Hello and welcome to Making Crime Pay! I’m Nicki Thornton - I’m an author. I share my creative journey here and what I am learning along the way. I pass on my love of books by sharing what I am reading and review them so you can enjoy them too. I visit schools and other places to encourage a love of reading and help writing be more fun!
My latest novel is The Floating Witch Mystery, about three determined children, an eccentric witch and the world’s best magical detective who will stop at nothing to save everything they love. If you would like to hear me read the opening chapter you can head here.
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Nicki
Trying not to let writing take over
I do get up from my desk (not as often as I should).
I do go outside (notes about how I find this difficult later!).
This year I joined in with something that has really given me a new reason to leave my desk and get outside, so today I wanted to share that with you. It was the second time I joined in with something I hope will become a new year tradition - I joined the New Year Plant Hunt. Ever come across it?
I only started last year. It’s about getting people to record botanical life in their local area and gather mass data that helps botanists understand how our plants are responding to changing weather patterns. What changes are being recorded as we experience autumns and winters with warmer temperatures and fewer frosts?
All you do is take a walk at the turn of the year and make a record (ideally take a photo) of every plant you see flowering.
Results are just in
I found it a great way to get outside on New Year’s Day and the results have just come in, so I thought I would share them here.
More than 3000 people took part and 76 per cent of those were first timers. So I am not alone in being quite new to this!
It is run by the Botanical Society of Britain and Ireland.
What was notable this year was that a mild winter meant there were plenty of plants still flowering from the autumn, whereas normally they would be expected to have been killed by frosts.
Why take part? It helps me notice nature more
At first you look around in January and feel everything is still over-wintering. But as you start to look more closely, it is amazing how early things start to flower. We found daisies and dandelions that I otherwise would not have noticed or overlooked as not important. And I can now identify many more plant species!
Think it would be tough to find flowering plants in January? In coastal Swanage the records uploaded show more than 100 different species were noticed in flower.
If you’d like to, you can read a full report here.
Why not put a note in your diary to take part next year?
It gives me some much needed balance
I love writing. Perhaps everyone will think this is inevitable (otherwise why do something that is very hard, very time consuming and brings a small financial reward). But actually quite a lot of writers don’t like writing all that much! They are much more in tune with the feeling of ‘having written’. Which I do get.
I find writing very mindful. It really switches me off from everything else. Disappearing inside my own imagination into the worlds I’ve created I find fun and satisfying.
But it takes me ages. Writing for me is a very slow process. I think the only reason I make progress is not because I am a fast writer (I am definitely not), but because I find so much joy in it. I deliberately do not add up the hours I put into writing (and revising).
But I am also aware that hours go past, days go past - and I do have to make an effort to move away from my computer and desk. I sometimes really need an incentive to leave my imaginary worlds and get outside.
Writing means I can work from home, which is great. But it also means I basically never have much of a reason to leave the house!
Making an active decision to observe the nature changing around me has made it much more worthwhile and purposeful for me to even go for a short walk and cover pretty much the same ground every day.
Reducing screen time
The other side of writing as a job is that you are largely responsible for trying to move yourself from being an author no one has ever heard of to being one some people have heard of. And these days that’s far more about social media than it is going out to give talks,
And yes, it’s just another part of the job that involves a screen and not leaving the house. Although the best of social media is it is a place to meet up with other people who inhabit the same spaces as you - other authors, booklovers, educators, bookshops and that is fun - and I still do not have to leave the house.
So part of my strategy for my overall well-being is to leave the house once a day. And one big incentive is to be much more mindful and noticing of nature. So expect more scenes like these from me this year.
And really consider making that note in your diary and joining in with the plant hunt next year.
I go for a short walk after breakfast and I am befuddled by the number of people looking at their phones while walking. What's so captivating? They are missing out on what's happening right beside them.
Taking notice of our surroundings, like your botanical project, allows us to be part of the world and then add to it with our writing.