As my foot FINALLY begins to heal - 6 weeks after falling down some stairs, I realise that in that fall, I lost my ability to multi-task. I have been plunged into a world of tunnel vision where not only is it impossible to do more than one thing at a time but I now can only even think about one thing at a time. It is all very strange. The plus side is that my one focus has been Bombus books the downside is that the fridge is not as well stocked as usual and dinner has become a more haphazrd affair! Now the website is up I hope to find less excuses for actually writing something - with my Arvon course looming on Monday my distractions may be even further diminished as we are told there is neither phone nor internet access....just writing then....
http://www.arvonfoundation.org/courses

Distractions are over - England left the Euros last night so I can put my writing head on again. I need to prepare for the Arvon writing course I have signed up for (in Shropshire) on "Making a start on your novel". I am madly panicking about what this will be like alongside reading the work of Jane Bailey - a last minute tutor for the week and am half-way through "Tommy Glover's Sketch of Heaven".
It is our Oxford Inc writing group meeting this week (7 of us) when as well as having our first session of writing for our new project we will also discuss the birth of Bombus Books and how the world will hear about us.
It is also my reading group meeting on Friday this week. This also has 7 members -  I guess good things happen in 7s. This week the meeting will be at my house so it is my turn to choose "the next book" - I am ducking and diving on this - lurching from a big, fat summer read to something more classic. Such a responsibility. Still a few days left to make my mind up.

Publishing your own books takes a lot of time (and thought). We have to do everything from book content, design and proof-reading to sales and marketing. I now need to put together some press releases and we need to start "selling". Telling people about us and getting them to part with their money for our books is about as hard as it sounds! All this, alongside the "day job" of course, provides endless distractions from sittiing down and being a writer! ....and of course Euro 2012 continues...and Wimbledon starts on Monday

I have spent the past half hour looking at the programme for the Edinburgh book festival - not that I will be able to go but as a publishers it seems as though we should be sizing up the competition!

So...this is not exactly the beginning of our adventure but the first recorded evidence of "a" beginning.

It is some years since we all met at a creative writing class in Oxford and began to write together. Since then we have set up our own writing group (Oxord Inc) and now our own publishing company, Bombus Books. We have a smattering of expertise between us - publishing experience, years of working in business, marketing and an eclectic selection of links to the trade along with a dusting of optimism. We are, more importantly, committed to writing and to producing the kind of books we would love to see on sale.

The adventure begins amidst Euro 2012 so having introduced us I will return to Czech Republic v Portugal...whilst desperately reading the end of the new Lynda LaPlante book "Backlash" More anon...