I don’t have a great deal to write about in my diary at the moment, mainly because my creative energy is being siphoned off into another direction. Most of it is going into a series of essays about life in a corner of Somerset, not far from Wells. The aim is to capture a sense of the place — a snapshot of what people are doing and why they do it — before time changes it all beyond recognition.

I’m now four weeks into the project, and it’s growing faster than I expected. I’ve reached around 30,000 words from twenty interviewees, each offering a different insight into country life. Their voices are varied, often funny, occasionally poignant, and together they form a tapestry of rural experience.

Much of my time is spent turning conversations into readable prose. That means long hours of transcription and careful editing — turning speech into something that flows naturally on the page without losing the warmth of the original. Even the most articulate people, when recorded, tend to repeat themselves or drift into half-finished sentences. It’s my job to preserve the spirit of what they say while making it coherent. I once had an 8,000-word transcript that, after trimming the repetitions and tangents, became just 1,000 words of clear, purposeful text.

As for the title of the book, that’s still evolving. It began as a simple idea — a book about life on the Mendips — but as the themes have widened, so must the title. It needs to resonate with readers who might never have set foot in Somerset but still recognise the human truths beneath the local detail. I won’t give away the new title yet, but the key is to see the whole thing through the reader’s eyes, not the writer’s.

I plan to publish through Kindle Direct Publishing. I’m undecided whether to prepare the book myself, hire someone who knows the system, or go through a small company that specialises in helping authors like me. The last option won’t come cheap — probably not less than £2,000 — but it might be worth the investment if it saves me a steep learning curve.

If all goes well, I should reach 60,000 words by the end of November. December will be for rereading, refining, and illustrating — bringing the book to life visually as well as textually. Once the final version meets KDP’s requirements, publication can happen within forty-eight hours, which suits an impatient soul like me very well.

Of course, publishing is only half the story. KDP won’t market the book; that responsibility rests squarely with me. Talks, local publicity, an e-book version — all the usual routes must be explored. It’s the kind of project that demands full attention.

I sometimes think of Michelangelo painting the Sistine Chapel — that great vision in his head, the drive to finish what he started. When you’re in the middle of something like that, days off feel irrelevant. The work becomes its own incentive.

And that, I suppose, is where I am now.