This is not a book about Harry Styles.

(but it's meant to be)

My second weekly posts, a glimpse behind the scenes as I write a new book (or three) are for paid subscribers. A paid sub costs just over £1 a week (less if you go for an annual subscription!).

If you would like a paid sub but can’t afford one, email me and I’ll sort you out.

Hopefully next week, I will actually have some of my own words to share.

That was me, last week.

Since then I’ve written ten thousand words, but not in the right order.

Whenever I used to write magazine articles, I’d get to a point where I had all the info but it was a big jumbled mess. And for a while I would flail.

I spent most of each day just panicking and yelling at myself. I think probably 85% of my work time is still panicking and yelling. It kills me to think of how much time I’ve wasted and continue to waste, between the self-excoriation activities and, you know, the internet.

OK, but my friend, you know it is all part of the PROCESS.

The fucking process, right.

From Jami Attenberg’s interview with Emily Flake

And then I would remember that I just needed to go to the beginning of the piece, work my way through and maybe add something, delete something, move something to the right place, get to the end and start again. I didn’t have to fix the whole thing all at once.

And then I would always think of this Michaelangelo quote

The sculpture is already complete within the marble block, before I start my work. It is already there, I just have to chisel away the superfluous material.

And then that quote would remind me of this, from Rainbow Rowell’s Fangirl:

"You working on your final project?"

"Indirectly," Cath said.

"What does that mean?"

"Have you ever heard sculptors say that they don't actually sculpt an object; they sculpt away everything that isn't the object? Well, I'm writing everything that isn't my final project, so that when I actually sit down to write it, that's all that will be left in my mind."

I found that quote by searching my Facebook. Because I know I wrote this:

This is exactly how I approach writing novels, if you add 'reading everything (including the internet)' to 'writing everything'. (I don't recommend it.)

I wrote that on 3 July 2013. Ten years ago. Nothing’s changed, except now I’m not writing a novel, I’m writing a book about Harry Styles. And see how one reference just led me to another and another? This is constantly happening while I’m writing this book.