Writing a novel

When I returned from NYC in late July, I began writing a novel. I just woke up one morning with a story in my mind and began. That is the reason this blog has not been updated in a while. Six months later and too many hours of research to assess, I am finally ready to piece together the bits I have written. This first part will take my main character from his home in a village in southwestern Russia, to Moscow in the second half of the 1800s, and on to Sakhalin Island in the Russian Far East. Chekhov wrote a detailed account of this penal colony when he visited it in 1890. Without Chekhov's book I would not have been able to write this portion. The character escapes from Sakhalin and makes it to Hakodate, Hokkaido, Japan and then on to Vladivostok on the mainland of the Russian Far East.

Now the hard part begins. Writing so that the story flows and the words capture what I want to tell is not, I have found, such an easy task. But I begin...

A reply to Skyehigh

Thanks for the link to Lapsang Souchong Zhivago. As soon as I have finished my current package, I will try this. This was an amazing coincidence also. Reading the text for the naming of the tea I was surprised to find Vladivostok mentioned. I am currently in the process of writing a novel in which this amazing place figures. It is not your everyday place, so coming across it this way was a pleasant coincidence for me.