Doing nothing is doing something (Anne Rooney)

 

Back to Cambridge University Library

Penny Dolan posted about procrastination a few days ago. This is not quite an apologia for procrastination, but more a plea to be easy on yourself if you're not doing enough. I've not been writing full time (as in, 35 hours a week) since before the pandemic. A string of deaths and other disasters/disrupters, plus turmoil in the publishing industry, have made it pretty much impossible. 

 I thought I'd get back to it this autumn, but I'm honestly not sure I even want to. Publishing is still turmoily, AI is wreaking havoc, and the three book projects I have in prospect are, as often happens, waiting on design decisions. They will then turn into a panicked rush to get samples together in time for the Frankfurt Book Fair in October (which is not very far away). 

While waiting for publishers to get their act together, I've returned to a book I started before the pandemic and then had to give up as it was based on material in the British Library which was inaccessible . It's fun poking around at it, though I'm still not sure what shape it will eventually take, if any. I've also decided to learn some new skills, nothing to do with writing. And although this looks like 'doing nothing', it's already throwing up new ideas. Even the doing nothing that is gardening or walking around the fields looking for sloes lets some slow mental composting go on, and that all feeds into work when work happens. At least, that's what I'm telling myself...

Anne Rooney

Out now: Weird and Wonderful Dinosaur Facts, illustrated by Ro Ledesma, Arcurus 2025

 

 

Members' news

 Happy back to school week! September is thriller month with news of two exciting new releases coming soon.

Congratulations to Teri Terry on her debut adult book, first of a four book deal with Boldwood Books.

Here's the publisher's blurb:

A twisty, tension-packed and heart-stopping psychological thriller from bestselling author Teri Terry.

IF I WERE YOU, I'D GO HOME NOW.

When an anonymous note sends Lou rushing home, she discovers a betrayal that shatters her carefully built life. Catching her husband in bed with another woman, Lou walks away heartbroken - only to find herself the target of a sinister campaign. Threatening notes continue to arrive. Her car is vandalised. It seems someone is watching her every move. Lou suspects Freja, the woman she found in bed with her husband. But as she digs into Freja’s past, disturbing truths about her own history begin to surface. And as the threats begin to escalate, putting Lou’s own family at risk, Lou finally realises the danger isn’t just coming from the outside. It’s been inside Lou’s story all along.

THE STALKER will be published on October 6th. The pre-order link: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Stalker-Teri-Terry-ebook/dp/B0FF987219

And a big shout-out to Helen Lander, whose YA thriller HIDDEN TOXINS is out on October 15th from Hawkwood Books.

An addictive, hard-hitting YA thriller filled with poisonous twists, ‘Hidden Toxins’ will keep you hooked. Six audacious teenagers. Far too many secrets. A corrupt politician. Stalking… Murder… One thing’s for sure – Cedar and Sorrel are in way too deep.

#youngadult #thriller #diverse #LGBT+ #gripping #gritty #girllovesgirl #boylovesboy #girllovesboy #boylovesgirl #hawkwoodbooks #booktok

The pre-order link is here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Hidden-Toxins-H-J-Larder/dp/1068710349

There's also an absolutely stunning book trailer made by Helen's filmmaker nephew. Do check it out:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?si=gbldui_RRRTMYMNs&v=gtWN4AqbFmI&feature=youtu.be

And for more information on the production studio, here's the website: https://www.reframe.studio/

Any news you'd like publicised? Book deal, events, prizes etc. Send the details Claire Fayers

Jenny Wagner's Book About Writing by Paul May

You most likely know Jenny Wagner for her picture books with illustrator Ron Brooks— The Bunyip of Berkeley's Creek and John Brown, Rose and the Midnight Cat, for example, or for her novel The Nimbin. But Jenny Wagner also wrote one of the most useful, practical and entertaining books I've come across on writing books for children. It's called On Writing Books For Children and it was published in 1992 but it's not that hard to find a copy today online.

One of the things I particularly like about this book is that it contains both detailed advice about matters of style which would be helpful to someone who had never written a book of any kind before as well as more general outlines of, for example, the different ways in which you might choose to tell a story. There's a chapter entitled A Matter of Style which deals with the following: 'clumsiness, clichés, redundancies, inappropriate grandeur, archaic expressions, inappropriate imagery and accidental music to name just a few.'  In the section on Clumsiness she says this, which is both informative and encouraging: 

'Beginning writers often overlook clumsiness, which usually takes the form of a lot of little faults rather than a few dramatically big ones. But like all writing faults, they are cumulative; you can get away with one or two, but several can cast a veil over the writing, eventually making it unreadable. Fortunately it works the other way too: the removal of many small roughnesses can make a startling improvement to clarity and vividness.'

This is a short and entertaining book but contains lots of helpful information. Over the years I've enjoyed dipping into it from time to time but I think it would be most useful to those who think they'd like to write a children's book but have never really given much thought to what might be involved in doing so. There's a very succinct discussion of narrative points-of-view and a terrific chapter on dialogue which begins with some very basic stuff, but it's stuff you wouldn't know if you'd never written dialogue before— among other things, where you need a comma and where a full stop. 

Then there's quite a lot about speech attributions, a subject I find endlessly interesting. Wagner suggests that if you're writing for older children and are trying to avoid attributions you can 'drop in a name here and there', as in "I'll fix that, Julian!", but goes on to say: 'Only don't overdo it, unless you want your character to sound like a used car salesman. In real life people don't use other people's names a great deal, and we become suspicious when they do; we suspect they are trying to sell us something—a car, a time-share unit, or even a religion.'

Wagner describes what she's trying to do in her introduction. Having said there are no rules (the obligatory preface to a book about writing) she says:

'This book is not a collection of handy hints that will bring you fame and fortune; instead I am giving you a toolbox. I explain what the tools are, what job they do and how they do it; I show you the best ways I know of using them, and how not to hurt your fingers on them. I even suggest some things you might like to make. But I don't claim for one moment that these are the only tools available, or that there is only one way to use them.'

And here to end is a warning to all writers:

'Sometimes the faults in your writing hide from you. The desire to write something excellent is overshadowed by the even greater desire to have already written it.'

On Writing Books for Children by Jenny Wagner, Allen and Unwin 1992

11 Cached Days to do Nothing In - Joan Lennon

This post will appear on the 3rd of September 2025.* It will be a day where, I'm sure, many interesting things will happen and, I hope, I will get a fair old whack of writing done. But if I don't, for whatever reasons, it's quite possible that, even as a lost day, I will be moving the story forward in the dimly lit and largely overlooked bits of my brain. By not writing, I WILL BE ABLE to write another day. 

Empirically, we know that this is true, but it is mostly really hard to believe it. So I am offering you a gift of not one, but ELEVEN extra days where you don't have to achieve ANYTHING. Where do they come from? On the 3rd of September 1752, Britain changed from the Julian to the Gregorian calendar. Instead of the 3rd of September being the 3rd of September, it instantly became the 14th of September. Eleven whole days were passed over. Lost? Or just cached (in the sense of hidden away for later use). Those 11 theoretical days are available to everybody, of course, not just writers, but I feel as if we maybe need them more than many. Take a deep breath and embrace some extra time!

Epictetus not writing (wiki commons)

(He's nothing to do with calendars but I do like his pose - I'm ready! I'm ready! I'm ... blast, nothing coming.)

What could you do with your allocation of incorporeal days? Nothing is definitely an option. And, while you're revelling in that extra time, you ARE moving your writing on. Right?

* And it turns out Penny Dolan's post on the 1st strolls through the same ball park!

Joan Lennon website

Joan Lennon Instagram

THE PROCRASTINATION THINGY by Penny Dolan

Today is the first of September, bringing the turmoil of the start of a new academic year. Stationery stores are full of eager acquisitive children and concerned parents. Shoeshops are busy with purchasers. Even the weather is in a quieter mood.

Meanwhile here, at home, we are co-ordinating diaries, calendars and life for the months to come and then the troublesome thoughts start to arrive . . .  not only Where's that red Pomodoro timer? but the more serious worries: What have I achieved? What did I actually complete? And the follower-ons such as What am I going to do now? What writing do I want to work on next?  

There are plenty of ideas and stuff: the never-ending tome that I really would like to finish, a short story project, a collection of poems that needs fattening, some non-fiction titles I need to research and fiction I must read, as well as a monthly blog, and the daily journal and . . . and . . . and . . . and then there’s the eternal problem.

 PROCRASTINATION!  

I, by way of procrastination, read a bit about that subject, so I'm start by focusing this post  on the aforementioned Tome, which has been hanging around for too many years. I have more questions to ask.

What level of priority does this manuscrip have in my life? Am I avoiding the m/s because of its complexity? Am I having problems choosing what work needs to done on the m/s?  Do I need a more sensible, well-structured completion of the plot? More research about historical aspects of the setting? A deep analysis of the structure? A culling of words and scenes? And on and on. 

Alongside, with a loud metallic clang in the mind, comes my worry about managing that overwhelming list of tasks - as well as the fear that I no longer have the skills to do what must be done, or even to create a story worth reading. Is there honestly any urgency about this Tome, this fantasy, Penny? No publisher is interested. 

Do I actually have the energy for self publication? Or even the personality needed for such an idea to succeed? Why am I even spending time on it in the first place?  

For a while, I persist, and a few happy past author experiences creep into my mind. I remember working on projects and events that went well, and where I made genuine progress. Then I start to think of the times when - for many reasons - things didn’t work out or went wrong. Is it honestly worth starting on something that will be failure, that nobody will want or care about? Who have I thought I am, anyway? A writer, no. An imposter, yes. And a moaning groaning one at that. Where’s the joy? The belief?
 

And this is when I, the procrastinator, any procrastinator, sitting at the desk, is in danger. There is, a voice inside me suggests, a feel-good alternative to working on this wretched writing. Surely, there must be something smaller and easier to spend my time on? Some action or activity that will actually be of use to society, that will please people and be better worth the time than – sshhh! - this wretched dragged-out thing that I am half-bored with already?  

In that unsettled moment, the ideas come roaring in: all the distracting, dangerous, doing-good rewarding alternatives. The washing still stuck in the machine. The shopping that needs doing before the rush. This domestic task. That domestic task. A good home-made cake that will be higher up life’s scale, surely, than a boring unwieldy manuscript, Penny?  

Then the small distractions start muttering at me too. The phone on the desk, bringing news, breaking the tension? Those Whatsapps I heard pinging in? The various emails that really do need reading, and maybe responses too? Suddenly I hear the chattering of social commitments that need my attention: arrangements that need doing for others, not simply for my own sake. Now I am feeling anxious, imagining the host of people who need to be contacted, spoken to, visited, and to whom, mostly, my writing work has no relevance or value. Surely this writing lark deserves to be discarded?  

And, at this point, in sneak more hard words and sad feelings. You vain imposter, you feeble creature, you upstart crow, you witless podge of a garden pigeon – and, of course, now you’ve mentioned it, there are all the birds in the garden with feeders to fill before the evening meal so I’d better . . .  on and on

But, golly gosh, with all this wittering about my work and procrastination, I’ve only just remembered a blog that I simply must write, now, today. The wretched task has been hanging about at the back of my mind for ages, and it’s certainly higher priority than any of my own writing ideas . . .
 

Enough, enough. So often the dance in the head goes on like this, mental patterns of procrastination going round and round, like one of those Rolodex rotating files from the offices in old films. But I know there are better days as well and my pattern is not always this. I’m hoping, by recognising these thoughts as they arise, to push back at all the distractions and temptations, to organise my days better, and have a more useful Autumn. 

 See you in October. By which time my project will be well on its way. Won’t it?
Penny Dolan.
 

NB. This personal account of the ‘cycling’ nature of procrastination came about from information in the book ADHD UNPACKED by Alex Conner and James Brown, which I was reading out of more general interest. I did start on a straightforward post about procrastination, based on the analysis in the book, but the version above seemed more truthful and recognisable to me. Conner and Brown are the Founders of the ADHD Adults Podcast.

Young Scribblers -- Heroines who write by Sheena Wilkinson

Recently I read a review of a novel where the reviewer said she didn’t like books about writers because she always assumed they were autobiographical. This piqued my interest, partly because I’m almost at the end of a first draft where the main character is not only a writer, but a middle-aged writer suffering some of the vicissitudes in her career that I’ve been through myself, but mainly because I have always liked reading about writers. 

As a bookish child I didn’t often see myself in books – fictional characters were too busy solving mysteries, galloping their ponies, falling into adventure or playing tricks on Mam’zelle to bother much with sitting quietly with a book, my own favourite pastime. So when I did encounter heroines who liked not only to read but also to write, they had a special resonance for me. And now that I think about it, it makes sense that writers might identify with, and therefore write, characters who also wrote. 

So before this all gets a bit meta, here are some of my favourite young fictional writers.

Elizabeth Farrell, in House-at-the-Corner by Enid Blyton. Lizzie is plain and bespectacled, overshadowed by more obviously attractive siblings. But she has a talent for telling stories, and is delighted when she is published in a local newspaper -- though sorry that they don't print her name. Blyton  explores the sensitive Lizzie's pride as well disappointments and rejections, and of course, when the family fortunes falter, it is Lizzie's piggy bank, full of her writerly earnings, which help to make things right.

Of course one must include Jo March! Like Lizzie, Jo has grand ambitions, but like Lizzie (and also her creator, Louisa May Alcott) she has to content herself with writing what will sell, even if her sensationalist stories are disparaged by her friend and mentor, and eventual lover, Professor Bhaer.  I was never a fan of the gothic or sensationalist myself, much preferring cosier stories (like Little Women) so I don't know that I would have been a fan of Jo's stories, but Jo herself, inky-fingered and apt to lose herself in her stories, was a definite kindred spirit. As for Amy burning her manuscript -- I couldn't have forgiven that! 

And talking of kindred spirits, we must have Anne Shirley! Though a lot of Anne's storytelling happens inside her head, we do see her show promise as a writer. The most memorable scene is when she wins first prize in a short story competition -- much to her shock, since she doesn't remember entering it. But bosom friend Diana, not herself gifted with much imagination, has entered on her behalf, adding the important detail that the heroine's cake was so successful because she used Rollings Reliable Baking Powder -- Anne feels she will disgraced for life, but it's not the last time someone has had to compromise the purity of their artistic vision.

Montgomery's Emily of New Moon is the real writer in her oeuvre. I discovered Emily as an adult but I'd have loved her as a child reader, because she takes her writing so seriously.  

As does Harriet the Spy, in Louise Fitzhugh's book of that name.  On the very first page Harriet is frustrated with her friend Sport because he doesn't have 'get' how to play her imaginary game which involves making up a fictional town. I LOVED Harriet. I identified with her frustration -- I could never get other kids to join in with my made-up games and when they did they DIDN'T DO IT THE WAY I WANTED. I wasn't so sure about walking round the neighbourhood spying on people but I certainly understood her need to have her notebook with her at all times. Even today, on the rare occasions when I decide to have a break from writing, I usually end up buying a new notebook and I think of Harriet, the spy unmasked, her notebook confiscated, buying a new one on the way to school.

And there are others. There is Arthur Ransome's Dorothea, with her stories of the mysterious outlaw; Darrell Rivers, who writes a pantomime in In the Fifth at Malory Towers and is thrilled at its success; Jo Bettany who not only writes a school story but has it successfully published by the end of the term (like Françoise Sagan and S. E. Hinton she is still in her teens), the precursor to a long career as a novelist (as well as having eleven children). 

But perhaps my favourite young writer is one you may not know by name, but she deserves to be better known. Alison, the heroine of Joanna Cannan's I Wrote a Pony Book. Alison is fattish  and bookish and hates games. When her horrid English teacher goads her into her writing a book herself 'since you know so much about it', her friends Harry and Hop try to get in on the action. They are fundamentally unsuited to collaborating and Harry and Hop are argumentative and have the imaginations of cheeses, so it doesn't amount to anything (apart from one of the funniest scenes in children's literature). Undeterred, Alison, believing the edict to 'write what you know' writes a pony book, The Price of a Pony which is eventually published. You might call it fanciful but of course Joanna Cannan was the mother of the Pullein-Thompson sisters, who were also published in their teens, and it's also one of the funniest books I have ever read. 

As a young writer myself I loved meeting these scribbling heroines, and now that I call them to mind, there are more of them than I thought. So I must disagree with that reviewer who doesn't like books about writers. I love them! 

Between the Trees by Claire Fayers

Hello, and I hope you all had a good Bank Holiday weekend. I spent part of it at Between the Trees - a lovely festival in Merthyr Mawr, South Wales. Merthyr comes from the Latin for martyr, by the way, and Mawr means big or great. The area is thought to be named after the Welsh saint Myfor who may be buried there. However, one of the talks I went to was on the invention of tradition, given by the historian Graham Loveluck-Evans and so I am taking everything with a pinch of salt. 

The main stage - bring your own chair!

The festival includes music, craft demonstrations, an eclectic mix of talks, and of course folklore. Because in this setting it's easy to imagine the fairy folk peering at you from behind a tree. I do a regular folklore session and usually get a handful of kids. This year, the audience was mainly adult and it filled the space to overflowing. More proof, if needed, that traditional tales are enduringly popular. 

Welsh Giants, Ghosts and Goblins

In terms of inspiration, I find there is something very special about being among trees. The calming shades of green, the shifting mix of cool shadow and patches of bright sunlight. Add in music wafting in from various directions, friendly chatter, the smells of cooking and it's the perfect atmosphere for creating stories. Unfortunately the festival is over for another year, but, while the dry weather lasts, I'm going to be taking my notebook outdoors to write.

www.clairefayers.com