writers' boot camp

I have just come back from a week in Spain with my friend and fellow writer Jason Webster, author of the brilliant Sacred Sierra, which documents his experiences living on a mountain farm in the remote hills north of Valencia. And they are remote- not a person lives in his valley, only eagles, wild boar and ibex. As well as slagging off most well known writers, de rigeur, for lesser known writers gathered together in remote places with copious quantities of home made grappa, we explored the concept- ie. talked about- the possibility of holding writing courses up there in Jean de Florette country. The place is inspiring with amazing views and a waterfall strewn river to bathe in, but more importantly we came up with the notion of making it really TOUGH. Because writing isn't easy and the excuses to NOT WRITE are legion. We decided that the best way to get good at writing was to learn how to write fast. Writing well can come later. So the notion of writers' boot camp was born, where each would be writer comes for five days and has to turn out 2000 words a day. No excuses. Our next trick is not to criticise this in the normal useless manner where each person in turn throws in his tuppeny happeny worth, instead we focus on building the sense of achievement at having written so many words. At week's end you'll leave with 10k words- a sixth of a book- which is a huge boost to confidence. If you have any interest in this idea email me or Jason.