Aimee Horton

Happy GIN Day!

Jun
11

What a gin day it has been, I may have had a glass of gin after my brunch this morning (Williams Chase GB Extra Dry in case you were wondering) and then after a fab night at Elton John last night, we went to collect the boys from my mum and then it was straight off to a party with Iron Man.

As an aside, why do we stand behind our children while they’re eating at birthday parties? I have never understood this, I just go along with the flow and stand behind my child as he ignores me, or tells me that he’s had enough and can he go and play.

Then I came home and dumped the boys are Matt so I could do one thing, and one thing only. FINISH DOTTIE.

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Technically I finished it yesterday, bar about 500 words, which at the time I wrote “BLAH BLAH BLAH fill in some crap here” but that’s not really good enough is it?

So I changed “some crap” for “something” and added “The End” and sent Mr Aimee into Sainsbogs for gin. Unfortunately he didn’t have any ID so they wouldn’t serve him, so I had to go in myself.

I had no such problem.

If truth be told this draft is a bit of a mess. Well, a lot of a mess. I spent a lot of time trying to be a grown up proper author and write a plot and an outline, and break it down by chapter etc. However, I should know by now that I just need to wing it with the first draft. Luckily by the time I got to the 30k mark (!) I realised that and the second half of the story came a lot more smoothly, and now I’m done, now I’ve written the majority of THE END I can start from the beginning and go back and make things right.

I’m actually rather excited.

So with that in mind, I’m raising a glass of my new gin Whitley Neill and enjoying the rest of the weekend before I crack on with the hard work.

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Because not only do I need to get cracking with making Dottie work for you guys, but I also need to get cracking with this lot.

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Yes, that’s right, that’s two baskets worth of laundry that needs ironing/putting away (this is why we all look like tramps right now). But it’s ok, that’s just what happens when you focus all your attention on writing a book.

ISN’T IT? TELL ME I’M NOT THE ONLY ONE!

Anyway. HAPPY GIN DAY! Enjoy the rest of your weekend, and I’ll see you on the other side of my second draft!

x

PS. If you’ve read and enjoyed any or all of my books and haven’t had chance to leave a review yet, I would really appreciate it if you clicked here for Amazon.com and here for Amazon.co.uk and just left a few words. Reviews could be the difference between somebody buying or not buying a book so I WOULD LOVE YOU FOREVER if you helped people decide to buy. x

 

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Life Lately

May
13

There are some bloggers that just get in your head (Alison, Molly and Morgana I’m looking at you), and yesterday no different.

I was sitting looking grumpily at instagram (instead of happily) then I flicked onto twitter…which I have no idea why, because that makes me always grumpy and despondent. But for once it didn’t…I happened to catch Molly’s latest post called “Life Lately” and as always, she hit the nail in the head.

Like her I have exciting (totally not meaning to be cryptic) things happening. I’m also nearly at the end of my draft of the next Dottie novel, and the sun is shining. When you’re pulled this way and that, sometimes your ideas for blogs are clouded. Right now I have loads of ideas, they’re just all pants when it comes to writing them.

So instead, I’m going to embrace Molly’s idea, and this is my life..lately..

WRITING

Me writing

I’m on fire with Dottie. Getting to THE END is going to be amazing, but I know that this draft is going to need a lot of work. I’m trying to remind myself of the quote “the first draft is always shit” one I tell myself all the time, but by golly, there’s shit, and then there’s the runs. I’ll be looking for Beta readers soon though, so please get in touch if you’re interested.

ENJOYING THE MONKEYS

Monopoly

Theo went on his residential last week. In fact this time last week I was just willing him to come home, and was very relieved he’d managed to not break something abseiling down THIS ACTUAL TOWER.

Tower

*throws up in mouth*

While he was away I feel very lucky that the school was closed for polling day, so I got to take Larry to the farm and spend some quality time with him. We used to visit the farm a lot before he started school, so it was lovely to recreate it. Even though we did end up having a very in-depth discussion about why things cost what they do in the gift shop and why we can’t cross out the prices and write a cheaper one on with pen.

Larry runs

 

I was bloody glad to get this one back though…

Theohome

ENJOYING TIME WITHOUT THE MONKEYS

Mr Aimee and I worked out that it’s been quite a while since we have managed to bin the children off let the grandparents have the kids overnight, so when our friends suggested a night out we JUMPED at the chance.

Although I have to say, I enjoyed sitting in the garden with my book thoroughly too.

Winebool

WEARING

Mainly my dungaree’s if I’m honest. I don’t care what Mr Aimee says (that I look like a drunk kids TV presenter) I LOVE THEM.

Dungers

I’ve also loving my slogan tee’s & sweats right now. I feel very proud to be able to support my fellow #Mumboss mums…well support or their tops make me feel like I might be cool one day.

Fearless

FEARLESS TEE by Tease and Toes

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GIN AND ON IT Sweat from Parent Apparel.

Anyway, now I’m off for a photoshoot…she says really casually…

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WIN GIN!

Oct
19

The biggest thing I’ve learnt over the last year or so is that books are slow burners. Not just to read, not just to write, but as a whole. The process is long, and the rewards are what you make of them. It’s rare one of those rewards is to be rich, and if you understand that, you begin to see the real benefits.

For example, the sense of accomplishment is rather nice. The little worlds you get lost in can be good fun – or blooming scary depending what kind of books you write!. But to me, the two bits that stand out are (nice) reviews and seeing people REAL LIFE PEOPLE with my book.

My dream (other than of course tv/movie rights – KATHERINE PARKINSON FOR DOTTIE PLEASE) has always been for my books to be on a poster in tube stations, and to see people reading it. Now I’m not big enough for either the tube station, and I don’t go on the tube enough to see people reading my book, but thanks to the wonderful world of the internet, people are kind enough to send me pictures of them holding my book.

To me, this is HUGE. On a day where everything goes wrong, to see somebody with my book on their kindle or in their hands makes everything go away, and all the hard work feel worthwhile, as does a review where somebody says they laughed a lot at what I’ve actually written. PEOPLE TELL ME I MAKE THEM LAUGH!

Which, when you read it like that, in all honesty confirms what I always knew. It’s about my ego. The ego that spends most of the time doubting itself, and in the middle of the night, while I’m wiping bottoms and tripping over action figures WHICH I SWEAR ARE LEFT TO HURT ME, questions whether I’m any good or not. So, because I’m not an autumn person, because now Mothers Ruined is out there and I’m sitting here biting my nails telling myself you all hate it…I thought I’d be proactive and ask you to feed my ego. I guess I’m bribing you, some might say.

It’s not gone unnoticed that I like gin. I have a large choice at home, and I have a few favourites right now. All you have to do, to win a bottle of one of my favourite gins, is to like my Facebook page which is here and post a picture of you with one of my books (or all of them). If you want an extra entry into the hat (which Larry will be pulling the winner from) all you need to do is review Mothers Ruined and leave a link on my page so I know about it.

SIMPLES.

Competition ends Friday 20th November 2015. GIN DRINKING!

T&Cs.

This giveaway is open UK wide
The prize is a bottle of gin chosen by Aimee Horton from Passthegin.co.uk
It ends on 20th November 2015
Winners will be contacted, and required to provide their postal address.
The winner will be chosen at random.
The winners must have fulfilled the mandatory requirements – liked Aimee Horton’s Facebook page and posted a picture of themselves with a copy of one of Aimee Horton’s novels on above mentioned Facebook page.
The winners will have 3 days from announcement to contact me and provide their details. If they do not contact me I will re-draw.
You can gain an additional entry to the competition by leaving a review for Mothers Ruined here & here.
The prize is not transferable and there is no cash alternative.

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