No sooner had I posted my little lecture on making writing the ONLY thing you do, I went and got a gig reporting on the Bristol Comic Expo last weekend. I knew as soon as it was arranged that this was going to put a serious dent in my writing schedule, and I was dead right. Quite apart from the 6-hour round trip to Bristol and back, and two nights away from home, taking notes from three 1-hour audio recordings, then turning them into three 3000-word articles, is one metric buttload of work – this, and the fact that I bizzarely decided to write a short story at the same time (more on that later). But as a DC fan through-and-through, the chance to hear Dan DiDio in person was just too good an opportunity to miss, and despite it taking a big bite out of my novel time, it was a fantastic weekend. My first report is up on CBR, and you can enjoy it here. My hat is off to CBR editor Jonah Weiland for making my articles look so good with lots of tasty comic art to accompany them!

However, although my wordcount suffered, it was a very worthwhile experience for one important reason. Getting a peek into the inner workings of a comics company as large as DC was an incredible inspiration – there are dozens of creators, writers and artists working very hard to keep an entire universe of characters and storylines going. The planning and management of such a vast mythos as the DCU requires, according to Dan, rooms full of whiteboards and blackboards and story charts, all kept under tight security.

And then it occurred to me. It was all about the story. Hearing it from Dan himself, and the host of DC creators who were at the expo, it was patently clear that the number one priority was telling good stories.

That, to me, is a wonderful inspiration, that people are striving so hard to entertain others with works of fiction. And really, fiction, the written word – be it book, novel, short story, comic, screenplay, theatre script, even the scripting in a computer game – is what most of us spend most of our leisure time seeking. Human culture derives most of its entertainment – and let’s face it, the persuit of happiness is mainly what life is about – from storytelling.

This is perhaps not news to a lot of people. But sometimes you come to these kind of realisations, even though it was staring you right in the face. This is a good thing.

So after a weekend and a week buried deep in the DC universe, I’ve emerged recharged and re-inspired. And of course, I happen to actually be writing a superhero novel anyway, caught somewhere between the brightly coloured spandex of the Justice League of America and the muted adult tones of Watchmen.

Seven Wonders then has hit 14,377 words, which leaves 85,663 to go. I’ll need to rejig my timetable as I’m about two weeks off schedule, but with a bit of luck this new-found creative energy will let me build up a bit of momentum, and I’ll be able to get some extra words down to catch up. And in fact the 6,800 word short story I wrote in the three days immediately following from Bristol was a really good exercise in getting the imagination back in gear.

But more on that later!