Flu

I've managed to pick up a bout of flu from somewhere (yes, in the middle of a summer heatwave *rolls eyes*) and have been sniffling and sneezing - hence the lack of updates here. Progress on writing has been pretty slow too but I have managed to scrape a few words together on Mandragora, including this fun description of the Central Library in Birmingham:

"Luckily Birmingham had an excellent library. From the outside it might look like an upturned concrete ziggurat that someone had dropped from a great height to land with a splat on Paradise Place, but inside it had eight floors of reference material including a whole floor dedicated to history, another to periodicals and a separate area, up a wrought-iron spiral staircase, for the city's archives. And even the outside wasn't so bad once you got used to it. True, Paradise Place was rather a misnomer with not so much as a blade of grass in sight - just flights of ugly steps and a pointy Gothic fountain where pigeons drank and barely-dressed tots (and students) frolicked on hot days. But the city council had done their best with the basic resources, festooning every ledge and crevice with boxes of flowers until it resembled a cement hanging garden, and providing a clutch of scruffy shops and bars in the ziggurat's forum, if that wasn't too much of a clash of cultures."

And here's a photo of the library to show you what I'm talking about. :)

Now I'm desperately trying to come up with ideas for articles for the main character to write, since I've gone and made him a freelance journalist. I'm having to think back far too many years to my own stint at university and remember my own essays for inspiration. So far I've only come up with the history of castle building, but at least it's a start.