The books on my bedside table now:
"The Waves" by Virginia Woolf
"Between the Acts" by Virginia Woolf
"1984" by George Orwell
"The Remains of the Day" by Kazuo Ishiguro
"The New Oxford Book of English Prose" edited by John Gross
I've recently revived my interest in Woolf after buying one of her books from the second-hand bookshop: the first one on the list. Orwell I just happened to spot in the library, along with Ishiguro, who I've read before but going in for the experience again.
The Oxford Book has been on my table since last Christmas. I've skipped about 200 pages worth of extracts from writers from the 17th century up to Charles Dickens; I plan to finish the entire book by the end of the year, absurd as it may sound. (It makes me fall asleep very easily.)
The progress on the novella is slow. I'm constantly changing my ideas; now I've planning to do away with the four characters I originally intended and replace it with one. And I've revised the actual story completely. And I've thrown away the seashell motif I was considering. Everything continues to churn and mix and blend into something new; the fragments of imagery I wrote down a few days ago now seems unusable. I'm finding the influence from Woolf massive, and just today I've read another attempt to emulate her brilliant style. It was lacking her shine, unfortunately.
A tentative, working title: Fire and Glass.