I have a friend, Ross, who manages to set aside a couple of hours every day for writing. And he's been successful — a published collection of memoirs that has sold more than 2,000 copies and now a three-novel contract with a Toronto publisher for his medical mysteries, including an excellent first novel that is due to be published in spring of 2009.

And I have a friend, John, who is now retired and is a full-time writer. He has completed several novels of exceptional quality and, I trust, is currently in the heavy marketing stage. He certainly delivers the goods and should be able to find an agent and/or publisher fairly quickly.

And then there's me. I struggle to get my life organised enough to set aside two or three hours each day (even one hour would be great) for writing. There's always something that needs to be done: the lawn mown, the dog walked, dinner made, etc. So I end up making very slow progress on my creative work. I wrote my first text book almost 10 years ago at a time when I was still young, I lived in a tiny apartment and my partner was overseas at University. I worked every night after work for two to three hours and finished the 300-page book in just under three months. Amazing, when I think of it now.

So I know I have to start playing with my schedule to figure out when I can write. Ross writes early in the morning, before his work day begins. I could try that. My partner and the dog are usually still asleep then so I would have fewer interruptions. But I already get up before 7 so how early would I have to be out of bed? Yikes.

I was successful with the text book by writing in the evenings. I could try to go back to that. But that's when life comes to call more often and I'm tired from a day at work.

I'll have to keep plugging away, trying to find a niche of time. Perhaps I should write every day through my lunch hour at work. Not a bad idea but lunch tends to get eaten up (so to speak) by phone calls and e-mails and people dropping in and projects that leak into the break.

I am recognising now that my first two Phillip Gold novels are pretty good as early efforts go but I need to get stronger and more consistent as a writer and I need to take the full-developed characters and thrust them into new adventures that help them to grow further. I like the first two novels; I'm proud of the first two novels. But maybe I have to accept that they were necessary experiences to put me into the position of writing one that will sell.

So I need to make the time to write.

Tags: Three-Day Novel, Writing, Ross Pennie