Instead of clicking on social media icons on my phone I'm enjoying a selection of videos on Youtube. It's great because it gives me the buzz that only the internet can, but also it's time limited and much less likely to result in a negative emotion as I was finding with social media.

So here's some of my favourite songs I'm loving at the moment:

Phixx Hold On Me - When they created Girls Aloud, the boys group who didn't win were called One True Voice, and they weren't great tbh. Anyway, the guys who didn't make it into One True Voice, formed Phixx and this is their biggest hit. Plus, the blond buy went out with Sarah Harding from Girls Aloud. That, as they say, is all.

Kylie, The One - very underrated song from Kylie (the woman is a goddess, that is alll). Squelchy bass, rhythmic arms, homage to a Busby Berkley musical. And that hook...A-ma-zing!

Churches - Clearest Blue - I love electropop and somehow this group had passed me by until I discovered them and promptly bought their whole back catalogue, watched them at Glastonbury and more and more. Anyway, this is one of my faves of theirs. Hold on tight for the mid point chorus about 2mins 10 because it's wicked. Plus, this has given me an idea for a story...more later.

Yazoo, Only You - I've loved this song since the early nineties when it wasn't fashionable. Plus the video is from a series I've yet to get into. Sean Maguire. Justsaying.

Sex and the City - love love love this series, and both films. I don't care if you think the films are rubbish because I *know* they're not! Doctor's Orders - brilliant kitschy song. Seeing Charlotte drunk, when she's normally so buttoned up is lovely.

Time to Say Goodbye - reminds me of Camella Soprano (amazing series, even more amazing character). Plus there was a documentary about a towerblock in Deptford, south east London, being converted into 'apartments' for the rich. All the council tenents were chucked out. They played this song endlessly during the documentary. It still makes me cry most times I listen to it.

Dream Academy - Life In A Northern Town - I know the hook from this from Dario G Sunchyme because I love nineties music. But this is where it came from. Bleak, northern, rhythmic chorus. Love love love.

The Primitives - Crash - We sang this with the uklelele band at UK Meet. I knew the song but didn't know who'd done it. Since then it's regularly on my youtube links to enjoy. Na na na na, na na na na na ha.

Tracey Ullman - They Don't Know - it's kitsch, it's snappy, it's fun, it's catchy. End of.

Kitty - Patricia Routeldge on Victoria Wood (five clips in total) - She said, 'I'm a radical feminist lesbian.' I thought, what would the Queen Mum do? I smiled and said, 'We shall have fog by teatime.' The phrases, the timing, the everything is brilliant. I could, and do, watch these again and again. Enjoy! They've asked me to talk about aspects of life in general - nuclear war, peg bags.

Melissa McCarthy best moments - I love all of her films. Fell in love with her as Sukie in Gilmore Girls.

Chicane - Thousand Mile Stare - I love dance music. I love trance music. I love Chicane. I also find it's pretty good music to write to as there's few lyrics and using headphones listening to music like this it blocks out EVERYTHING happening around, so I can write anywhere.

Welll, that's enough from me for today. I hope you've enjoyed a few of these and you've discovered some new to you things to enjoy.

Love and light,

Liam Livings xx

I know, I know, the event was 5 months ago, but I meant to write this and then I was busy with self publishing, writing, living, other stuff.

I always love UK Meet and it has a special place in my heart because through Clare London, I attended my first UK Meet in Brighton in 2012 and there I met my writing family. A wonderful, caring, helpful, friendly, group of a people who I've loved meeting at subsequent UK Meets and other events too. Here's the best bits of the last UK Meet as far as I was concerned.

I was very touched to be mentioned in such a lovely way in Charlie Cochrane's blog. I never think of myself as anything special or out of the ordinary, but the way Charlie summed it up in her blog had me crying (good, positive tears) a little. 'And here are two people who defy all labelling – myself and Liam Livings.' Charlie reminds me of the quote that you must be yourself because everyone else is taken. And that's what I always try to do.

The ukuleles. I must admit, when Cathy said she had organised these for the rainbow dinner I wasn't too enthusiastic. How wrong was I? Their enthusiasm, wonderful skills and picking some great sing along songs made for the best part of the night as far as I was concerned.  I told the group as I walked through the room where they were getting ready to go home, 'The most fun I've had with all my clothes on.' Which they shared on their Facebook group. Praise indeed.

Here's some audio clips of us singing along I recorded on my phone. Just click on them to download or open and they should work on media player etc.

Mum came to the Rainbow Dinner. It was the first time she'd met all the people I'd been talking about for so long. She had a great time, dancing, talking and singing along. I explained to her everyone at the event would know me as Liam Livings and not *real name* so she had to keep remembering to refer to me as Liam and not *real name* which also starts with a L. The rainbow teapot still has pride of place in her kitchen.

Love and light,

Liam Livings xx

I’m taking a break from social media for a while. I found myself recently becoming either very upset, angry, insulted, or discouraged by what I saw there. I realise they are all my reactions to what others have posted, so because a I need to own my reactions and I can’t tell others what to post and what not to post I’ve removed myself. My mental health is always a bit wobbly in winter, and lately social media hasn’t helped.

It’s also undeniably a massive time-suck and when I only have limited time to write I should really be writing and not on social media.

Instead of checking Twitter of Facebook I’ve moved the icons on my phone to three screens away from the home screen and instead I’m watching videos on Youtube for my internet fix. It’s far more nourishing to my soul and I feel much happier.

It’s also making me more present in the now and less staring at my phone. This, is also a good thing I think.

Instead of checking social media before I go to sleep I’m reading more fiction and magazines which also improve my mood.

I’m not saying I’ll forever be off social media, but just at the moment, I think it’s the best thing for me to do. For so long I loved it because it meant I could keep in touch with and make friends with people all over the world. I miss the sociable aspect of it, but for me the other aspects had overtaken the sociable part.

If you want to get in touch I’m still replying to emails and my contact me page here.

Love and light,

Liam Livings xx

I read 38 books in 2016. 4 were about writing. 9 were fiction I read and enjoyed for research on something I wrote. 14 were non fiction biographies / autobiographies.
Here’s the best in various slightly random categories I’ve created especially:
Best literary fiction – The Talented Mr Ripley by Patricia Highsmith. My MA dissertation tutor commented on my current reading taste (Diana Her True Story by Andrew Morton) and suggested I might like to read something he recommended. As a swapsies, I told him how much I adored Valley of the Dolls by Jacqueline Susanne and he read it, in one sitting, that week.

Best non-fiction – Crusader in Pink, Henry Cloud’s biography of Barbara Cartland – such an interesting life, reading about her writing process and society background was wonderful; Behind the Candelabra – very sad, much better than the film, showed me how far we’ve come with gay marriage etc; My Family and other Animals, G Durrell, a brilliant way to present someone’s life in a slightly fictionalised way; Lost and Found, Lynda Bellingham, I laughed, I cried, I cried some more. So sad she is no longer alive; Joan Collins by Graham Lord – she appeared in so many terrible films yet kept coming back for more. She’s referred to as the British Open because of her sexual appetite.

Best non-fiction that isn’t an autobiographies – Mindfulness Plain and Simple by Oli Doyle – such a simple philosophy but so hard to actually do in practice. I’m trying every day to implement the learning from this which can be summed up: don’t worry about the fearful future, or dwell on the painful past, focus on living and enjoying the beautiful now moments of life.

Best popular fiction – The Beach by Alex Garland – I didn’t read it at the time because hype and I like to swim against the tide of hype. It was so simply written yet so clever how gradual the creeping realisation of how not perfect the island community is; A Spanish Lover by Joanna Trollope – I’ve recently got into this author. I love how she portrays family, women, men, relationships. Plus, she writes a very good sex scene without any stuffing of the turkey. She provided a great source of material for my talk on when to tell and not show I gave last year.

What did you read and enjoy in the last year? I'd love to hear from you.

Love and light,
Liam Livings xx

In September last year I set myself a slightly mad goal of writing three stories before the end of 2016. Did I manage it? Was I too ambitious? Or did I really write all the words in this time?

I didn't do Nanowrimo because I had edits and self publishing to do in November, but since part through September to the end of December I like to think I did about 2.5 Nanorwimos (if each is 50000 words).

I was lucky to have a few holidays booked in this time and I of course, brought my trusty Neo and wrote while in Tenerife, Ibiza and Levi, including on most of the flights too. That, I'm sure, was one of the reasons I did manage this mad goal.

The actual word counts weren't quite what I expected, but I did manage:

• wrote the m/f romance of 50000 words, it's with my lovely beta readers now and I'm terrified as it's my first m/f romance. Strictly speaking I wrote the last few thousand in early January 2017 in Levi and on the flight home, but it's my goal so I'm counting that in the 2016 words
• wrote the mm Christmas romance, which ended up at 38000 words and was published as A New Life for Christmas. Buy links: Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk
• wrote and submitted the Ibiza story which ended up at 45000 words and I am just about to start revising it based on some feedback I received ready to resubmit it

Total word count: 133000

Would I do it again? Probably.
Would I always bring a writing device for flights and while on holiday? Absolutely. I wrote about 10000 words at the airport and on the flight home from Levi, Lapland. I put my earphones on, Enya all songs shuffle, and wrote in the airport departure lounge. Quite apart from being a great way to use dead time, it also completely distracted me from the anxiety I always feel about flying. It's so much more absorbing than simply writing. The only times I didn't write on the flights was when I was too tired to do so.

I'd be interested to hear if other authors write while travelling in any ways?

I'm pleased to announce that following the successful Write That Book workshop of 21 January in London, which received 9.4/10 average score from the 12 delegates, more testimonials here, Virginia Heath and I have opened our next workshop for bookings. Building Believable Characters and Conflicts is in London on 1 April and is strictly limited to 20 places.

Love and light,

Liam xx

I’ve been looking at my word count spreadsheet for last year and here’s some numbers. This is excluding any blogging, promo, ghostwriting or the MA writing. It’s only my own fiction words:
During the year I wrote 199015 words which is an average per week of 3827 words per week
The most words written in one week was 26393 during week of 24 October which was also incidentally the Clacton writers retreat weekend during which I wrote 14000 words.
The fewest words written in one week was 0 and I did this for 11 weeks during which I did: edits of existing WIPs, beta reading, MA assignments, had a holiday of reading and relaxing.
The words I wrote on my own fiction consisted of:

• Looking for Love In Levi, a short story 2500
• Imploding Marriage first few chapters of a chick lit novel 4500
• Two Big Ifs – Hacienda story 63000
• Ibiza Story 45000
• A New Life For Christmas novella 38000
• M/F romance set in a hospital 50000

I think that considering for ¾ of 2006 I was studying full time, and I also work full time, that’s not a bad amount of words to have written.

What about for 2017?
I’ve seen some other author friends, who also work full time, state publicly they’ll write 1000 words per day. I won’t actually write 1000 every day because that’s not how I write. I tend to binge write and then have a break between WIPs. But as an average over the year I think 7000 a week is manageable.

I know other authors who write full time who can write between 600000 to a million words in a year. I don’t doubt that if I were to write full time I could average 5000 words a day over 5 days a week which in theory would be about a million words - allowing time for days of editing and promo. However, as the phrase goes, ‘If my uncle had t**s he’d be my auntie.’ And I don’t write full time, I’m being pragmatic and sticking to my 364000 word annual target.

I’m not going to track blog post words or promo words because although they are still words and it is still writing, that’s not what I’m really interested in monitoring.
Hopefully this will keep me focussed on writing fiction words and remind me of this when I’m mincing about on the internet or debating penning a long blog post about something or the other.

I went to a great afternoon tea event in 2016 and Victoria Connelly gave a great talk about writers getting back to the writing. She mentioned Miss Read, a prolific author who always said that writers write. Victoria Connelly updated this with some words of advice that now, authors are asked to promote, publish, social media, blog everything.

She ended by saying that really readers don’t want another blog post, they want another book. This is going to be my guiding principal for 2017.

In the meantime, if you fancy something to warm your heart, in two different ways, I thought I'd remind everyone about my two popular novellas:

• Heat Wave Astoria - a sizzling heat wave and gay romance Buy links: JMS Books Amazon.com Amazon.co.uk
  
• A New Life for Christmas - a gay romance life swap novella for anyone who enjoyed the fabulous film The Holiday as it's inspired by that. Buy links: Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk

Love and light!

xx