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"I use a double desk arrangement, one for the computer, one for the rest. It means twice the area to put things down with the good intention of tidying them up later. But, like others of a messy persuasion, I really do know where everything is. It’s also very much who I am. I hope I don’t mean a total wreck, but rather it’s the place where there’s just me and my characters and my words. No need to make any of the compromises that are necessary in normal social interactions. I can just sit there as an observer and record the goings-on.
The room’s in the basement of our house and I look out on a lush corner of the garden. Standing among the grasses and shrubs is a carving of an eagle I did at a class I started attending in order to find out what it felt like to carve a figurehead. That was research for my historical novel The Figurehead but I liked it so much that I still make things.
On the desks (and floor) apart from work-related bits and pieces, I have family photos and strange little things I’ve picked up at conferences and the like, such as a wee armchair for my mobile to sit in, or a long spring with a dog’s head at one end and a tail at the other in which I stick letters and things – my in-tray, if you like.
On one wall, there’s a huge poster for the film Germinal – a great book and a reminder of how nasty the gap between the haves and the have-nots is and always was.
In brief, though, and with no pretentiousness intended, the desks are like those magic mirrors and things – places you walk through to enter other worlds."
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Bill was a university lecturer but took early retirement to write full-time. His crime novels have been published in the UK and the USA. He also writes short stories, sketches, songs, and stage and radio plays, but earns his living writing commercial scripts and documents.
His website and blog are at:
www.bill-kirton.co.uk
http://livingwritingandotherstuff.blogspot.com/

"I don’t always write at my desk. I face a wall because I’d spend too much time staring out at the world. I can still turn my head left or right to see through a window.
I watched a fascinating programme on tv last night about the hardships facing shops on our high streets. It hit home to me because our local high street has suffered terribly in the 'economic downturn', with big name stores pulling out due to rent increases and independent shops closing by the week. I was staggered to find that we're by no means the worst; in some cases (such as Dunstable in Bedfordshire) the experts think that the closures have now reached critical mass. In other words, there are so few shops left that nobody is visiting the town centre and the remaining shops have no customers, so they too will have to close.
It's that time of year again: strawberries, rain, athletic young folk leaping about in whites, and the gentle thwack of balls. Tennis balls, that is. Yup, Wimbledon is here again. Two weeks of joy for tennis fans, two weeks of fuming and searching the tv listings for *anything* that isn't tennis for those of a less sporting persuasion. But hey, it is only once a year.



