can work out how to get there. This will be dealt with in the next writing session tomorrow.

The edits progressed well today, but it’s not purely been a writing day. I knocked 32 seconds off my PB for 5km on the treadmill this morning. The shed was shaking so much while I ran that the music centre, perched on a toolbox and blaring out an muffled and very ancient Cliff Richard and the Shadows tape, wiggled itself to the edge and then fell onto the floor with a bang, bringing my very uncool music to an abrupt end. And coincidentally, this was the same tape that I had played 25 years ago on a hand-held mono tape machine when hitch-hiking to a campsite in Provence (and which I wrote about in my travel book, Don’t Lean Out of the Window!). That hitch-hiking journey took me past a French lakeside location where Ruby has just arrived. Small world.

I also found time to watch An Education, starring that English baddie from Spiderman and that new actress who didn’t quite win an Oscar. The cad character in the film drives a Bristol, which is the same brand of rare and aristocratic car that Ratty drives in The Sphinx Scrolls.

Hopefully tomorrow I’ll get to the half way point in the novel and will start sensing a great deal of forward momentum with this draft. I want to get it done because the next draft will fill in a lot of interesting blanks that I’m very much looking forward to writing.